Perhaps the sentiments contained in the following pages, are not YET sufficiently fashionable to procure them general favour; a long habit of not thinking a thing WRONG, gives it a superficial appearance of being RIGHT, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom. But the tumult soon subsides. Time makes more converts than reason.[1]
So begins the publishing success that was the equivalent of Harry Potter in the 18th Century. This is not a work of fiction. This is not something that deals with magic and fantasy. And yet it persuaded many people to risk everything for a goal that was considered pure fantasy at the time. A bunch of colonies were going to unify and rebel against Great Britain. The opinion of many of the colonists was that such a plan would be nothing but a Great Folly.
What convinced these colonists to risk everything?
Let me be clear on everything. Their lives. Their property. The lives and property of their family members. Torture. Not waterboarding, but the organ failure producing torture of places that are not America. This was not simply going all in in a game of poker. This all in was limited only by the imagination of one's captors. They were going to engage in treason.
You don't really think they were endangering their families by rebelling, do you?
Section. 3. Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.
The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.[2]
Corruption of Blood?
It sounds dramatic. It is.
English Crim. Law. The incapacity to inherit, or pass an inheritance, in consequence of an attainder to which the party has been subject
When this consequence flows from an attainder, the party is stripped of all honors and dignities he possessed, and becomes ignoble.[3]
Of course, all of that presumes that the family is still alive to contest this in court. It also presumes that their property hasn't been given away, or sold. That probably presumed too much for the time.
The best selling book in the colonies in the 18th Century. Common Sense.
Every thing that is right or natural pleads for separation. The blood of the slain, the weeping voice of nature cries, 'TIS TIME TO PART.[1]
Some writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness POSITIVELY by uniting our affections, the latter NEGATIVELY by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first a patron, the last a punisher.
Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one; for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries BY A GOVERNMENT, which we might expect in a country WITHOUT GOVERNMENT, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer. Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are built on the ruins of the bowers of paradise. For were the impulses of conscience clear, uniform, and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest; and this he is induced to do by the same prudence which in every other case advises him out of two evils to choose the least. WHEREFORE, security being the true design and end of government, it unanswerably follows, that whatever FORM thereof appears most likely to ensure it to us, with the least expense and greatest benefit, is preferable to all others.[1]
We have taken this idea of security and expanded it to mean a security blanket. Those who fought to separate from England would be embarrassed at the depths to which we have sunk in our risk paranoia. There is no freedom that
I draw my idea of the form of government from a principle in nature, which no art can overturn, viz. that the more simple any thing is, the less liable it is to be disordered, and the easier repaired when disordered;[1]
Outside of Corruption of Blood and a few other technical terms, the document creating the eventual government of the United States of America is simple and resistant to disorder. Contemporary legislation is in a whole different category.
The Bill of Rights is a bunch of restrictions on the government. These restrictions make it more difficult for the government to lock you up. A side effect is that it is also more difficult for the government to lock up bad people. Pick pockets, embezzlers, thieves, rapists, child rapists, murderers. All of them are protected by the Bill of Rights.
Did the people, who just risked everything, not realize the consequences of what they were doing? Did child rapists not exist back then?
They understood.
They understood that the rights of the citizens are more important than the desire to punish the guilty. When we become more concerned with punishing the guilty, than with protecting the Constitution that protects us, then the tyrants have won.
When something is presented as being for the children, it is because this is an attempt to get around logical debate and appeal to emotion. There are places where the people have little, or no, protection from their government.
China.
North Korea.
Cuba.
China may need to give up some of that control. Why? The benefits of a market that is open to countries with more freedom. The inability to suppress information. The desire, of so many of their citizens, for freedom. Maybe we should have an exchange program with China.
Send us your citizens, who are yearning to be free. We will send you our citizens, who are yearning to avoid risk.
Win and Win.
We are a nation of immigrants that has given up and decided to play it safe. We are trying to trade off our liberty for the illusion of safety. We do not deserve that liberty. We need to bring in people who do - the Chinese, the North Koreans, the Cubans, and others. What do we lose by sending them our people - people who do not understand what they have?
We are having a mid-life crisis. Rather than trying to recapture freedoms, we have given up. We want to crawl back into the womb and hide. What if somebody hurts my feelings with mean words. What if somebody hurts my child? What if somebody hurts me? That is the price of being an adult. That is the price of living in the real world.
There are plenty of people, who will tell us they can protect our feelings.
Liars.
There are plenty of people, who will tell us they can protect our children.
Liars.
There are plenty of people, who will tell us they can protect us from the big bad terrorists.
Liars.
Maybe we should educate our citizens. Most of these citizens are just citizens because of the accident of being in the US when they took their first breath. Maybe we should educate our citizens about what others gave up for their freedoms.
Visit some war memorials. Read of the mistreatment that led people to move here. Read of the mistreatment that led people to fight for freedom. Freedom can just as easily be lost. Too many people sacrificed everything they had for us to barter away freedoms for a little temporary safety.
Freedom isn't easy.
Footnotes:
^ 1 Common Sense
by Thomas Paine, initially published anonymously
Links include the postscript, which is dated 2/14/1776, only just more than a month from the first printing.
Full Text, in several formats, from Gutenberg
Maybe you don't want to read this, but would prefer to listen to someone else reading.
Full Text Audio, in several formats, from Librivox
^ 2 Constitution for the United States of America
Article. III.
Full Text
^ 3 Corruption Of Blood
The 'Lectric Law Library's Lexicon
Definition
.
11 Comments:
Amen.
Herbie,
Thank you.
So is anarchy the answer?:)
I remember reading Thomas Pain's Common Sense as a required reading for my Eagle Scout. My leader, a big American War of Independance history buff and actual author, was entralled with the book. I just did not share all of his enthusiasm about it, but then again, I was just a young teen.
On a serious note, I could only see the dismay not only our founding American fathers but those of the early settlers who sought freedom.
Funny thing, when the constitution was still fresh, criminals met a quicker and harsher justice than they do today. It is more and more we excercise the rights of criminals than we did back then.
From my earliest memory we have called George Washington the father of our country. Over the years I've learned that the true father of our way of life is Thomas Paine. Paine's writings were instrumental in educating the colonists in the benefits of true, individual liberty and the meaning of real independence. The most revered founder of our country is Thomas Jefferson, who learned the meaning of liberty at the knee of Thomas Paine, yet Paine died as a virtual unknown on June 8, 1802.
How easily we discard those who taught us. How easily we discard that which made this a free country.
Truly an excellent post, RM.
Thomas Paine did not die an "unknown". American independance cannot be taught without dicussing Thomas Paine. He at least was dicussed in my grade school and high school years, but maybe today other more polically correct issues take priority in school.
It is my understanding Paine refused to believe in religion and on his death bed still refused to accept the notion.
Shaggy,
So is anarchy the answer?:)
Unfortunately, there are many people who read Paine and come to the conclusion that this advocate anarchy. Not even close. People seem to be afraid of taking responsibility for their actions. They seem to desire to have every possible decision made for them by somebody they can blame when foolproof turns out to be no match for their foolishness.
I remember reading Thomas Pain's Common Sense as a required reading for my Eagle Scout. My leader, a big American War of Independance history buff and actual author, was entralled with the book. I just did not share all of his enthusiasm about it, but then again, I was just a young teen.
An excellent companion piece to this is by Henry David Thoreau.
On the Duty of Civil Disobedience at Gutenberg.org.
On the Duty of Civil Disobedience at Librivox.org.
On a serious note, I could only see the dismay not only our founding American fathers but those of the early settlers who sought freedom.
It is such a radical idea, that it took desperation, on the part of the colonists, for them to go for it.
Funny thing, when the constitution was still fresh, criminals met a quicker and harsher justice than they do today. It is more and more we excercise the rights of criminals than we did back then.
The concern was more about the government abuse of arrest powers to silence dissent. These concerns were well founded. One example is the Alien and Sedition Acts. Not long after the creation of the government, John Adams - the 2nd President and one of the Founding Fathers, pushed these laws that are contrary to the Bill of Rights through Congress.
Just because they understood the potential for abuse of power, did not mean that they would not abuse power, themselves.
Mule Breath,
From my earliest memory we have called George Washington the father of our country. Over the years I've learned that the true father of our way of life is Thomas Paine. Paine's writings were instrumental in educating the colonists in the benefits of true, individual liberty and the meaning of real independence. The most revered founder of our country is Thomas Jefferson, who learned the meaning of liberty at the knee of Thomas Paine, yet Paine died as a virtual unknown on June 8, 1802.
I agree. You also make this pretty clear with your prominent display of Thomas Paine in your sidebar.
How easily we discard those who taught us. How easily we discard that which made this a free country.
That is yesterday's news. It is all about the spin. Apparently Thomas Paine never hired a spin doctor.
Truly an excellent post, RM.
Thank you.
Shaggy,
Thomas Paine did not die an "unknown". American independance cannot be taught without dicussing Thomas Paine. He at least was dicussed in my grade school and high school years, but maybe today other more polically correct issues take priority in school.
Thomas Paine was not politically correct, but for that time he was the man who helped make everything happen. He does not receive as much credit as many others do for much less significant contributions to our independence and liberties.
It is my understanding Paine refused to believe in religion and on his death bed still refused to accept the notion.
You make it seem as if Paine had been threatened with violence in order to get him to believe. Hardly what we would want to think of as an American approach to religious liberty.
One of the things about religious liberty is the protection of citizens from the religion of others. Citizens do not need to be religious to be persecuted by those attempting to use government power to impose their religious views on others.
The First Amendment is pretty clear in its prohibition of any kind of government endorsement of religion.
It is wrong to require any religious belief for any part of citizenship. there is no real difference between requiring religious belief and requiring belief in one particular state sponsored religion. None of us should want the government to tell us what we should believe.
Whether he was religious is as irrelevant in a discussion of politics as is JFK's Catholicism compared to the traditionally Protestant Presidents.
I would hope that skin color would similarly not be a political issue. We know that is not the case.
When we have our first atheist with a real chance at being elected, that will probably be seen as a major political issue. Maybe some day we will get past these petty prejudices. In the mean time, we do have the Bill of Rights to protect minorities from abuse of power by political majorities intent on creating an America that is purely white, or purely religious, or purely members of any other political majority.
Rogue Medic said... When we have our first atheist with a real chance at being elected
I should live so long...
Mule Breath,
Rogue Medic said... When we have our first atheist with a real chance at being elected
I should live so long...
I'll see if I can keep Oscar, the death cat , from visiting you. :-)
Post a Comment