September 17th is Constitution day. Annually there is little to no recognition of this holiday. July 4th means nothing without the framework, of liberty, justice, peace and morality found in the Constitution. Unfortunately, nowadays most Americans don’t realize this. Corporate media, federally funded schools, the welfare/warfare state, nationalism, and questionable morality have led this generation to slip closer to a despotic and tyrannical state. It is one thing to maliciously ignore the Bill of Rights. But when tyranny is legalized it then becomes as it was said by Frederick Bastiat in The Law, “that plunder is a right, so that it is protected and self-defense is made a crime so that it is punished.”

Take for example the 17th Amendment. This amendment changed the method for electing senators. In article I section III of the U.S. Constitution, the state legislature is specified as the electing body for senators to U.S. Congress, and presidential electors The 17th amendment changed the electorate of senators and electors to “the people”. In the Citizen’s Rule Book they comment that this amendment that deals with; “direct elections of senators; electors; vacancies in the senate, took effect May 31st 1913. This moved the U.S. from a complex Republic to a simple republic much like the style of government of the Soviet Union. State rights were lost and we were plunged headlong in to a democracy of which our forefathers warned was the vilest form of government because it always ends in oppression.”

Sheldon Richman, originally from Delaware, in his article written for the Future of Freedom Foundation in December of 2000, titled “Don’t just keep the electoral college; Repeal the 17th Amendment” writes; “What was the function of the Constitution? To restrain the central government. The document is a device for dispersing power, because concentrated power is inimical to freedom. A related purpose was to thwart majorities that would trample individual freedom. There is an invisible line between democracy and mob rule. The main method the Founders hit on to contain central power and mob rule was federalism: the maintenance of the states as sovereign entities

Mr. Richman, then opines that, “the preference for states’ rights is merely a recognition of a tradeoff: decentralized power rather than centralized power. If government becomes intolerably oppressive, it is easier to change states than to change countries. Voting with the feet should be kept as cheap as possible.”

Also in defense of States’ rights, Mr. Richman adds; “That the Framers were men of wealth and property is no valid objection to their handiwork. Private property is indispensable to freedom and prosperity — even, or especially, for those who own little. Envious mobs are too easily whipped up by opportunistic politicians to keep property safe in a democracy. That’s one reason the Framers devised the Electoral College: it was to be a buffer between unruly majorities and the rights of the smallest minority, the individual.

In the words of Ayn Rand, “The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities.”

In conclusion, in my humble opinion I believe the colloquial saying that a society is known by how it treats its weakest and most vulnerable members. Therefore, protecting the rights of all individuals is and should be the paramount priority of that society. So, if the United States claims to be a government of the people, by the people, and for the people yet fails to acknowledge the sacred position of individual rights and thus property rights, this is known as a Tyranny of the majority, and in the baseness of the latin term demos regula, mob rule otherwise known as democracy. And to that I say Restore the Republic! Legalize the Constitution and the Bill of rights.

Compiled by Mark Parks