Tag: property

Marxist America

In a country once founded upon Locke’s “Life. Liberty. Property.”, we’ve become a nation shockingly comfortable with policy that is rooted in “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”

Among the dying embers of absolute monarchism arose two new political ideologies, both, in their own ways, a response to the autocracy that had been the dominant form of government since the dawn of human civilization. Philosophically, at least, both rejected the idea of privileged political classes that is the hallmark of absolute monarchism and, more or less, sought to level the moral and political playing field between the “common man” and his government.

It is how each ideology addresses the problem of moral and political station of the “common man” that defines them. The first ideology, Individualism, was born from the western classical Liberal tradition of Adam Smith and John Locke. Individualism took the sovereign rights long denied the “common man” by tyrannical monarchs and granted them to the everyone. Rights to their lives, to freedom of action and expression, as well as to property and acquisition of wealth, once reserved entirely to a tiny political class, was granted to everyone.

The second ideology, Collectivism, was born of societies still largely under the thumb of diffuse but deeply entrenched political and religious controls. Beginning with thinkers like Charles Fourier and culminating with Karl Marx, Collectivism saw the sovereign rights possessed by the tyrannical monarchs as the main moral defect of monarchism. In their utopian theory, sovereignty itself is eliminated. The individual’s value is inherent not in himself but comes from the community of which he is a part. Thus ownership is greed. Freedom is hubris. Life is expendable.

These differences between Individualism and Collectivism have been at the heart of the Culture War (as well as numerous actual wars) around the world since the late 19th Century. In America, a country founded unambiguously upon Individualism, it has been tension between these two ideologies that has driven political debate since Theodore Roosevelt through Franklin Roosevelt and beyond. The Culture War in America is ultimately still the same old philosophical battle.

That war, however, is largely over, and Collectivism, not Individualism, has won.

“…Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.”
-Thomas Jefferson-

That Collectivism has won the Culture War will shock many who believe themselves “right of center“, but the fact of the matter should be obvious. Many of these “right of center” people support government regulating every employment contract, no matter how minor, throughout the United States. They believe government has a role in protecting domestic industries from a global market place. Worst of all, they defend the morally reprehensible systematic confiscation of private property from every worker.

In a country once founded upon Locke’s “Life. Liberty. Property.“, we’ve become a nation shockingly comfortable with policy that is rooted in “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.” These people can’t comprehend of a nation without the government injecting itself into the commercial and private contracts of the people, because, wait for it, “what about the needs of society“? On a fundamental but unconscious level, their only question is how much of our “unalienable rights” is really alienable.

Do we, as a nation, believe that two parties have an unalienable right to decide for themselves what a fair and proper contract is without the involvement of “collective society“? Clearly not. Do we, as a nation, believe that it is morally wrong to impose upon our countrymen the cost government that outstrips its revenues every year enough to stop imposing upon our countrymen? Unequivocally not. Do we, as a nation, “prefer dangerous freedom over peaceful slavery” enough to forgo intrusive government regulation and taxation to support agencies that are bankrupting us? Demonstrably, this is no longer the case.

“There are two distinct classes of men –
those who pay taxes and those who
receive and live upon taxes.”
-Thomas Paine-

So Collectivism has won, and positions espoused by voices such as this one you are reading now are accused of being “fringe” and “extremist“, even as we quote directly from the writings of Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, George Washington, Thomas Paine, John Locke, Benjamin Franklin, and all of the other Founding Fathers. Is it that vocal voices of Individualism really are “fringe” or is it that Collectivism has crept, inch by inch into the national psyche and finally burrowed deep enough to become the accepted norm in America?

Call me an anarchist, because I believe taxation is theft? Call me an extremist, because I believe the government is always an enemy of the people? Call me a radical, because I believe that I am endowed by my Creator with unalienable rights and demand that my “countrymen” stop alienating them? Call me unrealistic because I retain the Spirit of Resistance necessary to fight for the Individualism of America’s founding? So be it. I’m in good company.

“Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil;
in its worst state, an intolerable one.”
-Thomas Paine-

Liberty is For The Win!

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Merry Christmas 2016

On this day, our King was born, not to punish us for our rebellion, not to enslave us to a divine tyranny, but to set us free.

The universe was created with a Word, and it was good. Through patient divine crafting, the fullness of Creation lead to the dawn of Man and Woman, and this, too, was good. When left to their own devices, however, Man and Woman turned away from their Creator and, in doing so, broke the first Covenant with the Creator of the Universe. This act of rebellion initiated the rift between what is and what was meant to be. A rift that has grown day by day and hour by hour.

Today we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, sent by God to redeem the world of sin and to heal this great rift between Creation and the Creator. Born to a humble laborer and his young wife, Jesus would become known as a teacher, as a man of infinite wisdom, and as God incarnate. He came to correct Creation, to make right that which was wrong. Above all, the divine child came to die, to pay the full price for the sins of every Man and every Woman.

Today we celebrate the Alpha moment in the life of Jesus, the moment that the Universe groaned wretchedly toward for untold thousands of years. Pushing and pulling, rising and falling, since the moment of rebellion, the Universe, stained by the bloody hand of Man and Woman alike, shuddered with the labor pains of redemption. Jesus Lord was born, and, on this day, the Covenant with every Man and every Woman could be renewed.

“Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord.”
-Luke 2:11-

As a calm falls over the political landscape of 2016 in America, this Christmas will be one that many will wish to pour themselves into to escape the pains of this year. With luck, others will graciously focus on the season as well. This is all to the good. Take this day in peace and remember the great hope that it represents, to all of humanity and the very Universe that is our home.

On this day, our King was born, not to punish us for our rebellion, not to enslave us to a divine tyranny, but to set us free. God put Himself, not us, upon a cross, accepting our brutish punishment for our own sins. You are meant to be free people, children of God!

Be brave! Be free!

Merry Christmas.

Liberty is For The Win!

We just checked, and it turns out that fighting for Liberty isn’t free, because it requires time and energy to research, prepare, and propagate this message for you. Please drop just a dollar a month into the proverbial tip jar and become a Patriot Patron. Of course, don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share. Keep this fight for Liberty going! – @LibertyIsFTW

A Short Word: Have a True Independence Day

Each and every individual must decide whether they are a free person, “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights”, or if they are a subject of the government of the United States.

The Independence Day 2016 Weekend has arrived, and what a weekend most Americans undoubtedly have planned. Many have been working on these plans for weeks now. Saving up for beverages, piles of meat, all important buns, and don’t forget the ketchup and mustard. The grill is cleaned, the freezer is full, and everything is set to make this a great time for all. This is as good a way as any to spend the holiday weekend, soaking in the superficial patriotism of the weekend with family and friends.

There is just one more ingredient needed to make it a celebration of actual patriotism, not just the photo patriotism that even American leftists can enjoy. All one must do in order to elevate the event to the next level is one more thing: do what Americans did on that first Independence Day and read the Declaration of Independence aloud at your gathering. Read it with reverence, with boldness, and with the spirit of Liberty.

Don’t just read the preamble, that’s patriotism for kids. Read the entire thing, right up to “we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor“. Then consider how stands the country that the Founders gave us? Do any of those transgressions against Life, Liberty, and Property  committed by King George III against the colonies sound familiar at all? Do we still have half the courage and spirit of independence that the Founding Fathers possessed?

Let’s not waste time talking about political candidates or even political parties. The Spirit of Liberty is the responsibility of each and every individual citizen. Each and every individual must decide whether they are a free person, “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights“, or if they are a subject of the government of the United States. That is the difference between photo patriotism and actual patriotism. Only men and women of true patriotism will fight to be free.

Only true patriots understand what is meant by “Be Brave. Be Free.”

Liberty is For The Win!

We just checked, and it turns out that fighting for Liberty isn’t free, because it requires time and energy to research, prepare, and propagate this message for you. Please drop just a dollar a month into the proverbial tip jar and become a Patriot Patron. Of course, don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share. Keep this fight for Liberty going! – @LibertyIsFTW

 

April 15th: A Day of Infamy

From the ratification of the Constitution in 1788 until the middle of the Civil War in 1861, the federal government did not take a penny from the People.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,
that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
-That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men,
deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,-
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these
ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute
new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and
organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem
most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
-Declaration of Independence-

It is that day again. That day when the government asserts its onerous authority over the citizens of these the United States. The day that demonstrates the unwillingness of the States to protect their citizens from the grasping hand of the federal government. The citizens themselves most often complicit in this base violation of their own Right of Property. This day where millions of Americans are forced to perform a task for the United States government, unpaid, on pain of criminal prosecution to their own detriment.

If we truly believe in the Declaration of Independence, that all free people are endowed by their Creator with unalienable Rights, among these Life, Liberty, and Property (or “pursuit of Happiness”), then it is unconscionable that we remain complicit in the tyrannical imposition of government upon our very livelihoods. If the bureaucrats cannot find better way to pay for their continued employment within the agency of the State without violating the sacred Right to Property of the People, then their employment is no longer justified and likely unnecessary.

How many more generations shall we pass on this injustice to, silently, without protest or disruption? How much longer shall we accept the imposition of the State on the very livelihood of our children and our children’s children? Unless the Founding Fathers were gravely mistaken, and the Right to Property is not unalienable, then our complacency under a grand tyrannical enterprise upon the People must end.

“Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends,
than that good men should look on and do nothing.”
-John Stuart Mill-

Do the federal and State governments have the right to tax at all? Of course, they do, without such power to tax at all, government couldn’t function. Doesn’t the Constitution empower the federal government to lay taxes upon the personal incomes of the People? Certainly, it does, though this was not always the case. It also once allowed for slavery and prohibition against alcohol. This is the fine distinction that the People must remember and understand. The legality of an unconscionable evil does not mitigate the evil itself. As conservatives, we are supposed to take heed of not just the Constitution but specifically the Natural Law upon which the Constitution depends.

From the ratification of the Constitution in 1788 until the middle of the Civil War in 1861, the federal government did not take a penny from the People. Taxes were assessed on the business incomes of companies and as excise taxes upon the exchange of goods and services. From 1861 to 1866, five short years, a tax of 3% on incomes, and 5% on incomes of the very wealthy, was imposed upon the People in order to pay to save the Union. This tax, with one revision in 1862, expired in 1866. As there were vacancies on the Supreme Court and the country was locked in a Civil War, this tax was not challenged before it expired.

There was not another attempt at an income tax for almost twenty years, when finally, in 1894, the progressive Congress passed the Wilson-Gorman Tariff of 1894, which, among other things, imposed a 2% tax on the top 10% of households. This 2% tax, minuscule by today’s standards, was struck down as unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1895, in the case of Pollock v. Farmers’ Loan & Trust Co. It was struck down as unconstitutional, because the Constitution was framed to protect the People from exactly such tyrannical usurpation of their Right to Property.

Consider one more simple fact. In 2014, the IRS took $1,311,482,260,000 (net) from the People of the United States, yet the federal government still managed a deficit of $483.35 billion that same year. At $50,000 a year, those tax revenue dollars could have created a total of 26,229,645 good middle class jobs in the economy. Instead, those jobs were liquidated, sent to Washington, DC, to be wasted on graft and corruption. Every dollar that is taken out of the economy via taxation is one less dollar available to drive demand and becomes one more dollar to drive the power of the State.

Conservatives, patriots, and countrymen! Please understand that the Founding Fathers never intended us to be tax servants. To them, the term “tax-payer” would have been a high insult, demeaning the individual into a tool of the State, undermining the great sacrifice the American People had made liberating themselves from the English crown. They understood that while the State could make a claim to our sacred livelihoods that we were not free!

Be Brave! Be Free!

Liberty is For The Win!

We just checked, and it turns out that fighting for Liberty isn’t free, because it requires time and energy to research, prepare, and propagate this message for you. Please drop just a dollar a month into the proverbial tip jar and become a Patriot Patron. Of course, don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share. Keep this fight for Liberty going! – @LibertyIsFTW

 

The Great Deception

Conservatism is conserving the principles of Natural Rights and Rule of Law (the basis of Natural Law), for the purposes of economic liberty, civil society, and self governance, via limited state power, as described in the Declaration of Independence and codified by the Constitution of the United States and its Amendments.

Some time ago, a Donald Trump supporter asked, “What makes Trump not a conservative?” The question itself demonstrates just how meaningless the term “conservative” is to too many of Trump’s supporters. If this individual understood what Conservatism meant, the answer would have been obvious. The problem is people supporting Donald Trump are doing to “conservatism” what the progressive left has done to the terms “marriage“, “gender“, and recently even “ethnicity“.

Trump’s supporters have twisted “conservatism” into meaning anything they want or need it to mean. So long as it seems to oppose the Democratic Party, political correctness, multiculturalism, etc. They freely paint the word “conservative” around their own superstitions, prejudices, and motivations, ignoring the well established practical definitions of what the ideology actually stands for. They willfully ignore what prominent proponents of conservatism, such as William F. Buckley, Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, and even Rush Limbaugh, have said about “conservatism” for 60 years now.

Conservatism is NOT an ideological contraposition of leftism, collectivism, or anything else. It is distinct from nationalism, populism, corporatism, libertarianism, anarcho-capitalism, and many other similar ideologies. Simply put, this is “conservatism“:

Conservatism is conserving the principles of Natural Rights and Rule of Law (from Natural Law), for the purposes of economic liberty, civil society, and self governance, via limited state power, as described in the Declaration of Independence and codified by the Constitution of the United States and its Amendments.

Anything else, anything less, anything more, and it isn’t “conservatism“. Though anyone is free to disagree, they will necessarily need to disregard the Declaration of Independence and abuse the letter and intent of the Constitution.

“The moment the idea is admitted into society, that property is not as
sacred as the law of God, and that there is not a force of law and
public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.”
-John Adams-

Now to the original question, is Donald Trump a conservative? Let’s look at his record.

The principle of Natural Law imposes a framework of equality in which individuals may interact with each other. Our United States Constitution imposes a framework of limited, and enumerated powers in which the government may interact with its citizens. Together, these principles of equality and rationed state power are the bedrock of our society. Conservatives understand the philosophical and legal reasons for these frameworks, why they are necessary, and endeavor to defend them.

Trump has demonstrably and habitually violated these bedrock principles all through his business career.

It violates Natural Law and the original intent of the United States Constitution to attempt to deprive another individual of his or her Right to Property. As the right to property is sacred, a conservative would never resort to the power of the state to try to drive elderly widows from their homes and definitely not under the pretense of “public use“. Public parks, public roads, and public hospitals have an obvious “public use“. That’s why they are called “public“. A private parking lot, a private golf course, or a private office building obviously have no “public use“. That’s why they are called “private“. Claiming that a “private property” has a “public use” is utterly contrary to both Natural Law and the Constitution.

Trump has repeatedly attempted to violate the property rights of private citizens, including Vera Coking (Atlantic City, NJ, 1998) and Michael Forbes, et al (Belmenie, Scotland, 2009).

Moral and legal equality is at the heart of our civil society, so all men and women are moral equals to each other. This principle of civil equality is the basis for our society, our justice system, and our principles of civility. Donald Trump has a long history of hurling insults and abuse at private citizens. His insults and belittling of women, professionally and privately, are a matter of fact. Trump has supported violence at his political rallies, even going so far as to promise to cover the legal fees of any supporter that physically assaults someone protesting against Trump. During a presidential debate, he even suggested that he doesn’t have to listen to criticism, because, of all reasons, he is rich.

Trump openly rejects the principle of moral and legal equality, treating individuals who are not as wealthy as him as second class citizens, while disregarding the most basic principles of civility.

By appealing to state power, in Atlantic City, New Jersey and again in Belmenie, Scotland, Donald Trump demonstrated that he believes that the state’s authority supersedes the rights of the individual, and he believes the state should intervene in private property disputes. He has also demonstrated that he believes his wealth and political influence grant him special privilege. This philosophy has a name, and it is called authoritarianism. Trump appealed to the principle of collective benefit as a justification of his abuse of the property rights of the hundreds of families he has bullied over the years. This philosophy also has a name, and it is called collectivism. Together authoritarianism and collectivism are the two faces of the same coin: socialism.

Trump promotes socialist policies, including federalized health care programs and government subsidization of industries, in direct violation of the principles of freedom of contract and freedom of commerce.

So is Trump a conservative? Not even vaguely. It’s not even a legitimate question; it’s so ridiculous. The question, however, begs a much larger and much more troubling question. How have we come to such a state that even self described “conservatives” would defend the very violations of private property rights that caused the Founders to rebel?

“If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense.
Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn’t.
And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn’t be.
And what it wouldn’t be, it would.
You see?”
-Alice in Wonderland-

For the greater part of the last century, the progressive left, with the aid of the predominantly center left Establishment, has been subtly redefining what it means to be American in media and education. Instead of celebrating a culture of patriotism and liberty, the media openly mocks American exceptionalism and delights in injecting collectivist propaganda in the news, movies, and television. Instead of institutions of academic and cultural excellence, our schools fester with “politically correct” thought and speech, demonizing America’s foreign interests as interventionism and imperialism, turning millions of gullible children against their own people.

The difference between objectively good and objectively evil have been abandoned in favor of moral relativism, leaving the country to spiral into a collective madness that rots away our American identity. From Locke and Rousseau, to Jefferson and Madison, to Goldwater, Buckley, and even Reagan, the American people have been cut off from their philosophical heritage by a concerted effort of the left, as they have redefined man and woman, up and down, and right and wrong into categories of exquisite meaninglessness.

Unfortunately, this deconstruction of Americanism has been so complete and so thorough, now that many self described “conservatives” are rising up against this Establishment and its openly collectivist-socialist policies, they are turning their torches to anything any everything. Removed from what “conservatism” even means, they have become worse than the barbarians they claim to be fighting against.

A “conservative” does not betray or destroy those precious ideals at the very foundation of our culture, because a “conservative” preserves life, liberty, property, and rule of law. As conservatives, we must stand together against the madness of leftism on the left and ignorance on the right. We must focus on what we stand for, not against. Stand for Jeffersonian liberalism, light the fire of liberty in your chest and retake the hearts and minds of the American People!

Long live the Republic! Be Brave! Be Free!

Liberty is For The Win!

We just checked, and it turns out that fighting for Liberty isn’t free, because it requires time and energy to research, prepare, and propagate this message for you. Please drop just a dollar a month into the proverbial tip jar and become a Patriot Patron. Of course, don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share. Keep this fight for Liberty going! – @LibertyIsFTW

Liberty 101: Rule of Law

Societies have organized themselves into rigid caste systems, where a select few possessed all power and all rights, and the populace possessed little power and few, if any, rights.

Our cultural identity as Americans is based firmly upon the Natural Rights of John Locke: the Right to Life, the Right to Liberty, and the Right to Property. Because every individual is entitled to these same rights, each individual has imposed upon them a moral duty to respect the rights of all other individuals, thus no individual has any right or entitlement to impose upon another individual’s rights without his or her consent. What do we do, however, when someone does infringe on another’s Natural Rights?

The fact is that there are those who will act maliciously against others and that accidents will happen. For the bandit who will seek to do harm for his own benefit, or for the dog that breaks loose of its kennel and digs up a neighbor’s garden, there must be some system of just recourse. Since every individual is entitled to the same justice as his neighbor, for his moral actions and wrongs, Natural Rights necessitate the Rule of Law.

Rather than trying to rehash the nature and reason of Rule of Law and its philosophical role in the government of free people, Let’s refer to one of our founding documents, the Declaration of Independence:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Government, in the American sense, draws its political authority from the “consent of the governed“, and is necessarily based upon the principles of life, liberty, and property. It is the consistent abuse of these rights that were the justification of the Revolutionary War. And it was the defense of these rights that were the foundation of the Constitution a decade later.

“When kings the sword of justice first lay down,
They are no kings, though they possess the crown.
Titles are shadows, crowns are empty things,
The good of subjects is the end of kings.”
-Daniel Defoe-

Imagine for a moment, playing a game with friends or with your children, where the board, the dice, and pieces all seem familiar enough, however every move and outcome is dictated by a single player. For a time, the game plays much like you would expect it, and your progress is allowed so long as it is inoffensive to the ruling player. Inevitably, your progress becomes inconvenient to the game’s arbiter, so the rules change. Every turn becomes progressively more and more difficult for you. Should you challenge the arbiter’s authority, any progress you made is nullified, and you are disqualified.

For the majority of human history, this has been the norm of civilization. Societies have organized themselves into rigid caste systems, where a select few possessed all power and all rights, and the populace possessed little power and few, if any, rights. From the dark ages of antiquity, the stark differences between religious, political, crafting, and slave castes distributed the power of arbitration upon the few, though this justice was arbitrary at best, and capricious at its worst. It was against this inequity that Socrates railed, and it was by this inequity Socrates was sentenced to death.

For thousands of years, in many different forms, this authority of the few, through divine assent, was the face of justice. While punishing bandits and thieves, this caste justice also punished political dissent through murder and brute repression. The transgressions of King George III enumerated by Jefferson had been practiced by the British Crown for centuries. The seizing of property and abolishing of legitimate self rule were part and parcel of the ruling privilege.

The Revolution, fueled by the Enlightenment values, was an attempt to end this tyranny of the few. First, it hurled the myth of a divine “right to rule” by a blooded aristocratic elite into the dustbin of history. Second, it established the equality of free people, or, at the very least, provided the fertile soil from which the seedling virtues of the Declaration of Independence would sprout into a nation of free men and women.

“The judge who always likes the results he reaches is a bad judge.”
-Antonin Scalia-

At the time of the founding, our nation was unique in the world, but the struggle against the encroachment of a dynastic ruling caste remains. This was the primary concern of James Madison when he wrote the first draft of what would become the US Constitution. The very concept of a career politician was not only antithetical to our national character, it is completely hostile to it, and yet it has sadly become a norm of our society. As has always been the case for thousands of years, where a political caste appears, it always requires the advancement of the rights of these arbiters and infringes the rights of the ruled.

How much different is our present political culture to the hypothetical game discussed earlier? A willfully contemptuous administration prosecutes patriotic dissenters as “terrorists“, while issuing executive orders in clear contravention of the Constitutional limits of his office. A populist corporatist candidate insults and slanders his way into political authority, after years of abusing his political connections to torment private citizens who stand against him. Where is the Rule of Law when political dissent is treated with the same contempt as criminal behavior?

The Constitution is the once crisp set of rules that came with our country. It’s been scribbled upon, stained, stepped upon, and frequently lost, but it will always remain the rules by which our country was intended to function. No one is above it. No one is beneath it. If those in power do not wish to abide by the rules of the game, then it’s well past time to remind them that they are just people, like the rest of us, entitled to exactly the same rights and beholden to the same duties as we are. If they think that their positions of authority grant them leave of their duty to protect our Natural Rights, then they have willfully transgressed against us, and, just like any other criminal, forfeited their Natural Rights.

If the people who have entrenched themselves as a ruling caste have, as they seem to have, become convinced that they are no longer answerable to the rules of our nation, and that the authority of rulership can be passed among them like a prize granted to Governors or Congressmen or Corporate King Makers as a matter of privilege, rather than public service, then it is time for the American People to resort to the only two rules that matter: the Second Amendment and the Declaration of Independence. If this “ruling class” will not listen to the People of their own accord, then it is up to the American People to make them listen.

“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.“
-Thomas Jefferson, The Declaration of Independence-

The People have a duty to force their government to remain subservient to them, not to be subservient to their government. Laws are instituted to ensure justice, not to infringe upon the rights of the people. A people who, for generations, prove that they are unwilling to protect their Natural Rights against tyranny deserve tyranny.

“[T]he tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time
with the blood of patriots & tyrants.
 it is it’s natural manure.“
-Thomas Jefferson-

A free people must always demonstrate that they will insist, through force of arms if necessary, to be free, because as there are thieves who seek to deprive others of their property, and murderers who seek to deprive others of their lives, there are always despots who seek to deprive others of their liberty and are enemies of free people everywhere.

Liberty is For The Win!

We just checked, and it turns out that fighting for Liberty isn’t free, because it requires time and energy to research, prepare, and propagate this message for you. Please drop just a dollar a month into the proverbial tip jar and become a Patriot Patron. Of course, don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share. Keep this fight for Liberty going! – @LibertyIsFTW

Liberty 101: Property

So far, these abuses of “eminent domain” have benefited no one except trial lawyers who specialize in evicting widows from their homes.

We’ve reached the last and most abused of the Natural Rights. Just like the Right to Liberty, the Right to Property exists as an extension of the Right to Life, an individual’s right to his life, health, and livelihood. To secure these things, the individual is granted a right to own land on which he may build a home to shelter him or develop for productive purposes (ex: a business or farm). Per Jeffersonian liberalism, this Right to Property extends to the individual’s Right to Pursuit of Happiness, so the individual may also own transportation and valuables consistent with his needs and wants, as long as he acquires these things through honest labor without violating the Right to Property of others.

The Right to Property seems straight forward and goes hand-in-hand with the freedom of contract from the Right to Liberty. The freedom of market and enterprise frees the individual to make the most of his livelihood, allowing him to maximize his well being to the full extent of his potential. Despite the explicit protections afforded by the Second Amendment (ownership of arms), Third Amendment (security of domicile against government encroachment), Fourth Amendment (privacy and protection from seizure of property), and Fifth Amendment (security of private property without due process of law or for eminent public use), this fundamental Natural Right continues to come under regular attack by powerful political and corporate entities.

“The true foundation of republican government is the equal right of every
citizen in his person and property and in their management.”
-Thomas Jefferson-

In 2005, working through an ostensibly non-profit real estate developer with significant ties to government, the New London Development Corporation (NLDC), politicians from the governor’s office of Connecticut on down to the mayor of New London decided to redevelop the Fort Trumbull area of New London, CT. They envisioned a bustling office building complex with modern residential housing that they believed would attract a major pharmaceutical manufacturer. The only snag was that people had been living in Fort Trumbull for decades, so their plan required that dozens of existing homes be demolished.

Pleading “eminent domain“, the governmental and corporate entities argued the proposed project would expand the city’s tax base and create jobs, which represented a “public use“, even though the property was going to be turned immediately over to a private corporation. Susette Kelo and many of her neighbors, among them a blind 80 year old widow, refused to sell their homes, and forced the NLDC to take them to court.

The court battle went all the way to the Supreme Court where, in a shocking defeat of Natural Rights, the court decided 5 to 4 in favor of the City of New London, evicting the residents from their homes and allowing the city to destroy (and in rare cases relocate) the homes of the hold outs. How did things turn out for New London? The pharmaceutical manufacturer chose to locate their headquarters elsewhere. Almost all of the affected families left New London, CT. And the development lots sit barren of any commercial or residential buildings, so the government cabal drove people out of their homes for nothing.

“Everybody coming into Atlantic City sees this terrible house instead of staring
 at beautiful fountains and beautiful other things that would be good.”
– Donald Trump –

Just 9 years earlier, in 1996, real estate mogul and GOP presidential candidate, Donald  J. Trump gained international infamy as he tried, in collusion with the Casino Reinvestment Development Authority (CRDA) of Atlantic City, NJ, to force an elderly widow out of her home so he could build limousine parking for his casino and hotel. Through months of abuse, harassment, and court proceedings, Vera Coking, then in her 70’s, fought Trump’s and the CRDA’s attempts to force her out of the home she raised her children in.

In 1998, the courts found that the intention of the CRDA (a governmental agency) to take Coking’s house through the power of “eminent domain” and immediately turn it over to a private owner (Trump) did not meet the Fifth Amendment definitions of “public use“. The elderly widow’s home and her Right to Property was saved. Had the case been brought just a few years later (after Kelo), it is certain that the CRDA and Trump would have easily condemned Vera’s home and forced her to leave the home that she had lived in for half a century.

Worse, after bitterly fighting an elderly widow for years in the courts, Trump sold his stake in Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City, NJ, and the casino and hotel officially shut its doors in September 16, 2014, as the entire casino industry in New Jersey struggles in the post Recession economy. So far, these abuses of “eminent domain” have benefited no one except trial lawyers who specialize in evicting widows from their homes.

In 2009, 3,362 miles away from Atlantic City, NJ, in a quiet, rural area in the northeast corner of Scotland, a few miles outside of Aberdeenshire, Donald J. Trump again attacked the Right to Property of several families who lived for decades in the little town of Menie, Scotland. Instead of a casino, Trump had decided to build a luxury hotel and “World’s Greatest Golf Course” resort (presently rated 2.1 out of 5 stars).

While the homes and properties of these families weren’t included in the original land purchased for his golf course, Trump believed that they detracted from the physical beauty of his golf resort. In 2009, he attempted to strong arm the Aberdeenshire Council to use its power of “compulsory purchase” (British equivalent to eminent domain) to force the home owners off of their property, and to give the land to Trump International Golf Links Scotland (TIGLS) so he could bulldoze their homes.

In the course of the very public political fight, Mr. Trump resorted to harassing the residents with barrages of law suits, police and security harassment and verbal abuse, going so far as to accuse Michael Forbes, a farmer, part time fisherman and quarry worker who lived on the property with his widowed mother, of “living like a pig” among other personal attacks on Scottish national television. As of the publishing of this article, the home owners have retained ownership of their properties, however Mr. Trump has made every effort to hide their homes from view of the golf course behind artificial dirt mounds dozens of feet high.

For more information on this, watch this documentary: Fighting Trump (2011).

“By nature’s law, every man has a right to seize and retake by force
his own property taken from him by another by force or fraud.”
-Thomas Jefferson-

Until now, we’ve only talked about transgressions by private or semi-private entities, colluding with political power to usurp the Right to Property of private individuals. While these infringements have disrupted the liberties and livelihoods of the citizens of Atlantic City, NJ, New London, CT and Menie, Scotland, there remains a far worse transgressor of Right to Property, one that has put otherwise honest and law abiding men and women into prison and claimed the life of at least one good and honest man.

To put things into perspective, the largest private land owner in the United States is John Malone, at a staggering 2.2 million acres. The entire city of Washington, D.C. is only 43,710 acres, so John Malone owns enough land to fit the capital of the United States into it over 50 times, which would result in a city of roughly 33 million people. This hypothetical city would be the largest in the world, by population, surpassing even Shanghai at over 24 million people.

At present, the United States government owns more than 608.9 million acres of land (excluding military bases and the capital). That is a plot of land 13,930 times the size of Washington, D.C., resulting in a city of over 9.2 billion people. This hypothetical city’s population is greater than the entire population of the planet. So what is the US government doing with this land?

  • The National Parks System controls 79.6 million acres.
  • The Fish and Wildlife Service controls another 89.1 million acres.
  • The Forest Service controls 192.9 million acres.
  • The Bureau of Land Management controls 247.3 million acres.

What is the federal government doing with this land? Nothing. Not military bases. Not airports. Not “forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings”, as is clearly spelled out in the Constitution of the United States, Art I, Sect. 8, Clause 17. The land that the United States government owns is just empty terrain, shrub land, desert, forests, and wilderness, each outside of the constitutional purview of the federal government. The United States government is simply holding much of this land, to the detriment of the States and the People.

When Cliven Bundy, a rancher in Nevada, let his cattle graze on US Government claimed shrub land, federal law enforcement officers seized his cows, without due process, and even resorted to shooting livestock found on federal “property”. This lead to a stand off between patriot militias and federal agents, which threatened to lead to violence for weeks. A newly appointed director of the Bureau of Land Management, Neil Kornze, reversed course, and pulled federal agents out of Nevada, allowing Bundy to continue to use the land for grazing his cattle.

In January of 2016, another dispute between the Bureau of Land Management and ranchers lead to patriot militia men to occupy a vacant federal building in Oregon in a peaceful protest. This time protesting against failure of the federal government to maintain the forests against wildfires and the unlawful seizing of property from families that had land titles to thousands of acres of land for generations, tracing back to the earliest days of land purchases, predating even the establishment of territories in some cases.

The federal enforcement did not back down this time, leading to another armed stand off that lead to death of Robert “LaVoy” Finicum, a rancher who had a long running land dispute over land that the BLM claiming thousands of acres that Mr. Finicum’s family had held the deeds to for decades. He was gunned down by federal and state law enforcement officers who refused to allow him to speak to a County Sheriff who was sympathetic to his concerns. What every man and woman who loves liberty must ask themselves is: Is land that is being unused for any Constitutional purpose worth the life of a human being?

As important as it is that the American public pay attention to very real and serious political debates surrounding freedom of speech, of religion, and to keep and bear arms, the lack of attention to the very serious loss of the Right to Property has lead us to this very precarious point in America’s history. Any government that believes itself able to freely ignore any of the Natural Rights of the individual ultimately believes it may ignore all of them.

At least one man has given his life for the Right to Property. How many more must give their lives before Americans have had enough?

Next Article: Rule of Law.

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