Jefferson Had it Right!

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Capitalism and Individual Liberty Work

Government Control Does Not!

(Originally posted in 2009, updated 03/05/19 for bad links and dated information)

Thomas Jefferson was a great man although many Americans, especially those taught in our government schools, don't know much about him. A “founding father,” principle author of the Declaration of Independence, and our third President, he shaped many of the ideas that made this a nation of individual liberty, religious freedom, and republican democracy.

Jefferson wrote in his Autobiography, “Were we directed from Washington when to sow, and when to reap, we should soon want bread.” If only the voting citizens of the United States understood the prophetic truth in that statement! The Democrat Party, increasingly a socialist party, under the leadership of a restored majority in the House and with the urgency of a relentless hatred for this President, is working very hard to run everything in this country from Washington, guaranteeing that we will “soon want for bread,” as well as safe food to eat, affordable energy, jobs able to support us, decent and affordable medical care, homes to live in, schools capable of teaching anything, crime free neighborhoods, or an economy to support their plans. The Republican Party cannot do better or even survive until it learns to convince this generation of the truth of Jefferson’s wisdom, unless it focuses individual liberty and local government as the key to prosperity. Unfortunately, till recently most Republicans seemed more interested in getting their own piece of the power and money, acting an awfully lot like the Democrats as it relates to hatred for this President. Frankly, I don’t care who rallies citizens to the truth of Jefferson's quote, but I pray somebody does!

The Constitution gives only “limited powers” to the federal government, which Presidents, Congress, and courts have slowly but surely been expanding. Of 15 current cabinet level departments in the Executive Branch of the government, interior, agriculture, labor, commerce, health and human services, housing and urban development, transportation, energy, and education all operate beyond these Constitutional limits. None of these areas require national control or regulation and, as Jefferson predicted, federal “direction” generally reduces effectiveness, raises costs particularly in the expansion of huge Washington bureaucracies, and accrues ever-increasing debt. Nowhere is this clearer than in the 2009 bailouts and so-called stimuli compared to Trump's tax cuts and today's booming economy.

These departments—state, treasury, defense, veterans’ affairs, homeland security, and the office of the attorney general—are appropriate federal functions, although some, especially treasury, have expanded well beyond reasonable limits. We do need a single voice to deal with foreign powers, provide for our “common defense,” maintain a common currency, care for our military and their families given their sacrificial service, secure our borders and protect our communities from international terrorism, and enforce our national laws. Interstate commerce and a few other matters that involve relationships between and among the various states may require some federal oversight. Otherwise, the Tenth Amendment plainly restricts the expansion of federal power: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” We do not need the federal government riding roughshod over the states in these areas, and we certainly have not amended the Constitution to authorize Washington to take over private business, whether it is financial or medical!

It doesn't take a brain surgeon to recognize that the federal government is growing beyond all decent limits, attracting rogues and profiteers, many of them our elected representatives! Interest groups and influence peddlers focus their energies in Washington, bypassing the voters and often imposing on all, laws and regulations that would not pass if the voters had to approve them directly. Lobbyists wield power through huge amounts of money, some itself tax dollars, used to buy votes, by-passing the will of voters. Abetted by various leaders in Washington through their support of trial lawyers, juries make laws, in effect, by awarding clever attorneys' judgments that force other potential defendants to function as if a law was passed, for fear they will be sued and ruined financially. State and federal courts, all the way to the Supreme Court, also ignore the plain sense of the Constitution to impose their own opinions, which become the law of the land. No decision of this kind is clearer than Roe v. Wade, which legalized abortion, set aside many state laws, and created a so-called “right to privacy,” which does not even exist in the Constitution, or Kelo v. City of New London, which expanded “eminent domain,” primarily to benefit builders and investors, not the public, well beyond the obvious intent of the Constitution. I will be very interested to see what SCOTUS decides about some of the cases surely to come from the work of the current administration.

The growing set of Democrat Presidential candidates and many in the Senate and House of Representatives would permit illegal immigrants to remain in the country despite the opinion of an many American citizens? Do Americans want universal health care? Others want “free” healthcare and imagine they want the government to provide it, without understanding what it will ultimately cost them in choice, coverage, and speed of diagnosis and treatment. How many oppose drilling for oil on American land, again despite the wishes of the majority, because of the influence of global warming, environmental, and alternate energy fanatics? Globalists and those favoring the United Nations would go even further, tearing down borders, and moving toward a world government, even though it is obvious that the bigger the government, the poorer its ability to function effectively, the more it costs, and the more likely it will become corrupt, as it attracts, like moths to a flame, those who seek money and power. The corruption and ineffectiveness of the United Nations already proves this. In every case, Washington ignores its citizens, creates enormous, expensive bureaucracies, and reduces the end result it delivers. Corruptions plays a role, but central control doesn’t work and never has, as the lack of a single effective example proves. Bigger is definitely not better when it comes to government!

One of the schemes leaning toward “one world” purports to deal with global poverty. The United States has tried from Washington to “cure” poverty, but government cannot cure poverty. Dispensing money is not a cure but an entitlement that encourages dependency. Laws may address factors that tend to foster poverty, and governments may provide services that address particular problems in poor areas. Doling out cash is like pouring water down a rat-hole; there is not limit to how much will be absorbed with little effect. Expanding such notions to a world-wide scope merely creates a bigger rat hole. Such schemes tend to ignore the real key to reducing poverty, which is individual freedom and opportunity. Given the chance, most people will work themselves out of poverty, if those with power will just get out of their way.

Today there seems to be little limit to how much many world leaders are willing to pour down the "rat hole", although some in the European Union seemed to have found it. In addition to understanding Jefferson’s warning, perhaps the people need to understand anew that only “the people” know how to make bread, whether it’s a literal or metaphorical kind. Governments print money, but productive people give it value. People and their representatives need to understand that spending what doesn’t really exist leads to disaster, beyond a credit “crunch” or “melt-down” to a literal debt disaster. Even if the entire system manages not to collapse, the Democrats’ latest profligate spending plans with no apparent limit, as yet, will burden future generations unbelievably. A government that willingly bankrupts its own people is odious; a government that will bankrupt the future is an abomination!

One of the first crises of the new nation was finding a way to repay the monies borrowed to fund the Revolutionary War. This problem revealed the weakness of the Articles of Confederation in uniting the colonies and provided the motivation to create the Constitution. Still, the states did not want to become a single State; each wished to retain a substantial measure of its individual power to control its own future. The answer was to create a system that provided only limited powers to a central government. The framers would be appalled at the way recent leaders have accrued a far more massive debt, simply because they chosen to live beyond nation’s means. Jefferson would be even more disgusted to learn that the reasons were to gain more power and wealth for those very leaders, disgusted but not surprised.

Why are the people willing to accept this oppressive assumption of power, despite the plain restrictions of the Constitution? Some are enamored of Barack Obama’s image and promises of change; they tend to believe him uncritically. A large number are woefully ignorant including many in government, knowing too little of our history, constitution, and actually manner of government. The President does not make laws although he asserts immense power (that I believe he should not) through fiat; Congress enacts laws. The President does not declare war as Commander-in-Chief; Congress alone has the power to declare war, and it should not be involved in fighting it, which is why we have a Commander-in-Chief! The Supreme Court is supposed to “interpret” law and the Constitution, not implement the personal opinions of its members.

I believe a more serious, fundamental problem has lead to America’s acceptance of de facto socialism (I believe Communism is even more the right word, but I leave that for another discussion). People have become too comfortable and simply want someone else to take care of them. They don’t want to be bothered with guarding their own liberty, educating themselves so they know what is and is not legitimate, making themselves aware of the struggles already faced and the lessons learned in those struggles, or, in many cases, working for their own physical and economic security. In their apathy and ignorance, the promise to provide equally for everyone, something very different from “equal opportunity,” sounds attractive and reasonable. Attacks on the anonymous wealthy, typically characterized as evil profiteers who have “stolen” their riches from everyone else, buy votes with no recognition of the essential economic role they provide as both producers and financiers of the jobs, resources, and technologies that have blessed our contemporary American life.

As a Christian, I reject big government, socialist, progressive secularists on principle. I prefer to live in a place where I as an individual am free to live my life, work and worship as I choose, work hard to become prosperous if I want, and accept responsibility for my own housing, education, healthcare, and retirement. As an educated man, I reject big government socialism because it does not, will not, and cannot ever work! In that light, I recommend two books by Ayn Rand—We the Living and Atlas Shrugged—the former for its stark but accurate depiction of the early Soviet Union and the latter for its clear portrayal of the struggle between producers and looters (socialists). Yes, I know that Rand was ardently anti-Christian and included their kin among the looters; some so-called Christians belong there! I don’t recommend her books for their religious teaching but for their clear insight into this dangerous struggle, which the “looters” are currently winning. We the Living is a depressing look into what happened to the wealthy, the business owners, the middle class, their families, and eventually everyone in Russia after the Communist takeover. After almost 75 years, the rejected that system amid it oppressive failures; I don’t want to see the United States go through that.

In the end, the Soviet Union had too little bread, and people stood in lines for hours just to get a loaf of bread. Jefferson knew what he was saying, and Russian history proves it. Their system worked so poorly, they couldn’t even raise enough wheat to feed their own people. Where did they go for wheat? They bought wheat from the capitalist enemy they despised, the USA, which grew far more wheat than it needed. American history from back in the Carter years, when the government tried to control gas shortages with price controls, also proves that Jefferson was right. Unfortunately, I fear we will get an abundance of further proof if America does not rise up and stop the current usurpation of Constitutional power.

Do you recall what the colonies did, a few years prior to Jefferson’s wisdom? They rejected another example of the trouble that comes with government power. For them, many born Brits who loved their tea, it was the tea tax; their response was the Boston Tea Party. Some Americans have even tried taking a page from their book on April 15.