All Posts Tagged With: "Bill of Rights"

Constitutional Intentions

A question frequently arises in disputes about how to interpret the U.S. Constitution: What was the intention of those who framed the document? This question contains an invalid assumption. It assumes that those who drafted the Constitution at the 1787 convention and those involved in the subsequent debates were of one mind and intent. In [...]

1Jun2000 | | 3 comments | Continued

Government as Slave Owner

James Bovard is the author of Freedom in Chains: The Rise of the State & the Demise of the Citizen (St. Martin’s Press, 1999). The Declaration of Independence proclaimed that “all men . . . are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights.” This assertion captured the idealism and the principles of this nation’s [...]

1Feb2000 | | 1 comment | Continued

How War Amplified Federal Power in the Twentieth Century

After surveying the Western world in the past six centuries, Bruce Porter concluded: “a government at war is a juggernaut of centralization determined to crush any internal opposition that impedes the mobilization of militarily vital resources. This centralizing tendency of war has made the rise of the state throughout much of history a disaster for [...]

1Jul1999 | | 1 comment | Continued

The Second Amendment in the Light of American Republicanism

The “transforming” ideology of America’s revolutionary period saw the chief conflict in society as one between liberty and power. That ideology synthesized themes from several sources.[1] Given the differing origins and jumping-off points of classical liberalism and classical republicanism (the two most important elements), the American “synthesis” might be expected to undergo some unraveling when up against the harder problems of political life.

1Jun1999 | | 4 comments | Continued

The Human Rights Deception

Richard Stevens, a lawyer in Washington, D.C., specializes in legal research and writing. On December 10, 1998, world and national leaders commemorate the birthday of an impostor. The United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights turns 50 years old on that date. Because Americans know so little about their own Constitution and Bill of Rights, [...]

1Dec1998 | | 7 comments | Continued

The Essence of Americanism

Leonard E. Read established FEE in 1946 and served as its president until his death in 1983. “The Essence of Americanism,” first delivered as a speech in 1961, was Mr. Read’s traditional opening address at dozens of FEE seminars. Someone once said: It isn’t that Christianity has been tried and found wanting; it has been [...]

1Sep1998 | | 4 comments | Continued

The Heritage We Owe Our Children

Leonard E. Read established FEE in 1946 and served as its president until his death in 1983. This article, reprinted ftom the September 1976 Notes from FEE, is the seventh in a monthly series commemorating the 100th anniversary of Mr. Read’s birth. “But he who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and [...]

1Jul1998 | | 0 comments | Continued

Reading the Second Amendment

“A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” —Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution Is this sentence so hard to understand? Apparently so. Even some of its defenders don’t like how it is worded because it [...]

1Feb1998 | | 0 comments | Continued

How Much Do You Know About Liberty? (a quiz)

Try your hand at answering the following questions: 1. What method of resolving disputes did trial by jury replace? 2. Which great American patriot was called the “Prince of Smugglers”? 3. What bulwark of American liberty do we owe to the Antifederalists? 4. How many slaves were liberated by Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation? 5. After the [...]

1Jun1996 | | 0 comments | Continued

James Madison-Checks and Balances to Limit Government Power

James Madison didn’t originate the idea of checks and balances for limiting government power, but he helped push it farther than anyone else before or since. Previous political thinkers, citing British experience, had talked about checks and balances with a monarch in the mix, but Madison helped apply the principle to a republic. Contrary to such respected thinkers as Baron de Montesquieu, Madison insisted checks and balances could help protect liberty in a large republic.

1Mar1996 | | 5 comments | Continued

Is There a Right to Work?

Copyright 1995 by Gary North. Dr. North is president of The Institute for Christian Economics in Tyler, Texas. Back in the 1950s and 1960s, one of the most popular phrases among conservative Americans was “the right to work.” It was a code phrase for “anti-labor union laws.” This was recognized by both friends and foes [...]

1Sep1995 | | 1 comment | Continued

Private Property and Government Under the Constitution

The economic concept of private property refers to the rights owners have to the exclusive use and disposal of a physical object. Property is not a table, a chair, or an acre of land. It is the bundle of rights which the owner is entitled to employ those objects. The alternative (collectivist) view is that [...]

1Jan1995 | | 9 comments | Continued

Habeas Corpus to the Rescue

Mr. Jordan is a British journalist. At the old Mark Brown’s Wharf in London, on Wednesday, July 28, 1954, the “Jaroslaw Dabrowski,” flying the flag of Communist Poland, was unloading huge bales of wood wool used for packing. Agile cockney dockers went down into the hold to lash the bales to chains swung from an [...]

1Jun1956 | | 0 comments | Continued
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