The People are No Longer in Charge

Once upon a time in a country called the United States of America, the people held the sovereign power and the government worked for them instead of against them.

In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln resolved that “government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth.”  Lincoln’s hope and the hope of the men who founded this country was that the government would always serve the people and that its purpose would be to protect the rights of the citizens. 

The Declaration of the Independence states that “to secure these [unalienable] rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

That original vision of the government-governed relationship has all but dissolved.  Instead of working on behalf of the people, it now works against the people.  The IRS has turned into a government-sponsored mob agency, secretly silencing groups that disagree with the President.

Freedom of the press has been undermined by Obama’s Justice Department.  It was revealed earlier this year that the DOJ spied on numerous Associated Press reporters and Fox News reporter James Rosen.

The concept of separation of church and state has been perverted to mean that religion has no place in public life.  The First Amendment has two clauses relating to religion.  Both clauses are under attack today.  The free exercise clause prohibits Congress from getting in the way of people practicing their religion.  The establishment clause prohibits Congress from establishing a national religion such as the Church of England.

In no way does the Constitution require that religion be completely excluded from the governing process.

The Obama administration’s trampling of the Constitution does not stop there. The Second Amendment, like the first, is being attacked and misinterpreted by our elected officials.  The right to keep and bear arms, like every other Constitutional right, is a right granted to individuals, not groups. 

Gun control advocates like to argue that the Second Amendment only applies to militias.  The purpose of the Second Amendment was not to arm the militia; it was to provide for the security of a free state.  A citizenry that is equal in strength or stronger than the government is critical for liberty to endure.

The Fourth Amendment, perhaps more than all others, is being flat out ignored by the people we elected to preserve the Constitution.  The TSA has endured years of public scrutiny over its airport security checkpoint procedures. 

I used to be on the side of the TSA.  I used to believe that the embarrassing scanners and pat downs were worth the peace of mind of knowing we were safe.  Yet, if this was the only way to ensure safe flight then why didn’t everyone receive a full body scan and pat down?

Benjamin Franklin believed that “those who would trade in their freedom for their protection deserve neither.”  Freedom and liberty are the cornerstones of our country.  They can never be compromised.

Another government agency, the National Security Agency, is under fire for collecting information about phone calls made by Americans to Americans.  Not only is this kind of data mining outside the scope of the NSA’s purpose or protecting against foreign cyber-security attacks, but it is wholly unconstitutional. 

One of the gripes that the signers of the Declaration of Independence had with King George was his use of general warrants.  The collecting of private information without a warrant is a clear violation of the Fourth Amendment.

Think about this for a second: the federal government spent tax dollars sent to them by the people for the purpose of protecting their rights, and the government in turn used those dollars to violate those same rights.  If we were living in 1773, some disgruntled patriots in Boston would be throwing a little party on a boat over nonsense like this.

Next on the list of amendments that Obama and his band of merry men have tainted is the Fifth Amendment.  Lois Lerner, director of exempt organizations at the IRS, pled the Fifth at a hearing on the IRS scandal.  I find one small problem with her doing this; the right not to testify against oneself applied only in criminal cases.  As far as I know, Lerner had not been charged with any crime at the time she testified.

We have reached a point in time where the president is using the weight of the federal government to suppress the people and infringe on their rights.  This is tyranny. 

The government is no longer accountable to the people.  Government of the people, by the people, and for the people is rapidly eroding in this country, which is supposed to be the last best hope of Earth, to quote Ronald Reagan.

If freedom and liberty evaporate in America there is no place to escape to.  Newt Gingrich was mocked during the 2012 primary race for suggesting we build a base on the Moon.  That idea is quickly looking more appealing.

We are in need a serious reset in America.  Politicians debate about the best way for the government to help the people and solve our problems.  The pretense to that discussion is what’s wrong in America.  The government is not best equipped to solve society’s problems, the people are. 

Sovereignty needs to be restored for the people.  We need to take our country back.