LibertyEagle
01-07-2009, 02:53 PM
http://www.jurisdictionary.com/essays/lifting_the_lamp.htm
Lifting the Lamp of Liberty
Amid all the patriotic fervor alerting us to corrupt politics and the encroaching globalist threat that rightly should concern all Americans, the silence of a particular message screams for attention while millions of dollars are spent to alarm, alert, and infuriate the public about what’s wrong. Everywhere we hear the hue and cry. "The end is near! The evil empire is taking over!"
Lift the Lamp Higher Who is teaching us the wonderful laws we should be thankful for in this nation?
Sincere as the alarmists may be, there is a thundering quiet when one asks, "What are you doing to teach your children what’s good about America’s legal system?"
For all the flag waving and constitutional demands to expose imagined conspiracies, who is preparing the way for future generations by teaching due process and the rule of law?
It’s one thing to complain about abuses of due process. It’s quite another to take time to teach your children what due process is and how it can be used to insure that the good guys win.
It’s one thing to complain about globalist movements to take over the world, but it takes dedication and sometimes thankless perseverance to teach your children what the rule of law is and how the rule of law can successfully defuse centralist policies.
Who is teaching these things?
I don’t hear it.
I hear complaints. I hear saber-rattling. I hear doomsayers urging us to buy dehydrated food and keep our weapons lightly oiled. I hear people warning that our constitutional rights are being taken away by international interests … yet I don’t hear anyone explaining where those constitutional rights actually came from, nothing about the philosophies of law that inspired the framers to write the constitution as they did, not one single word about what we can do to keep our liberties free from the evil inroads of international imperialism. No. All I hear are complaints about what’s wrong and very little about what we can do to prepare the way for liberty to be preserved for future generations. Complaining has its place, but it is not the solution.
Please don’t get me wrong. I oppose globalism as much as anyone. I’ve been opposing it openly and actively for nearly 30 years. I went to law school to learn how to be more effective in my influence of others. I hate the idea of a global imperialism. An old friend, Gen. Lewis Walt, USMC Ret’d, told me of his first-hand experiences in Vietnam and Korea where globalists made decisions that caused his men to be killed unnecessarily. He wrote in the flyleaf of his book, The Eleventh Hour, "Never give up the fight." I work for sovereign nations like America, a nation of States, to share the planet in peace and prosperity under the rule of law. I see the potential horror of global imperialism quite as clearly as any who spend their energies warning us.
But, who is going to teach the children how to preserve our nation?
Who is teaching the children the fundamentals of our American jurisprudence?
Who is teaching the Rules?
Finding fault alone is not enough!
Finding fault is only part of the answer.
It’s a good thing to know there’s a fox in the hen house, but if you don’t know how to get the hens to lay again when the fox is gone, what do you gain by yelling, "Fox! Fox!"? You may get others to praise you for being such a watchful farmer, but if you forget the necessities of keeping chickens (feeding them, repairing the hen house roof, giving them their medicines, collecting the eggs, keeping away the foxes that come sneaking into the barnyard late at night) then all your yelling hasn’t really provided the needed answers.
Anyone can yell, "Fox!"
More is needed.
Warning us of impending danger is not enough.
Complaining of alleged conspiracies is not enough.
Someone needs to teach the American people how to use our marvelous system of law and order to make things better, to get rid of the fox but also to manage the farm effectively so every resource is utilized for the greatest possible common welfare. Someone needs to teach America what America is supposed to be. Someone needs to teach America how it will be when the American legal system is finally working as it should – the way it will work once again when we have taught our children how to use it properly, as it was intended to be used.
We no longer have a philosophy of law in this nation today. Ask a patriot what he or she believes in, and you’ll hear the reply, "I believe in the Constitution," but not even a tiny handful has any idea about the maxims upon which our Constitution was built, nor do they seem to care. We allow the Constitution to be misinterpreted because we the People don’t know how it should be interpreted. As a people we know next to nothing about the principles of law. We have by our own ignorance abdicated the responsibility of rule, then we complain when our rulers don’t rule us as we think they should. This nation was designed to be a land of self-rule, but wise and prosperous self-rule requires that the People themselves know the law and share a philosophy of law that unites them as a People. We don’t have that, though millions of dollars are being spent these days to scream ever more loudly, "Fox!"
We need to teach our children the maxims that gave birth to this nation.
Finding fault is not enough.
If the doomsayers have their way, will they close down our courts?
Will they put our legislatures out to pasture?
Will they empty the Whitehouse and hang all the governors of our States?
By what will we be governed then? By laws? Or by a new set of powerful men acting out of their own willpower, determining for us from on high what is good for each of us? How will we be better off when the government we have has been destroyed instead of repaired according to the rule of law and principles of due process our children need to learn as quickly as possible?
Perhaps the time has come for patriots to realize that complaining is not enough. Warning the world of the dangers of global imperialism is not enough. Pointing fingers at corruption isn’t replacing corruption with sound policy nor encouraging people to learn how to be good citizens participating in the task of making government safe for the governed.
Perhaps the time has come to teach once more the fundamental principles of due process, the rule of law, and the ancient maxims by which all that you hope for can yet be achieved.
Our nation suffers from mass neurosis … knowing there’s a problem but being unable to stand together united as a single force to make the problem go away. We are too much divided.
On the one hand are those like Chicken Little, running about screaming to anyone who will listen, "The sky is falling! The sky is falling!"
Another group demands dolefully, "It’s God’s will. The end is near. There’s nothing we can do."
Still another points its finger at the shadows and insists, "It’s them! Those people hiding over there. The moneyed interests. The lawyers. The bankers. They’ve all conspired against us."
Yet in all this madness there’s not a single voice of reason that can be heard above the din of doubt teaching, "When the dust settles, you are still going to need a vision to unite you."
Why not let ourselves be reunited by that vision in this very present hour?
Why not be reunited by the fundamentals that gave birth to our nation in the first place?
Why not reach again to the maxims of law, the principles upon which our nation was built, teaching these maxims and their corollaries to our children, lifting a generation of hope to inherit the wisdom of our forefathers and make the world safe at last through law and order?
Why do we listen to those who insist the world must get worse? What is most important to these people, the welfare of our children or the prophecy their blindness threatens to insure?
Nobody ever made progress by merely tearing down.
Someone must build again.
It doesn’t take much intellect to find fault with what’s "out there". There is plenty to find fault with. There is plenty we need to know about. Horrible, senseless, unnecessary, dangerous things are going on in the world today, but every one of them results from the refusal of people to see the truth and teach it to others so we can stand together united against the falseness that threatens to destroy our peace and forever deprive us of liberty and the protection of justice.
It’s time for a positive vision for America!
It’s time to stand up for what’s right by teaching what’s right and good and honorable and long-lasting and peaceable and fruitful and functional and prosperous. There is good to stand for. Let’s stand together!
How about a movement to teach our children the maxims of law on which all our dreams must ultimately be established? How about a movement to teach our children how law and order make peace possible? How about a movement to teach our children the People are sovereign in each of the States, how state constitutions enacted by the People control legislatures, courts, and executive branches in Ohio, Nebraska, Florida, and all the others States? How about a movement to teach how the federal government is a mandate by the states to provide for a common defense, promote commerce, and do a number of other useful things it must be maintained to do and can be required to do once the People know how our system is designed to work?
How about a movement to promote positive press about America? Not just flag-waving rhetoric but rock-solid teachings that empower the People, teaching people that they can lawfully change government when leadership gets out of hand, encouraging them to promote peace by learning the principles of due process, the rule of law, the maxims, and the fundamental rules of evidence and procedure?
We can do this.
Think of the millions being spent to advocate rebellion against our nation’s government. What will happen when some of those millions are diverted to promote public legal education in our schools and positive articles and books about what’s good about our system of laws?
This is still the most wonderful nation in the world. It is the most wonderful not because of its waving fields of wheat or shining shores. It is the most wonderful because it is predicated on a set of principles called maxims that promote justice and establish liberty through law and order, governing the People by their own consent, a land where knowledge is needed to preserve these principles, a land where public legal ignorance is our greatest enemy … the conspiracy of darkness that a few well-placed candles of legal knowledge can quickly disperse!
Yelling, "Fox! Fox!" is something we will probably always need.
But someone better come forward soon to teach again the fundamental principles upon which this nation was founded, or all the yelling and complaining will never bring peace to the hen house nor keep the foxes at bay for very long.
Lift the lamp higher. Teach the maxims of law.
Teach the children!
Lifting the Lamp of Liberty
Amid all the patriotic fervor alerting us to corrupt politics and the encroaching globalist threat that rightly should concern all Americans, the silence of a particular message screams for attention while millions of dollars are spent to alarm, alert, and infuriate the public about what’s wrong. Everywhere we hear the hue and cry. "The end is near! The evil empire is taking over!"
Lift the Lamp Higher Who is teaching us the wonderful laws we should be thankful for in this nation?
Sincere as the alarmists may be, there is a thundering quiet when one asks, "What are you doing to teach your children what’s good about America’s legal system?"
For all the flag waving and constitutional demands to expose imagined conspiracies, who is preparing the way for future generations by teaching due process and the rule of law?
It’s one thing to complain about abuses of due process. It’s quite another to take time to teach your children what due process is and how it can be used to insure that the good guys win.
It’s one thing to complain about globalist movements to take over the world, but it takes dedication and sometimes thankless perseverance to teach your children what the rule of law is and how the rule of law can successfully defuse centralist policies.
Who is teaching these things?
I don’t hear it.
I hear complaints. I hear saber-rattling. I hear doomsayers urging us to buy dehydrated food and keep our weapons lightly oiled. I hear people warning that our constitutional rights are being taken away by international interests … yet I don’t hear anyone explaining where those constitutional rights actually came from, nothing about the philosophies of law that inspired the framers to write the constitution as they did, not one single word about what we can do to keep our liberties free from the evil inroads of international imperialism. No. All I hear are complaints about what’s wrong and very little about what we can do to prepare the way for liberty to be preserved for future generations. Complaining has its place, but it is not the solution.
Please don’t get me wrong. I oppose globalism as much as anyone. I’ve been opposing it openly and actively for nearly 30 years. I went to law school to learn how to be more effective in my influence of others. I hate the idea of a global imperialism. An old friend, Gen. Lewis Walt, USMC Ret’d, told me of his first-hand experiences in Vietnam and Korea where globalists made decisions that caused his men to be killed unnecessarily. He wrote in the flyleaf of his book, The Eleventh Hour, "Never give up the fight." I work for sovereign nations like America, a nation of States, to share the planet in peace and prosperity under the rule of law. I see the potential horror of global imperialism quite as clearly as any who spend their energies warning us.
But, who is going to teach the children how to preserve our nation?
Who is teaching the children the fundamentals of our American jurisprudence?
Who is teaching the Rules?
Finding fault alone is not enough!
Finding fault is only part of the answer.
It’s a good thing to know there’s a fox in the hen house, but if you don’t know how to get the hens to lay again when the fox is gone, what do you gain by yelling, "Fox! Fox!"? You may get others to praise you for being such a watchful farmer, but if you forget the necessities of keeping chickens (feeding them, repairing the hen house roof, giving them their medicines, collecting the eggs, keeping away the foxes that come sneaking into the barnyard late at night) then all your yelling hasn’t really provided the needed answers.
Anyone can yell, "Fox!"
More is needed.
Warning us of impending danger is not enough.
Complaining of alleged conspiracies is not enough.
Someone needs to teach the American people how to use our marvelous system of law and order to make things better, to get rid of the fox but also to manage the farm effectively so every resource is utilized for the greatest possible common welfare. Someone needs to teach America what America is supposed to be. Someone needs to teach America how it will be when the American legal system is finally working as it should – the way it will work once again when we have taught our children how to use it properly, as it was intended to be used.
We no longer have a philosophy of law in this nation today. Ask a patriot what he or she believes in, and you’ll hear the reply, "I believe in the Constitution," but not even a tiny handful has any idea about the maxims upon which our Constitution was built, nor do they seem to care. We allow the Constitution to be misinterpreted because we the People don’t know how it should be interpreted. As a people we know next to nothing about the principles of law. We have by our own ignorance abdicated the responsibility of rule, then we complain when our rulers don’t rule us as we think they should. This nation was designed to be a land of self-rule, but wise and prosperous self-rule requires that the People themselves know the law and share a philosophy of law that unites them as a People. We don’t have that, though millions of dollars are being spent these days to scream ever more loudly, "Fox!"
We need to teach our children the maxims that gave birth to this nation.
Finding fault is not enough.
If the doomsayers have their way, will they close down our courts?
Will they put our legislatures out to pasture?
Will they empty the Whitehouse and hang all the governors of our States?
By what will we be governed then? By laws? Or by a new set of powerful men acting out of their own willpower, determining for us from on high what is good for each of us? How will we be better off when the government we have has been destroyed instead of repaired according to the rule of law and principles of due process our children need to learn as quickly as possible?
Perhaps the time has come for patriots to realize that complaining is not enough. Warning the world of the dangers of global imperialism is not enough. Pointing fingers at corruption isn’t replacing corruption with sound policy nor encouraging people to learn how to be good citizens participating in the task of making government safe for the governed.
Perhaps the time has come to teach once more the fundamental principles of due process, the rule of law, and the ancient maxims by which all that you hope for can yet be achieved.
Our nation suffers from mass neurosis … knowing there’s a problem but being unable to stand together united as a single force to make the problem go away. We are too much divided.
On the one hand are those like Chicken Little, running about screaming to anyone who will listen, "The sky is falling! The sky is falling!"
Another group demands dolefully, "It’s God’s will. The end is near. There’s nothing we can do."
Still another points its finger at the shadows and insists, "It’s them! Those people hiding over there. The moneyed interests. The lawyers. The bankers. They’ve all conspired against us."
Yet in all this madness there’s not a single voice of reason that can be heard above the din of doubt teaching, "When the dust settles, you are still going to need a vision to unite you."
Why not let ourselves be reunited by that vision in this very present hour?
Why not be reunited by the fundamentals that gave birth to our nation in the first place?
Why not reach again to the maxims of law, the principles upon which our nation was built, teaching these maxims and their corollaries to our children, lifting a generation of hope to inherit the wisdom of our forefathers and make the world safe at last through law and order?
Why do we listen to those who insist the world must get worse? What is most important to these people, the welfare of our children or the prophecy their blindness threatens to insure?
Nobody ever made progress by merely tearing down.
Someone must build again.
It doesn’t take much intellect to find fault with what’s "out there". There is plenty to find fault with. There is plenty we need to know about. Horrible, senseless, unnecessary, dangerous things are going on in the world today, but every one of them results from the refusal of people to see the truth and teach it to others so we can stand together united against the falseness that threatens to destroy our peace and forever deprive us of liberty and the protection of justice.
It’s time for a positive vision for America!
It’s time to stand up for what’s right by teaching what’s right and good and honorable and long-lasting and peaceable and fruitful and functional and prosperous. There is good to stand for. Let’s stand together!
How about a movement to teach our children the maxims of law on which all our dreams must ultimately be established? How about a movement to teach our children how law and order make peace possible? How about a movement to teach our children the People are sovereign in each of the States, how state constitutions enacted by the People control legislatures, courts, and executive branches in Ohio, Nebraska, Florida, and all the others States? How about a movement to teach how the federal government is a mandate by the states to provide for a common defense, promote commerce, and do a number of other useful things it must be maintained to do and can be required to do once the People know how our system is designed to work?
How about a movement to promote positive press about America? Not just flag-waving rhetoric but rock-solid teachings that empower the People, teaching people that they can lawfully change government when leadership gets out of hand, encouraging them to promote peace by learning the principles of due process, the rule of law, the maxims, and the fundamental rules of evidence and procedure?
We can do this.
Think of the millions being spent to advocate rebellion against our nation’s government. What will happen when some of those millions are diverted to promote public legal education in our schools and positive articles and books about what’s good about our system of laws?
This is still the most wonderful nation in the world. It is the most wonderful not because of its waving fields of wheat or shining shores. It is the most wonderful because it is predicated on a set of principles called maxims that promote justice and establish liberty through law and order, governing the People by their own consent, a land where knowledge is needed to preserve these principles, a land where public legal ignorance is our greatest enemy … the conspiracy of darkness that a few well-placed candles of legal knowledge can quickly disperse!
Yelling, "Fox! Fox!" is something we will probably always need.
But someone better come forward soon to teach again the fundamental principles upon which this nation was founded, or all the yelling and complaining will never bring peace to the hen house nor keep the foxes at bay for very long.
Lift the lamp higher. Teach the maxims of law.
Teach the children!