When a woman asked Benjamin Franklin, a founder of our Constitutional Republic, what kind of government the States created, he answered, “A Republic, if you can keep it.”  The key to keeping that Republic exists in the understanding how the Constitution was designed to function.

The Constitution of these United States is not arbitrary.   It is a document of standards established to keep the GOVERNMENT from becoming arbitrary.  These standards were not invented by the men who wrote the Constitution.  These standards were axiomatic truths that had proven themselves for over a millennium. Many of these truths can be found in five historic liberty charters, the very liberty charters that gave birth to America’s founding documents. The US Constitution is not an invention, it is an inheritance.  Those who claim that America’s Constitution is vague, arbitrary, or even irrelevant do so because they are uneducated about where our Constitution came from and why it was formed.

The US Constitution and the govt it created was designed to protect Liberty.   This purpose is declared in the Declaration of Independence.   It is recorded in the Pre-amble to the Constitution. And The Bill of Rights (the 1^st 10 amds) was incorporated into the Constitution to trigger an alarm when this liberty is being threatened.  And yet, nothing in either of these three documents is an invention of the men who wrote them.  Everything, every principle of government, every security to Liberty, and even at times the very language itself was taken from lessons learned from over 700 years of history and five essential Liberty Charters.  It is this history that proves that the Constitution is not an arbitrary, living breathing document, but a document designed from blood-bought lessons in the historic struggle between liberty and tyranny.

Once this history is understood, today’s claim that the Constitution is irrelevant falls away and we begin to see not only how the Constitution is designed to limit government and preserve Liberty, but why we must adhere to this standard.  The living breathing deception can only exist by eliminating these historical truths and isolating men from their own history.

Originalism or original intent means looking at the history that gave us our founding principles and realizing why they are important, it means understanding the Constitution in its historical context. This is the only way to ensure that this government operates to preserve the essential principles of liberty, to ignore the origin of our constitutional principles is to invite the same threats that prompted the necessity of their protection.  To throw off the lessons of history invites despotism and inequality, apathy and corruption, slavery and oppression.

Originalism is the shield against slavery, masters, and oppressors.  Originalism not only understands these essential principles of liberty, but embraces it with the knowledge that Liberty was the stated goal of the designers of the Constitution.  Originalism is not only the correct legal way to apply the Constitution, it is the only way that guarantees and secures Liberty.

Originalism declares, “we don’t care what the mob says, we don’t care what the powerful say, we will ensure that all are treated equally with dignity.  We are not ruled by mob mentality, but by the principles of Liberty because we know our history.”

However, a living breathing constitution is arbitrary.  It creates government that is dependent upon current social trends and the will of the powerful.  It is just another name for a Banana Republic.  A living breathing constitution allows those in government to say there were no cell phones in 1789 so we have the right to arbitrarily control your communications.  The living breathing constitution allows those in government to say since there was no internet in 1789, we can define who is a journalist and what can be said.

A living breathing constitution gives power to the oppressor through interpretation by the powerful, the majority, or the deceptive who distort history.  So if the majority or the powerful decides that one group of people deserve less or more protection, less or more property, less or more liberty, then there is no recourse for the powerless or the minority.  A living breathing constitution is slavery.

If we ignore that history and the Constitution in its proper context ceases to be the fixed standard for govt, then we are left to be ruled by the powerful or by the whim of the majority or by those at the controls of information who would distort history and truth.  If we do not know these essential principles of liberty and where they came from, we cannot evaluate and ensure the solutions are proper and not tragic.  Some call these unseen consequences, but when you can see through the lenses of history you know that they are no unseen; they are proven facets of human nature.

There is no magic pill.  History and truth tells us there is no quick fix.  If we truly want to make America great, we must reacquaint ourselves with some essential truths.  Without these foundational building blocks, we cannot achieve the successful ends we are all looking for and we continue to spin our wheels, haphazardly maneuvering government, sometimes to good ends, sometimes to destruction.  Our problem is that our policies are not driven by these foundational principles, but instead are driven by the phantoms of prosperity or security.

Our Constitution is not arbitrary and neither are the solutions.  They are time tested and essential.  The designers of our Constitution put these solutions in our hands.  It was the greatest gift they gave us…the opportunity to self-governance.  It’s time we remember who we are and the power that we hold.  I am convinced that Reconnecting with this truth will reignite the lamp of liberty. Let’s learn from history so we will not be doomed to repeat its mistakes. Let’s stand for liberty today so our children will not have to bow tomorrow.

Reignite the lamp of liberty today with the knowledge our founders expected us all to know: www.LibertyFirstUniversity.com

Patrick Henry, designer of our Constitutional Republic said, “I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past.”   What history lessons about the design of our republic can we learn from natural disasters?

As Americans we believe in helping each other in time of need, so the question is not SHOULD we help, but where should disaster help come from? Looking at the design of our Republic, here are some hard observations.

Constitutionally there is no delegation of authority for the federal government to act as emergency funding services for the States.   James Madison, father of the Constitution and 4^th president declared before congress in 1792:

“I, sir, have always conceived — I believe those who proposed the Constitution conceived — it is still more fully known, and more material to observe, that those who ratified the Constitution conceived — that this is not an indefinite government, deriving its powers from the general terms prefixed to the specified powers — but a limited government, tied down to the specified powers, which explain and define the general terms.”

If the power is not expressly delegated through a specific Article, section, or clause, then the federal authority does not lawfully exist.  The only way to change or expand federal power is through the amendment process described in the Constitution which in either process includes the creators of the Constitution, the States.  No single branch of the creation can expand its own power by any other means. Remember:

1. Congress cannot expand its own or another branch’s delegated power by legislative act. Alexander Hamilton, a designer of our Constitution wrote in Federalist #78: “There is no position which depends on clearer principles, than that every act of a delegated authority, contrary to the tenor of the commission under which it is exercised, is void. No legislative act, therefore, contrary to the Constitution, can be valid.”
2. The President has no authority to change the Constitution; he doesn’t have the authority to make laws of any sort. “All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.” Article 1 section 1. Since any legislative act contrary to the Constitution is invalid, the president making legislative acts, is a clear violation of the Constitution and per se in valid.
3. The Judiciary cannot expand federal power beyond the Constitution. James Madison, addresses such a violation in 1800: “…dangerous powers, not delegated, may not only be usurped and executed by the other departments, but that the judicial department, also, may exercise or sanction dangerous powers beyond the grant of the Constitution…”

If elected representatives in Washington DC cannot identify the Article, section, and clause that authorizes the federal government to engage in emergency funding services to the States, then that authority, very plainly does not legally exist.  Any reference to a congressional act, does not create that authority.  If legislative act is the only authority, then as Hamilton so accurately announced, that legislative act is void and no law at all.  A supreme Court opinion, nor series of opinions cannot be the basis for undelegated authority since the judiciary cannot exercise or sanction any authority that is not tied down to a specific power delegated through the Constitution. The existence of executive agencies designated to perform a function beyond the grant of the Constitution cannot provide legal justification for pretended authority.

Sadly, what we hear is that “We must have the federal government’s help; without it we cannot function.”  According to William Pitt, the Younger, in 1783 “Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.”  The purpose of the Constitution is to “preserve the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” The plea of necessity over the limited nature of the Constitution is yet another unconstitutional argument. This cry of necessity is annulled because the terms of the Constitution binds the federal government to expressed powers. If the people through their states want the Federal government to have a new authority then they must amend the document that enumerates its abilities.  To put forth any or all of these extra-constitutional assertions as legal justification for powers that are not enumerated is to suggest that the Constitution is NOT the foundation for the rule of law in our Republic. In that case, then Congress, the President and the courts would have ZERO authority, because without the Constitution they have no basis to even exist.

So how should relief be handled?

If the federal government wasn’t stealing and extorting money and power from the people and their States to fund and operate all their unconstitutional federal agencies and programs throughout year, the States would have plenty of money to manage their own disasters.  Under a properly operating Constitutional Republic, our States would have a surplus beyond our modern comprehension and the States (in addition to the millions in private donations we see after major disasters) could individually provide relief as they see fit. In fact, the designers of our Constitutional Republic speculated about unexpected burdens that one State may not be able to handle.  Throughout the eighty-five published Federalist Papers, the authors of these papers repeatedly assert that the establishment of the union of the States would create a fiduciary relationship between the States.   This “brotherhood” would create a feeling of friendship and duty amongst the States for economic and defensive support.  They postulated that if there were such an unforeseen and unreasonable burden placed upon one State, the remaining States would voluntarily and individually administer aid as their citizens felt appropriate.  The designers of our Constitutional Republic never once asserted that the federal government would have the authority to engage in charity in any form.  As a matter of fact, they spoke against the federal exercise of charity on multiple occasion.

James Madison proclaimed before Congress in 1792, that for the federal Congress to engage in public charity with tax dollars, “would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited government established by the people of America.”

He repeated this truth in 1794, when he said most definitively: “I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.”

There is no reason and no authority for the feds to become involved with these kinds of domestic affairs. However, because America has been errantly trained for over 150 years that this is the purpose of the federal government, most do not even have an inclination that their cries for federal aid are transmuting the mutual brotherhood of the States into a “nanny-hood” of the federal government.

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