The Rule of Law

To subvert a well-established political system one must find a way to cannibalize and take over legitimate institutions and twist them toward radical ends – academia is obviously a case in point. But the fundamental safeguards of the United States is the Constitution and it’s role in the functioning of checks and balances. That is to say, that no one part of the system could override another part of the system – and the federal government was in turn checked by the states. The least important of these entities was the judiciary. Indeed, it was set forth in the Constitution as something to be established by Congress – rather than actually being established by the Constitution itself.

The rule of law applies to those involved in the legal system. In other words, that Judges will honestly follow the law as set forth before the public at large. The rule of law does not exist simply because judges make legal decisions.  If it did, the rule of law would be equally valid to judicial decisions made in Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union. Today, left-wing ideology is using the rule of law to force onto the country what it cannot achieve under the actual political system.

In contra to what we are told today – as courts chip away daily on our individual autonomy and freedom – statesman did not always cowardly defer to judicial overreach. President Jackson’s much noted comment was “Justice Marshal has made his decision, now let him enforce it.”  More substantively, no less a leader than Abraham Lincoln (in his first inaugural address), flat out reminded all that the Supreme Court did not run the country – and that he would not be bound by it.

President Lincoln stated:

I do not forget the position assumed by some that constitutional questions are to be decided by the Supreme Court, nor do I deny that such decisions must be binding in any case upon the parties to a suit as to the object of that suit, while they are also entitled to very high respect and consideration in all parallel cases by all other departments of the Government…At the same time, the candid citizen must confess that if the policy of the Government upon vital questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made in ordinary litigation between parties in personal actions the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their Government into the hands of that eminent tribunal.

That is precisely correct and precisely what has come to pass.

copyright 2018 J. Barnes

Empire To Come

The general rule of thumb regarding empires is that they are acquired through territorial expansion as a nation state (more or less coherent and homogeneous) expands outward. It may be (in various degrees) benign such as the British Empire or even (subject to military submission) the Roman Empire – or it may be completely exploitive, destructive and non-assimilating (think of the Nazi Empire).

But empires can be made in other ways too – as we are demonstrating within our own lifetime. The United States was founded as a democratic republic arising from the expansion of European peoples into a largely open and vast land mass. These people were largely homogeneous – and even where diverse shared basic historical norms and influences. In no sense was the United States founded as an empire. Even Federal “territories” could become States – and then enjoy in full the rights of the original 13 states compromising the Union. Remarkably, the government answered to the people –  the people did not answer to the government. The government was checked not only by the rule of law, but also by the tug and pull of the semi-sovereign individual states. Wrapped around all of this was an intrinsic cultural matrix which spoke to assimilation under a broadly agreed to Christian doctrine, English language and free economy perspective.

Today, all of that is being radically altered. Ironically, and without any territorial increase (indeed the United States may well shrink in size) the United States is becoming an empire. It is becoming an empire because rather than seeking territory of other people’s, it is allowing other people’s to flood into its territory without any required assimilation (or any cultural matrix to do so). The obvious historic parallel is ancient Rome allowing itself to be transformed internally by those it had conquered (i.e. think of the spread of Christianity) and later fundamentally transformed and indeed destroyed by the influx of barbarian tribes from outside (i.e., mass migration).

Different languages, different cultures, different religions, different customs all being told to get along in a soon to be “diverse paradise”. The Federal government (the empire in being) acting vigerously only where the native culture seeks to protect and defend itself).Which means, of course, that those coming in with the least interest in assimilating will press their race, creed and color (their “culture”). While certain areas will remain more or less “American” other areas will become a Byzantine patchwork and others still will become distinctly non-American. For example, is difficult to see how Southern California 50 years from now can be anything culturally but a northern attachment to Mexico – assuming it is still physically part of the United States.

Why this is being sought is an entirely different matter. The massive centralized government out of Washington – and the vast administrative apparatus to support it – is becoming increasingly like an empire. One can hope it is more of a benign empire perhaps like Rome that allows one a certain amount of freedom in so far as they do not cross the interests of the state. But clearly it is becoming an empire and the empire will be subject to the whims of whatever ideology the Empire transmits. As the Roman Empire itself became a vassal for the transformation of itself through Christianity.

It is ironic that overwhelmingly those considered liberal progressives (and otherwise pushing a radical ideology) are the ones mostly responsible for the increasingly centralized state upon which an increasingly fragmented country must look to in a manner consistent with an empire.

We distinguish. We refer to the Roman Republic followed by the Roman Empire (followed by the Byzantean Empire in the East). But the Romans did not so distinguish. They had the illusion that there was a continuously unchanged state – SPQR. While it while it was a nice fiction, quite obviously Rome had transformed itself from a Republic to an empire. Here too, a hundred years hence, we may well still call ourselves a federalized Republic but we will in fact be a centralized empire. This is not to be welcomed, but given the current trend is difficult to see how it is to be avoided.