A Manifesto – Say Good-by to the Rule of Law!

There were a number of political philosophers who influenced the founding of America. Most of them were not around by the time of America’s founding, but they heavily influenced the philosophy upon which we were founded. Our Founding Fathers did not come up with the form of government that is America by chance, but by seriously considering the writers of the past, those philosophers who arose to provide insight into the formation of civil societies. These writers, lived through the tyranny of kings, the failure of totalitarian government to provide for the freedom and success of the people and they reasoned why an alternative form of government was possible. The history of the human race can be easily seen as the rule of the strongest, the right of kings and the succession of rulers for the benefit of the ruling class. Government, by and large, has always been the rule of a man, or occasionally a woman, but an individual in whom was vested all power and all authority. The assumption throughout all of history has been that people cannot govern their own affairs and need an all wise leader to tell them what to do and where to go. It is the identification and challenge of this assumption that makes America different. Well, different, at least until this point in history… Let’s look at some of those philosophers who set the stage for our nation: John Locke – 1632 – 1704

Locke believed that a society should existed because of an agreement or contract that provided a rule of law for its existence. This contract, or constitution would provide a barrier between the people and the leaders so that the personality, whims and personal desires of the leader would not be the motivating and precipitating force in the administration of law and justice. Locke’s had many ideas, but wrote of the need for the separation of powers in government. This led to America’s three branches of government.

David Hume – 1711 – 1776

David Hume wrote about many things and his ideas spanned the philosophical spectrum. Many of his political ideas were similar ideas to Locke. He advocated the separation of church and state and federalism. His view of federalism helped influence the dispersion of power in America across state governments rather than being concentrated in a single, central government. He was cautious about any accumulation of power within a central government.

Voltaire – 1694 – 1778

Voltaire was a man of many interests from poetry to music to political satire. He probably had the greatest influence on our First Amendment. He was critical of any state supported or created church and was high on the individual right of self-expression, freedom of religion and a general sense of tolerance for varying and even contrasting ideas and beliefs. Difference of opinion was high on his list of things that were to be appreciated rather than controlled.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau 1712–1778

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, like Locke, believed in the existence and power of a constitution or social contract as a means of establishing the rule of fair and equitable laws, as opposed to the rule of a person with the power to administer government through their personal whims and flaws. This was the cornerstone of his philosophy. His influence points most directly to the Federalist Papers in America, the documents outlining the importance of property rights in any civil society and to the dispersion of powers so that a central and all powerful government did not intrude into the property rights of the individual.

Immanuel Kant – 1724 – 1804

Immanuel Kant’s contribution to philosophy is in the sanity of morality, ethics and knowledge. He wrote much about politics as well, and stressed the essential importance of the rule of law. He felt that the best form of government was a mixed republic, as opposed to a true democracy, much like what America became. His moral philosophy has influenced the American system of law and many other countries as well.

And we could continue to discuss the influence of philosophers like Bentham, John Stuart Mill, Adam Smith, and others. There was no lack in the available thinkers and material that spoke into the political considerations of the day. The interesting fact is that they were all in contrast to the forms of government that were in existence in the day, and as we have stated, throughout the majority of the history of humanity. It was this conflagration of philosophical resources and the studious nature of our Founding Fathers that gave rise to our form of government. America is unique in that never before in human history did all of these political philosophies come together at one point to serve the need of the revolution. This noble experiment in government reversed the assumption of power that proceeded it. It limited the powers of government and of individual rules and placed primary responsibility and power within the hands of the people. Leaders could only have power as it was delegated upward to them. Power was not inherent with the office or the person. One of the great political philosophers arose after some of those mentioned above and after the founding of America. Frederic Bastiat 1801 – 1850 summarized many of the prior philosophical concepts about law and social justice, in his short book, ‘The Law.’ Bastiat asserted that the sole purpose of government is to protect the right of an individual to life, liberty, and property, and why it is dangerous and morally wrong for government to interfere with an individual’s other personal matters. While the greater consideration of governmental philosophy in the past, had to do with the ‘greater good,’ Bastiat summarized the emphasis of the philosophies behind the American form of government as focused on the individual in relationship with others as opposed to the individual as expendable for the greater good of the whole. And this is the central point of this entire divergence from the previous forms of government. The concept of God in relationship to the individual and His granting the individual certain rights, and of course their corresponding responsibilities, provides a new focus in law and in political philosophy. It recognizes a simple truth, that we are all motivated by self-interest and by that which provides a personal benefit. It acknowledges that all human relationships have at their core a personal benefit. We marry because we fall in love and it feels good. We have children and love them and it benefits us to be good parents and protect them and support their success. We have friends, not born out of altruistic motives, but because we, as human beings are naturally social creatures. We date, mate and relate because of emotional benefits. We share our lives and our resources most easily with those the closest to us. We do not need law or government to tell us how to do these most personal relational agreements. It is natural. We are also motivated to work and to produce and to create. We do so because we enjoy the task and the rewards and the moments when creativity elevates our minds our spirit and our success. Responsibility has great power to drive us forward as individuals to accomplishments. Bastiat recognized that and proposed that this is the central meaning of life and the responsibility of government – to protect the rights and activities of the individual. Law, he proposed, was the means of that protection. There was another historic truth that Bastiat saw. Most of human history can be seen through the matrix of conquest. Tribes seeking advantage and survival all understood the threat to their welfare by enemy tribes. War is not the exception to human history, it is human history. The accumulation of success and the productivity of one group, often drew the attention of the competitive group over the next hill. Success can be found by extracting from the earth that which benefits a person or a family, or it can be extracted from the hands of the dead enemy. So conquest, warfare and confiscation of goods has been around since time began. Bastiat writes that law is the means by which government protects the individual from plunder and it is the enemy of the individual when the law becomes the means of government plundering its own people. It is here that we need to see our current political situation in the light of our founding philosophies. We have moved away from the provision of limited power and small government. We are experiencing the destruction of our philosophical commitment to the rights of the individual to create personal property and to pursue their own responsibilities as they see fit. We have, once again in the course of human history, allowed the source of power to be in the hands of the leaders. The evidence of this is the quest for power by political power brokers, the conscious decision on the part of our Executive Branch of government to not enforce some laws while creating others without approval by the governed, and by endless regulations that make it impossible to walk outside without violating some beaucratical mandate. The law which started out to protect us and limit governmental power, has become the instrument of government to plunder us. Philosophically we have moved almost 180 degrees from our founding, where individual liberty and creativity was sovereign to a place where what is best for other, for foreign situations, and for the leaders, is the rule of the land. The simplicity of God, man, government is being replaced with a central means of redistributing wealth, regulating toilets and the creation of new laws at the whim of the leader. The rule of law is fading as the influence of personalities and of the desires of the leaders supersede those of the individual for whom the law was intended. One of the primary evidences for this conclusion is found in a disconnect between legal principle and government policy, or the lack thereof. In the rule of law, it is not just that the courts should ultimately decide what the law is, while in the practice of government, it is ignored. Government action should be a reflection of our legal foundations and philosophy of government. Those principles of truth are not opinions of old white men from the past who were out of touch with reality. They were truths they placed carefully in our foundations to protect us. From those principles, government is responsible to make administrative policies that will serve to accomplish the objective of protecting the rights of the people. Principle – Law – Policy – Action (administration). The problem we have is that our current administration does not have a policy for anything, and acts based on its own whim to bring its own philosophical ideology into vogue. It is not just a careless point of personal failure, it is a dangerous precedent that cannot be tolerated. To allow it is to consent to the destruction of our foundations and to go back to the historic tyranny of central control and the loss of the protections of law. When asked about his foreign policy, President Obama, early on, said that international issues would be handled on a case by case basis. In other words, he had no clue what his overall policy would be because he did not understand his responsibility, the applicable laws, or the principals necessary to form a policy. It is obvious that this lack of a sense of responsibility owed to the law, its principles and to the people he was to protect was nonexistent. He is not the administrator of the law, he is the law, and that is exactly what we rebelled against in becoming a nation. In the days ahead we will be facing the need for structures to rediscover our roots, our principles and the rightful place of government and the law. There are some serious issues that need to be addressed:

• The role of the executive branch in upholding the constitution and the law of the land.
• What discretion is reasonable and what is outside of the principles we espouse?
• In that power corrupts and seduces humans by its lusts, what term limits should be in play to keep we fallible people from accumulating power that rightfully belongs to all individuals?
• Why is it that our states has ceded traditional powers to the federal government without a whimper?
• How did our government become so large, powerful and imposing? How do we reverse it?
• How did federal bureaus acquire the power to legislate, tax and fine without the approval of the legislature? Should all laws and penalties be approved by the people, at least through their representatives?

And we could go on and on! The point is, we are at a tipping point. We have moved far away from our founding principles and unless we reverse course quickly, this boat will sink in the sea of accumulated power, and the rights of the individual will be swallowed in just another well-meaning reversion to socialist or communist theory.