Process that Preserves

I've written about the problems of the NSA surveillance of Americans in Presumed Guilty, and will switch from that to the man who actually revealed the NSA PRISM program and fled to Hong Kong: Edward Snowden.

I am not going to pre-judge his actions, but note that they are in violation of the law with presumable harm to National Security involved.  Like any other person accused of a crime he deserves his day in court and I recommend that he do come to a US Embassy and publicly relinquish himself for a public trial.  It will take time for the enormity of his actions to hit Mr. Snowden and when that happens it is my dearest wish that he does come in from the cold.

Really that is the best course of action as the one he is on now leaves him open to accusations and no closure that a trial provides.  If he truly believes he did the right thing then, while he does have much to fear from the legal system, it is a system and it has a process to it.  It is a process that preserves rights and liberty of our citizens.

As I outlined in Presumed Guilty, Amendments IV, V and VI put together the legal system to be followed with in the US and it is one of presumed innocence at the start with the onus of proof of wrongdoing falling to the accuser.  It is a process where the accuser must gather evidence, seek warrants for more information from a judge, and present that evidence in a public court so that the accused has an opportunity for a public trial by jury.  There have been numerous prior proceedings involving secrecy laws and the information within them and the procedure of reading on a judge, attorneys and jury is well understood and well known.

Truly the government need only show that the program was compromised.

I presume that Mr. Snowden's defense was that in his view the program was unconstitutional either in its basis or execution, and that his Oath required him to reveal the program to the American people as a whole.  Most of the attention is being put to Amendment IV:

Amendment IV

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

As Mr. Snowden is pointing out that the NSA collection of information on American citizens in a wholesale manner is not only not allowable without a warrant, but that the whole of the people cannot be suspected for crimes of particulars done by individuals.  Thus even if the FISA court gave a Warrant for such activities, that Warrant is in violation of the Constitution: Warrants are for cases of individuals or small groups, not the entire population of the US.  If the NSA sought such a broad Warrant then it is in violation of the Constitution by seeking such and not narrowing its scope down to particulars and individuals.  If there is a Constitutional breach at that point it can have one of three sources, it it has happened:

1 – Judicial lack of oversight and not putting a narrow scope to data collection to protect the liberty and freedom of Americans.  You are presumed innocent of a crime and when the Executive asks for data on you via a warrant you are then suspected of a crime.  The entirety of the American people cannot be suspected of a crime and it is incumbent on the Executive to narrow the procedure down to likely individuals and their associates, not the whole of the People.  By not recognizing this basic piece of logic, the Judicial branch in authorizing such a Warrant can be found in breach of the Constitution.  At that point the Warrant is rescinded and all individuals not associated with suspected terrorists are removed from the data stores in their entirety, including all back-ups.

2 – Executive branch problems can fall into the area of not interpreting the law correctly and creating an unconstitutional execution of it via programs.  In this instance a law would be Constitutional but the PRISM concept would be violating basic protections and freedoms of the People as a whole and in their individual particulars.  Any program so ill-crafted as to need all of the data on all of the people to find the very few who may be supporting terrorists is so ill-conceived that it points to a basic and systemic problem in not just the program but in those who created and authorized it.

3 – Legislative works are not always found to be Constitutional and Congress may have given a law that contravenes the basic protections of the American people as a whole and as individuals.  The entire scope of the law may be so ill-created and ill-conceived that no one doing the process of approving it in Congress realized just how wrong-headed it was.  However if Congress did craft the law properly, but was not informed of the scope of the resulting program and what it entailed, then that is a failure of the Executive branch to properly inform the Legislative branch about the implementation of the program.  If the law, itself, is the fault then it lies with Congress at the very passage of it and all programs and functions created by it go away, and the data stores are destroyed.  A lack of Executive accountability, however, puts the Executive at jeopardy for not performing a duty to Congress as required by Congress so that Congress can exercise oversight.  In this instance a program and law can be Constitutional but both Mr. Snowden and all who are in the Executive reporting chain can be held accountable for not properly accounting the program to Congress.

These are the possible problems that Mr. Snowden may have seen and the remedy for his defense is not in Amendment IV, the basis for his revealing the program which he sees as problematical, but in Amendment VI:

Amendment VI

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.

This procedure in which the prosecution hands over all its collected evidence to the accused and opens those items up to further scrutiny by the accused is known as 'discovery'.  When getting a Warrant the Executive seeks to discover more information about someone and when it accuses them that information is then handed over.  That scrutiny is critical because the defense must be allowed access to exculpatory information in the way of witnesses and documents.

In this case the discovery would presumably happen on the PRISM program within the NSA.

The scope of it would be limited to those documents and procedures that detail the entire history of the program from its original emplacement in a Bill and authorized by Congress, to the implementation and creation of it, to how it functioned so that the Executive demonstrates that it is doing a responsible job in executing the program and properly informing Congress of it on a basis set by Congress.

The defense would not actually want much in the way of things like hardware, software, and who is running which piece of equipment as those would be a distraction and not relevant to the defense.  What is wanted is the high level Legislative enabling Bills and then how the Executive processed those to programs, with given scope and necessary high level overview of the program, and then how it proceeded over time.

The defense has multiple ways to demonstrate that Mr. Snowden operated under his Oath and duties to the Constitution and need but show how the scope of PRISM contravenes the power granted to the federal government in any single particular: with just one Constitutional problem he is vindicated.

An accuser has the power of the State behind them, but in this case it would be relatively open and shut if there is a strong belief that PRISM did all of the following:

1 – Is a Constitutional power granted to Congress.

2 – The Executive properly carried out the power that Congress enacted.

3 – The Executive properly ran the program within the scope of the power grant from Congress for the program.

4 – That no Warrants exceeded the Constitutional limits placed upon the NSA.

5 – That the Judicial branch did not improperly authorize any Warrant for the PRISM program.

6 – That the Executive branch kept Congress properly informed about the program so that Congress could give scrutiny to it so that the program was being run to their satisfaction.

Even though 6 is not a killer to getting a guilty verdict, it then opens the entirety of the reporting chain to prosecution.  And that opens up whole bunches of cans of worms because when the NSA goes rogue and lies to Congress, there is a huge problem in the National Security establishment, all the way up to the DNI who said that such programs didn't even exist nor collect data on American citizens.

So it is my dearest and most sincere wish that Mr. Snowden turn himself in because his worries of Triad contacts inside the US political establishment are valid, and drones are not the only thing in the clandestine arsenal that can take out an individual overseas.  And even Russia isn't safe, either, come to that.

If you are a supporter of the PRISM program then you want Mr. Snowden brought in for trial because you believe it will withstand Constitutional scrutiny.  Really, there is little to worry about in that instance if you believe that.

If you are not a supporter of the PRISM program then you want Mr. Snowden to come in on his own and then support him to get the best crack team of lawyers who know the security laws and how to dance them.  People used to chasing down bureaucratic paper trails, using documents to build a defense and showing just what the scope of the PRISM program actually is.  You don't get that with finger-pointing and argument, but with a court case.

And if you simply want Justice to be served, you want Mr. Snowden to come in or be brought in to trial.  If he acted properly in his assessment of the PRISM program, then he will be vindicated and the program shattered in public disclosure after he is found innocent.  And if he is guilty and the program is Constitutional and legally constructed and run, then the security apparatus will ensure that the information in the trial doesn't see the light of day.

If the entire process, including the Judiciary, has been corrupted thoroughly, then a trial will also show that, quite well.

Being on the run is only a temporary phenomena and you either find a safe haven, get brought in to trial or wind up dead because you know far too much and a trial would reveal that and possibly more.  If Mr. Snowden winds up dead, you will know that is exactly the case.  And then we have a real problem on our hands because someone no longer wants the process to preserve the system.

Structural analysis of Amendment II

From the US Constitution's Bill of Rights:

Amendment II

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

To do some analysis on this Amendment requires examining it by its parts as this is a passive voice clause that hints at it being of a large scope unlike the active voice clauses that mention a particular part of government or government function.  To those not familiar with this sort of terminology I point you to two prior posts looking at the work of Nicholas Rosencranz in – All agree or none shall pass Part 1 and Part 2.  His work on the Subjects and Objects of the US Constitution serve as a means to examine the inter-contextual structure of the Constitution and its Amendments via the SVO structure of sentences.

To begin comes the passive voice system in which the subject is not one of a stated power or function of the US government nor, indeed, any State government which would get direct recognition.  Here the subject is the Militia which has prior mention in the US Constitution which allows for the context of Amendment II to be seen in light of what the prior citations are for this subject.  In Article I, Section 8 there is this mention:

To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;

These are passive voice clauses as compared to the five more active voice clauses seen preceding them in Section 8 regarding the Army and Navy which are power grants to Congress:

To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences against the Law of Nations;

To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;

To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;

To provide and maintain a Navy;

To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces;

In these clauses Congress is granted power to do things: To define and punish Piracies and Felonies; To declare war, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; To raise and support Armies; To provide and maintain a Navy; To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces.

These are all things Congress is granted power to do and they are specific power grants to specific Objects be they legislative in nature or to parts of the government specifically created and cited by this language.  Congress is not granted power to create the Militia but to arm, organize, train and discipline the Militia when it is actively called up for service.  This is a function not of creation but of regulation to normalize the operations of the Militia to that of the military power granted to Congress.  This is not a power grant to Congress for creation of such a body or organization.  This is the power granted to Congress for the Militia is exacting: it may provide for calling forth the Militia and that the Militia will act under the Law to suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions.  In those two instances Congress is granted only the power to tell the Militia it must act in accordance to the Laws of the Union which are not just the civil laws but the military laws used to govern the stated Army and Navy powers of Congress.  Those Laws are those of the Piracies and Felonies, War, Letters, Rules of Capture, and Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces as well as the Militia.  These are militarily known as the Laws of War and are operational in nature, which means they are how a military is to operate and what the rules are it is to follow when in war.

The internal organization, creation, and all other powers for how the Militia gets its officers are not granted to Congress but to the States the Militia comes from.  That is to say that the power of assigning officers, creating drill routines, how often training is supposed to happen and how the Militia gets organized is not granted to Congress but to the States separately.  The second clause is thus one of regulation during a call-up to service which is strictly limited to war or suppression of insurrection.

From this the Militia begins to get a definition:

1) Militias are State bodies created by the States,

2) Militias can be called into service by Congress during war or to suppress insurrection,

3) Congress can regularize the operations of Militias to be in accord with army and navy laws, rules, procedures and common arms,

4) Militias have their internal command structure determined by their respective States, not by Congress,

5) Militias are not regular forces under the command of Congress and are explicitly stated as bodies that may be called forth in service to the Union but are otherwise not under Congressional power.

There are two additional clauses in Article I that deal with these powers, and they are in Section 10, which is in regards to the States, and I will give you the first and third clauses as the second does not deal with war powers:

No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.

[..]

No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.

These are active voice prohibitions and exceptions that pertain to the war powers and the Militia is an adjunct to those powers.  The first is an explicit prohibition on the States on war powers that they may not utilize nor exercise: Treaties, Alliance, Confederation and Letters.  The second is an active voice prohibition with exception.  States are not allowed without Consent of Congress to keep Troops or warships in time of peace or enter into Agreement or Compact with another State or foreign Power, or engage in war.  The exception is explicit on these things: unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.  Any State suffering invasion or in imminent Danger that no other forces can come to defend the State is then relieved of such prohibitions.

From this we get another definition of the Militia:

6) Militia are not Troops or navy.

That is Militias are not standing forces but those individuals of a State who come together to practice the arts of war but do not form a standing military organization.  They do not get regular pay from the State.  While uniforms may be regularized, actually getting one can be done either by purchase or donation of used equipment.  In fact all the equipment and supplies rely on those who volunteer for such work without pay and with only the internal rank recognition as formulated by their State.  As is often seen in movie depictions these are 'Honorary' titles, save during call up to arms by Congress or utilized by their State to combat invasion or Dangers, in which case they become active and formal titles of rank.

A Militia  is not the National Guard unit as that is part of an organization directly created by Congress, under standard Congressional regulations for the army and the navy, with its internal structure defined by Congress.  National Guard have many appearances of Militia in duties and their ability to be called up by Governors but their internal command structure is one created by Congress, not the States. 

If the National Guard were a Militia they would be able to own their own weapons and equipment, be responsible for them and train as their States provided for, as well as have rank positions that were solely a State concern.  The bases, armories, equipment, supplies, provisioning, and all other things would be the property of the Militia, the members of the Militia or set aside by the State to form volunteer Troops that answer to the State, first, then federal government only during times of war or insurrection.  In some instances the National Guard is explicitly called a Reserve Unit of a military branch, and a Militia is specifically not a Reserve but an autonomous unit under direct regulation of their respective States as non-standing forces.

Moving on to Article II, Section 2 and the Executive Branch there is the following, in part:

The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States; [..]

This is an active voice in 'The President shall...' and a direct and specific power grant to the individual of the President.  As leader of the armed forces, the President also becomes leader of the Militia of the several States only when they are called into service by Congress.  Thus there is a two part requirement with order precedence: active call into service by Congress then allows the Presidential power of command.  What is interesting is that the States generally place their Governor (or other determined Executive) in charge of the Militia during call to service for the State. 

This is an ongoing tradition of the several States as existed before the Constitution  as I examined for a number of the States in this posting.  Indeed during such times of service a Governor's power grant of Field Marshal or General (or whatever a State determines it to be) would then place the Governor in charge of his Militia during call up by the legislature in that State and such duties would also place that Governor in charge during a call up by Congress as the leader of the Militia.  This would serve as a check and balance on the President and federal power and also allow for a voice in wartime to be heard from the States, especially on operations taking place within that State (to repel an invasion, say).  The President would get overall command of forces, yes, but the particular way those commands are passed down would be through the Governor (who may appoint a State determined Militia Officer in charge of actual disposition, but the chain of command would still be present).

That is the Executive power grant and it is short and sweet.

In the Judicial power grant in Article III there is this from Section 2 and do note the internal link to an Amendment is in situ from the Archives:

The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority;--to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls;--to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction;--to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party;--to Controversies between two or more States;-- between a State and Citizens of another State,--between Citizens of different States,--between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects.

In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction. In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make.

The Trial of all Crimes, except in Cases of Impeachment, shall be by Jury; and such Trial shall be held in the State where the said Crimes shall have been committed; but when not committed within any State, the Trial shall be at such Place or Places as the Congress may by Law have directed.

During active calling for the Militia they serve as an adjunct to the regular forces and under the codes for them set by Congress.  In general when operating in the field on hostile territory, even during an insurrection, the State may not be said to be in control of such territory where that conflict is taking place or that the actual land is contested via force of arms.  Thus the military code is in place for field operations and as they are not normal, civilian operations they operate under the Courts Martial system.  Thus Courts Martial are normally not jury trials but ones by Tribunal or, if in the field during combat, often by a commanding officer who must make a life or death decision on the spot.

There is an appeals process to the Supreme Court and that is a direct and mentioned power grant to it.

Thus we now know who regulates the Militia: the States in Peace and the Congress only under calling forth in war.  This regulation is one that is in the nature of training, organization, and command structure.  Prior to the US Constitution, State Constitutions tended to leave the lowest and most local level of the Militia up to local organization and officers below a certain rank, and then those companies would come under the structure regulated by the State.  In this case 'regulation' is in regards to the regularization of duties, training, etc. not in what you arm yourself with.  If a higher level wants the Militia to have different arms in the field, then it must supply them and train the Militia in its usage, which is the Congressional language that says as much.  There are no prohibitions in such regularization and, indeed, it is usually an upgrading of arms and armament when it is supplied by Congress.  And nothing prevents the Militia from using what it wants to as each individual must support himself within the organization.

From this we now have a much better definition of the Subject of the Amendment II: the Militia.

Next is the Verb in the SVO sentence and it reads as follows:

being necessary to the security of a free State,

The Militia is a pre-requisite to a free State and that has a similar mention in the body of the Constitution in Article IV, Section 4:

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened), against domestic Violence.

This is an active voice part of the compact between the States and the US government which is created by the signatories to the Constitution, which are the duly elected representatives of that State with the assent of the people of that State.  The purpose of this larger government is to ensure that a Republican Form of Government is in every State, which is to say a multi-way power division between branches that have separate power domains, and that the government shall protect each State from Invasion.  Here we learn an important proviso on the prior Article I, Section 8 mention of suppression of insurrections: that can only be done when a State Legislature, or Executive when the Legislature is not actively convened, petitions Congress for this intervention.  Thus there is a State check on the suppression of insurrection power and is broadened to domestic Violence for the States.  Not only is this a positive check on Congressional over-reach, but it actually puts a greater scope on what a State may see as violence against the State as an entity.

It can then be said that as the States are guaranteed a Republican Form of Government and that each State shall be a free State, that the Republican Form of Government is a pre-requisite for a free State.  Indeed this goes with prior examination of Art. I, Sec. 10 and that the scope of governments in the States are to have Legislative, Executive and Judicial branches, although their exact powers are determined by each State.

A Militia then serves two purposes from Amendment II:

1. It serves to keep an established free State as free,

2. It is the foundation of a free State as its guarantor.

The US government is only to serve to protect each of the States and to come in service when a State Legislature or, in limited circumstances, Executive calls upon Congress for help.  As seen in Art. I, Sec. 10, the normal prohibitions upon a State to keep Troops disappears during an invasion, emergency which shall not admit of Delay which is larger domestic Violence against the State as an entity.  Isn't it nice how the same stuff gets repeated in slightly different terms throughout the Constitution so that people can get a good idea of what a specific power is?  Art. IV, Sec. 4 does that without ever once mentioning the Militia, and yet it now fully scopes out the power relationship with regards to it via the States and the larger government they have created.

If this larger government is the external guarantor of a free State, the Militia is the internal guarantor of it.  Amendment II puts the Militia in an exactly equal power position as the entirety of the US federal government in the Verb activity of the Militia.  They are exactly equal in power and are given the same domain with the exception of which is internal and which is external, and the line between them is demarcated and explicitly drawn.  It is because of that equivalence of power and stature that the Congress cannot control and regulate the Militia at all times, as that would make a sham of having a free State.  To have a free State you must have:

1. A Militia.

2. A Republican Form of Government.

Anything that is a necessary prerequisite for something else thus places it ahead of the other thing.  If A is necessary to having B, then B cannot be necessary to have A: A comes before B.  And if B is necessary to get C, then A comes before C.

A = Militia

B = free State

C = United States government

A then B.

B then C.

Militia before a free State before the United States government.

That is the explicit logic structure set up by Amendment II and is in accord with creation of the Constitution by free States.  You do not get to the United States before you get to a free State and you do not get to a free State before you have a Militia.

Now comes the Object of the SVO sentence:

the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Who makes up the Militia which is the Subject of this Amendment?  That is answered: the people keeping and bearing Arms in a way that is not infringed upon.

Who would do such infringing?  Who is this prohibiting, in other words?

The power of a passive voice is that when it is not explicit (which would create an active voice, as in Amendment I) then it is universal for that domain in question.  You can go to Amendment III and see this sort of thing at work with the 'No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without consent of the Owner...'  This is a universal protection against any that would house a Soldier in a private residence.  It does not matter if Congress wants it done or if the Executive orders it, or a Judge requires it: it is prohibited from all THREE from doing this.  Their power is limited, and circumscribed during peace time and then in times of war there is necessary military law to follow for territories under dispute.  In other words even during wartime there is a necessary set of laws to follow for Soldiers as set by Congress.  Yet at no time is 'set by law' mentioned in Amendment II, which means there are no provisos to Congress making law in this area.

Amendment IV also is a passive voice reading 'The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers...' is one that is against the Executive who must seek a Warrant from a Judge before violating these protections.  Otherwise, on just the say-so of an Executive this cannot be done.  What is more is that Congress cannot order a blanket search by law without having provisions for the Judiciary to moderate it via the Warrant process.  Yet the Executive and Judiciary are not mentioned in Amendment II.

Take a look at Amendment V, and I'll do a bit more with it here as it mentions the Militia, but as individuals:

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Note that while serving under call-up during wartime means you are subjected to military law and its system, so the standard civilian protections are not enforceable for individuals serving during a war.  Why don't jihadis get a civil trial?  They are at war with us, waging illegal war and are subject to military justice whenever they wage war against the Nation.  Similarly if you are in the Militia under call-up and commit a crime in-theater, you can expect military justice as given by Congress.  Thus when called up the Militia is under military law, and when not serving they are under civilian law.  It would be expected that during time of training in the voluntary Militia you would be under the laws set by your State for such activities and training.

It can be seen that there are laws for the individual regarding the Militia, how it is formed (done by the State) and how it serves under call-up either by the State or by Congress.  These are not prohibitory laws for firearms, but laws for conduct and order within the ranks and during combat.  Thus these are not venues to prohibit arms of any sort and they are universal and inclusive of not just the federal government but, because A then B, of the State as well.  Internally this is consistent with the other Amendments in the Bill of Rights and the Body of the Constitution as well, and this provision has rooting in both and must be read as part of the existing structure of the Constitution itself.

Would this mean that there are no prohibitions on any arms for anyone?

No, there are prohibitions and one of the simplest deals with loss of certain civil rights by criminals.  Convicted felons have their civil rights restricted in regards to the franchise and the keeping and bearing of arms as such individuals have demonstrated that they have placed themselves outside the law for their own reasons in the way of crime and are no longer trusted with either the franchise nor the right to bear arms.  But do note that felons who pick up any readily available arms for self-defense against animals or other criminals (or in times of war) will not be prosecuted as they have exercised their positive natural liberty to preserve their own life.  To those wishing to give back the franchise to felons, why not the right to keep and bear arms?  If they have, indeed, served their time and done penance, and you wish to trust them with the franchise, then why not with arms as they come in hand-in-hand should not your trust be perfect in that regard?

Looking back to the Common Law, there were restrictions on arms one could not bear on their own, such as cannons and mortars.  These crew-served weapons one could own (a man's home is his castle) but couldn't take along with him to the store or city council meeting.  Keeping and bearing meant that you could keep such heavier arms, but had restricted utilization of them because you could not bear them.  Keep and bear arms means things you can carry with you.  And back in that day it was not just muskets, pistols and such, but axes, swords, long knives, sabers... anything you could afford, really.  About the only other restrictions were on those who had lost all touch with reality, those who were violently insane, or just unable to learn how to operate even the simplest of arms or who were so withdrawn that very little could reach them save hunger.  They were usually restricted by confinement, kept from dangerous objects by family or cared for by individuals or institutions that tended to the sick.  If you heard voices but performed your duties, recognized commands and realized the voices in your head couldn't order you to do anything but that guy with rank insignia could, then you had the opportunity to defend yourself like the rest of them.  While we may have improved upon diagnosis, description and some treatment of these problems, the social controls seem to be less, today, than they were way back when before the Framing.  If you can't trust your fellow man to help on this, then bucking the stupidity up to government isn't an answer and becomes a whole different sort of problem.

Thus the restrictions upon individuals are those of self-government, caring for your fellow man, and seeing that those who are criminal really may do their time, but that lack of self-control for a felon means that there is a serious lack of something there that time just may not heal.  That's about it. 

A free State is not just kept by armed citizens, it is formed by armed citizens, and that logic is one that is at the basis of Amendment II.  It is a recognition that the positive natural liberty of bearing arms is not just self-defense, but in the creation of a free State that will recognize your rights as an individual to be free to live in a society that respects you and that government is forced to respect by its very foundation.  Of course there are dangers to this, but there is worse danger and blood... rivers of blood... due to tyrants and autocrats, despots and dictators, emperors of many stripe who have decided that slavery for others is better for them... when government is not forced to recognize that it is accountable to free citizens who are willing to change or abolish government when it no longer respects their freedom and liberty.

Liberty, security and those giving both away

“Anyone who trades liberty for security deserves neither liberty nor security”

- Benjamin Franklin (via Thinkexist)

The rights secured against government are particular and many, especially with regard to the US federal government and by incorporation to the States.  Additionally those powers not granted to the federal government are retained by the States and the people.  These are not new securities, by any means, and many go back not just to the Magna Carta and the pre-existing contracts between the people and their sovereigns, but also through the works of the post-Westphalian West that helped to delineate the differences between Moral Law, Natural Law and Civil Law.  As Natural rights and liberty are granted to us because we are part of the natural universe, there is no way that those rights can be severed from people as individuals and we can only agree to not exercise certain rights and liberties when we create government at the personal level and then at every level thereafter.  Of all governments it is self-government that is the strongest since it starts with each individual.  All other governments must utilize exterior power to enforce any larger agreements upon individuals as governments.  As Tom Paine puts it, government is the Punisher and all governments are created from the bowers of the ruins of paradise.

Freedom of speech is one of the prime rights secured against government as it is the way we communicate our inner-most feelings and ideas with each other as people.  As a people we are guaranteed that communication via the freedom of the press so that all means to communicate with each other are open to us.  With these two is the freedom of religion, the right to communicate our inner-most feelings to the Creator.  Together these are all descriptive of freedom of thought, the freedom to be oneself to oneself as you are.  Individuals who secure these rights are known as citizens, others that do not secure them properly are subjects as they allow their interior self to be defined by exterior forces.  Yet, within the heart of every subject is a free man, a citizen, if they would but allow themselves the freedom to think as they will unfettered by exterior forces.  This is the most powerful of rights as it allows self-direction, self-creation and the ability to reshape the very world by daring to find a way to do the impossible.

In our world there are those threatened by citizens, by free men, who dare to express their own ideas freely.  This is not the mischievous negative liberty to scare others (the yelling fire in a crowded theater paradigm) which is an attempt to subjugate others to fear of physical pain so as to cause pain.  In that same category is the incitement to riot which is a calling on the fear and hatred of others of some object, person, people, race, religion, or other demonized other of the moment.  Nor is there a thing known as 'hate speech' as there are only hateful people, and such people deserve the right and liberty to espouse their inner-most self so others can see just how small and hateful such people are.  Such speech is not applauded, but is counter-acted by various means, including just pointing out how hateful and baseless it is.  Thus even the worst, most vile of speech is not remedied by censorship on the outside, but through reasoning of individuals to understand just what the impacts of such speech are and why it is not good for individuals to do it.  Either that or learn to cope with the effects of such speech, that choice is up to individuals, not governments.

Current events always bring forward Franklin and his wisdom is one to be heeded as he helped to bring so much common sense to our Nation and because it is common sense and easy to understand it accords within free people to abide by it.  Events are within a time frame or period, and yet how we decide to deal with them help to chart the course of ourselves, our Nation and all humanity.  Thus your decision on how to deal with speech you do not agree with is up to you.  Sadly, there are those who want to vest that into bureaucracy we call government.  Take Eric Posner, at Slate, in has article of 25 SEP 2012 The World Doesn’t Love the First Amendment:

The universal response in the United States to the uproar over the anti-Muslim video is that the Muslim world will just have to get used to freedom of expression. President Obama said so himself in a speech at the United Nations today, which included both a strong defense of the First Amendment and (“in the alternative,” as lawyers say) and a plea that the United States is helpless anyway when it comes to controlling information. In a world linked by YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook, countless videos attacking people’s religions, produced by provocateurs, rabble-rousers, and lunatics, will spread to every corner of the world, as fast as the Internet can blast them, and beyond the power of governments to stop them. Muslims need to grow a thick skin, the thinking goes, as believers in the West have done over the centuries. Perhaps they will even learn what it means to live in a free society, and adopt something like the First Amendment in their own countries.

But there is another possible response. This is that Americans need to learn that the rest of the world—and not just Muslims—see no sense in the First Amendment. Even other Western nations take a more circumspect position on freedom of expression than we do, realizing that often free speech must yield to other values and the need for order. Our own history suggests that they might have a point.

Note that first part I put into boldface, about the means of communication and what is said: that is the power of free speech and the press, both.   I will repeat it as it is a complete logic construct in its own right:

In a world linked by YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook, countless videos attacking people’s religions, produced by provocateurs, rabble-rousers, and lunatics, will spread to every corner of the world, as fast as the Internet can blast them, and beyond the power of governments to stop them.

Without a free press the ability to disseminate ideas to point out tyrannical moves to punish people to think freely is then put into the very hands of those who seek more power via government.  Indeed, if government has not the power to stop such speech, as Mr. Posner implies, then there is no governmental remedy for such speech.  That is pure and absolute logic and proposing to make law of any sort that intrudes into this realm is backward, not by my logic but by that proposed by Mr. Posner.

The second part I highlighted is a call for self-censorship in appeasement of those who cannot or will not handle other people's freedoms well.  That is, individuals must censor themselves so as not to arouse the hatreds of those who will find any reason or rationale to express rage.  If it is not a video it is cartoons.  If not cartoons it is a book.  If not a book, then a poem.  The point is that it isn't the medium of expression that is at fault, nor those doing the speaking, but those doing the listening or receiving of such information that they cannot stand you not thinking and believing as they do.  To censor oneself in the face of such barbaric rage that seeks to impose its beliefs on others by silencing it is to give up that most especial of freedom: the freedom to be oneself.

That is not a 'response' but appeasement in the face of barbarism.

This is inviting more barbaric activity by becoming silent and passive.

It is acquiescing to barbaric actions by silencing oneself about them.

And no free man would ever consent to doing that.

This is not an 'alternative': it is inviting the death of civilization via the veto of the violent and intolerant.

To ask people to give away such rights and the liberty to use them, after going through the vagaries of the Left and Right, Mr. Posner puts this up as a reason to become silent in the face of barbarism:

We have to remember that our First Amendment values are not universal; they emerged contingently from our own political history, a set of cobbled-together compromises among political and ideological factions responding to localized events. As often happens, what starts out as a grudging political settlement has become, when challenged from abroad, a dogmatic principle to be imposed universally. Suddenly, the disparagement of other people and their beliefs is not an unfortunate fact but a positive good. It contributes to the “marketplace of ideas,” as though we would seriously admit that Nazis or terrorist fanatics might turn out to be right after all. Salman Rushdie recently claimed that bad ideas, “like vampires … die in the sunlight” rather than persist in a glamorized underground existence. But bad ideas never die: They are zombies, not vampires. Bad ideas like fascism, Communism, and white supremacy have roamed the countryside of many an open society.

The First Amendment is a securing of our Natural right of freedom of self, which is independent of the US Constitution.  The so-called 'contingency' misses the fact that this right had become an established one under the common law, with roots dating back not just to the Magna Carta but to the earliest law frameworks worked out in the House of Wessex.  In fact the concept that is embodied in this framework of law is that known as a 'contract' between the people and their government.  Contracts have varied over time, yes, and the extent of the limits of government start with these very first contracts that stipulate a concept of there being no taxation without representation by the governed to agree to such taxes.  The changes in these contracts and the limits of government are not ones on paper as those only come after countless changes of government, kings, and virtual despots.  These agreements are written after the blood has been spilled, victors found, and then limits on victory also found.  This Anglo-Saxon concept of limiting government and getting representation into it can be dated back to the 9th Century AD.  Where other peoples were having their laws and taxes dictated to them by government, the Anglo-Saxons were putting government on notice that it is by the consent of the governed.  As a Swedish King acknowledges that the Crown cannot go where the people do not want it to go and that the head wearing the Crown is liable to the same laws as the governed.

The Universality of Natural rights only came after 1648 and the Great Peace of Westphalia that got government out of using religion to gain more power and prestige for the rulers via religion.  This post-Westphalian European concept marries up with the English Common Law very well, as the latter is based on low-level contractual assurance, checks, balances and agreement, not sovereign dictates from the ruler.  With the Enlightenment the Natural Law is seen as universal and, thusly, the rights and liberty that they endow go to every man at every time, if they have but the wisdom to see them for what they are.  This is not a dogma but a piece of knowledge that put to an end the Divine Right Monarchy concept and helped to install a concept of sovereign power being accountable to the governed.  It is not universal because of dogma, the dogma comes from the understanding of the self-evident universality of these rights.  Clawing out positive rights from the negative power of government has been a fight going on for nearly two millennia, not since 1787 or 1776 or 1648.

In seeking censorship, Mr. Posner puts forward that 'bad ideas never die'.  That is correct.  And censorship only makes them more attractive, not less, if the Banned in Boston booklist is any measure of such things.  Bad ideas need to be countered, discussed, and the reason they are bad refreshed on a continual basis so that people know why they are bad ideas.  Not doing so, not speaking out against the atrocities of Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot and lesser tyrannical systems like the Ba'athists that grew from Nazism, ensures that you get lovely artifacts like a President having a Mao Christmas tree ornament in the White House, or children wearing apparel festooned with Che the torturer and killer on them.  You can't stop a bad idea by not talking about them, by not calling attention to how bad they are, by not seeking to show how bad they are by the fact that those you seek to talk to will call you racist, phobic or any of a million other names to distract from the fact they are unwilling to talk about how bad their ideas actually are.  Not talking about them allows them to spread because they are malignant and when not countered by simple logic their interior emotional venom allows people to justify all sorts of activities.

Like invading the grounds of Embassies.

Like killing Ambassadors and other protected individuals, which is an Act of War.

Like mass murder.

Like subjugation of the meek by tyrants.

In the end Mr. Posner puts this out:

The final irony is that while the White House did no more than timidly plead with Google to check if the anti-Muslim video violates its policies (appeasement! shout the critics), Google itself approached the controversy in the spirit of prudence. The company declined to remove the video from YouTube because the video did not attack a group (Muslims) but only attacked a religion (Islam). Yet it also cut off access to the video in countries such as Libya and Egypt where it caused violence or violated domestic law. This may have been a sensible middle ground, or perhaps Google should have done more. What is peculiar it that while reasonable people can disagree about whether a government should be able to curtail speech in order to safeguard its relations with foreign countries, the Google compromise is not one that the U.S. government could have directed. That’s because the First Amendment protects verbal attacks on groups as well as speech that causes violence (except direct incitement: the old cry of “Fire!” in a crowded theater). And so combining the liberal view that government should not interfere with political discourse, and the conservative view that government should not interfere with commerce, we end up with the bizarre principle that U.S. foreign policy interests cannot justify any restrictions on speech whatsoever. Instead, only the profit-maximizing interests of a private American corporation can. Try explaining that to the protesters in Cairo or Islamabad.

Again, note the bolded part of this.  Google, as a corporate entity (which is to say an incorporated person) exercised judgment and did what it thought was best.  This is a very exercise of the First Amendment right of Google which is a positive exercise of that right.  Of course this isn't what the government we currently have would have wanted, but so what?  Our rights do not come from government, we only ask that it protect those rights.  And the ability to exercise prudence, caution and adapt circumspection to individual actions is fully and completely within the realm of individuals.

But Mr. Posner decries that very 'profit making entity', which means that if Google were a charitable outfit, that its decisions would be OK?  Those are incorporated entities, as well, yet they do not seek a profit.  The implication is that the US government should impose laws on corporations to make them abide by the will of government policy.  Yet that is not a power handed to the federal government via the contract we call the US Constitution.  If the US government wishes to restrict all civil communications with certain governments then it can do so, of course, but that isn't what Mr. Posner is seeking via his construction of the equation.  He is posing that corporations should become an arm of government policy.  That means every religious organization, every charity, every small business, every thing that we do when we agree to work together and incorporate an entity comes under the control of the US government for speech and, by implication, all foreign policy.  Yet it has not the power to do so because we do not grant such powers to the government.  Nor to any government.

What you hear is the beg for totalitarianism under the guise of anti-capitalism.  Even worse it is a begging to destroy the meaning of our contracts writ small, between individuals, and writ large, between the people and their government.  Mr. Posner doesn't seek a trade in liberty for security, but a trade in liberty for tyranny with no interceding points.

The 1 to 30,000 Amendment Petition

The following is available at Petitions Online and has background with this document:

United States House of Representatives Proportion Amendment

Section 1.
Article 1, Section 2 shall be amended from: "The Number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty Thousand, but each State shall have at Least one Representative;"

To: "The Number of Representatives shall be one for every thirty Thousand, but each State shall have at Least one Representative;"


Section 2.
The House of Representatives shall have no personal staff. House Committee and other Staff for maintaining the House is limited to the size of that of the 109th Congress.


Section 3.
The House of Representatives member offices that have direct and secure communications between them shall be considered as part of the physical House of Representatives.


Section 4.
This Amendment shall take effect in by the second Congress after the Passage of this Amendment and shall have power to enact this with appropriate legislation to facilitate this Amendment.

The 10 years that changed the path of America

The following is a Position Paper of The Jacksonian Party.

This is not the decade you are thinking of, unless you have been paying very careful attention, and even then the full scope and impact of it have not been felt. A decade where America was involved in War but would not fully fight it, when the President would alter course for future generations, when Congress would accumulate power to itself and remove some from the People. A decade of vibrancy and change, after which the Nation would step into a new world order and try to expunge the thought of war from its mind. This was the decade that would forever change what it meant to be an American and start to alienate the People from its Government.

That decade is the one from 1909-1919.

In 1909 the US had called for an International Opium Conference to start to limit the opium trade. This had been spurred on by American missionaries in the Far East that had seen the social havoc of opium in China and the social decay of it there along with disrupting the counter-insurgency work of the Philippines by the US. The Hague Convention of 1912 would lead to international agreements on limiting or eliminating the opium trade. This Conference would lead to the very first legislation in the US to curb drugs: Harrison Narcotics Tax Act of 1914. This law was the very first in US history in which Congress tried to decide what an individual could or could not ingest in the way of drugs. This was done due to that missionary zeal and the feeling that such drugs were ruining the Nation as a whole. And it is hard to see where opium in cough syrup was a great help to much of anyone, since it hid tuberculosis. The use of it by mothers on children was a problem and should have been restricted by the States. This feeling by the prohibitionists to outlaw such was one that ran strongly religious communities, which saw the overseas use of such drugs and worked to marginalize or eliminate them for use in the US. Still, it was under Treaty obligations that the Harrison Act was promulgated, to uphold the US signing on to the 1912 Hague Convention. The far reaching effects of this are felt to this day with organized crime and Narco-terrorism rife in those areas that grow plants that lead to making narcotics and makes it such a profitable business in the criminal realm to this day. For the first time a social movement to limit the rights of Citizens had gained a foothold in America after the Civil War.

Also started in 1909 was Amendment XVI to the US Constitution that would allow Congress to collect income tax. Prior to that the US used a system of property taxes and tariffs to generate income, but the first was seen as being unwieldy and the movement to income tax was pushed by a view that the wealthy were not paying their share of the burden in the Nation. While it has done that, it has also been broadened to include such things as tips, wagers on bets, and even finding something of value and selling it. All of that now falls within the power first given to Congress once this Amendment was ratified in 1913. Until that point in time taxes were levied via apportionment to the States via the census so that it would fall equally upon all in the Union. Also in this era was the Clayton Antitrust Act that would further limit monopoly power and cover problems with business sales and mergers that would unduly concentrate market power as an extension of the Sherman Antitrust Act. These were aimed at reducing the power of wealthy individuals, but also put power in the hands of Congress to apportion taxation as it saw fit upon income and put limitations on how much market power a business can accumulate. While this may have made collecting taxes 'easier' the question of if such would actually lead to a 'fairer' assessment of taxes is still debated. With the ability of wealthy individuals to get loopholes and tax havens and other means to gain income outside of the income routes, the burden of this has fallen to the working class, by and large, although the wealthiest still do pay the largest amount in taxes. In the modern era the movement back to a more 'flat tax' which removes all loopholes is one that continues to be seen as more fair, even if graduated by income, as it removes the power of lobbyists to unduly influence legislation on behalf of the wealthy.

In 1911 the movement for the direct election of Senators by the public was put into what would become Amendment XVII which would also be ratified in 1913. Here the ill was seen as bribery and corruption at the State level to gain Senate seats, and these problems continued on for decades. Some States ran referenda to elect Senators and the election date was also regularized to that of the General Election. Still, the ability to 'wheel and deal' at the State level to gain Senate seats was seen as a major problem by the majority, and this Amendment was made to allow for direct selection by popular vote. This also changed the balance of power so that both Houses of Congress were now in hands of direct election instead of by dispersing power to the States and the People for the Senate and House respectively. The concentration of power in Washington via those that could win and continue to win these elections changed the turnover rate in the Senate and removed a major role for the States to play in the Federal system of governance. Previously that had been a check on Federal power via the States and a limit to the People so that more moderate voices could be heard in the Senate.

Also in 1911 came Public Law 62-5 which would permanently set the size of the House at 435 members and allow voting portion to float while keeping a set House size. With the enactment of this law in 1913, the modern Congress type would be set and the difficulties of it would take time to manifest. The first and most important of these is that as the population increased, the amount of diversity in the House remained the same. Seats would shift from State to State, instead of having States grow in their number of seats over time. Although gerrymandering or 'non-compact districts' had always been a problem, they were seen as amenable to the fact that more would be created over time. Re-draw the districts every decade and you get a different mix of communities. In a set system, the redraws come at a much lower rate and only happen due to internal shifts in proportion of population, not absolute size. With that comes House seats that become 'safe' election after election and often for decades at a time with a single member for that seat.

Finally, in 1919 would come Amendment XVIII for the Prohibition of Alcohol, and while that would be repealed, it pointed to how far social ills were seen as needing a National remedy instead of via local control. Taken as a whole, these Amendments and Public Law would greatly change the nature of representative democracy within the Republic of the United States and start a major power shift towards Washington. With that would also come the money of wealthy individuals to start influencing this new form of Government and change the outlook of the Federal system itself in that doing. Lobbying this more constant government set-up would entrench power and money over time and give affluence access to the National Government.

Changes were not only happening due to Amendments and in Congress, however, as a major change in the Executive would be brought about in this same era by Woodrow Wilson. And with President Wilson the source of the strain of American political thought that would come to bear his name was started: Wilsonianism. President Wilson would approach the world in an attempt to promulgate American commerce and ideals, in that order. He would also search to bring a re-ordering of Nations so as to avoid the scourge of war, but then have troubles addressing the problems of tyranny.

Staunchly anti-imperialist in outlook and pro-business, Woodrow Wilson would look to try and safeguard both of those during the looming war in the Europe, while trying to keep America out of the war. Running on a Neutrality platform that was isolationist in conception, Wilson won a second term in office as the War dragged on, and increased hitting more neutral shipping and Wilson then turned his decision to supporting the War which his opponent had run on during the campaign. In the previous campaign of 1912, President Wilson had supported the idea of a Jewish homeland in the Middle East, which was a continuation of American evangelical tradition that had been in-place for more than a century. What had changed during that time, however, was the idea of a Christian homeland where the Jews would naturally convert via evangelism to one that would be Zionist in outlook. This too, gained support, although Jews in America, at 1912 were not so much convinced of this. The people who were convinced of it, however, were the British and their outlook and secret treaty to carve up the Ottoman Empire once the war was over to give a homeland, but not Nation to the Jews in the Middle East was presented to President Wilson in 1917.

The plan had been seen by others in the Administration who thought no good could come of it, and President Wilson, himself, when talking to Arthur Balfour, the designer of the Sykes-Picot treaty was that it would be difficult to support something that sounded like a 'brand of tea' . Wilson would characterize this as the 'old diplomacy' of the imperial powers and was aimed at selfish gain for France and Britain. While he would give tacit support of it, and Balfour announce a broadly supportive outline of the British view of a homeland for the Jews in Palestine, the actual treaty was something not accepted 'as-is' by President Wilson. The reason for that is the United States would not declare war on a key German ally: The Ottoman Empire.

This set many aghast in Congress, including ex-President Teddy Roosevelt who decried *not* going to war against an ally of the Kaiser and supporting the Alliance fully. He had experienced the problems of the Ottoman Turks right after their massacre of Armenians and as word filtered out that even worse genocide was taking place Roosevelt and others in Congress were pushing hard for the entirety of those that opposed the United States should be attacked. On the political front it was beyond belief that the US would *not* attack an ally of an enemy that was seen as the 'weak link' . President Wilson put forward that as Turkey had shown no outright hostility towards the US and that the US had much in the way of trade with the Ottoman's, that putting that in danger would be very harmful to the United States. He also worried that US missionaries would then be targeted by the Ottomans in their view of clearing Europeans out of Turkey and the Empire. Also he put forward that the US could not sustain a war in Europe and the Middle East and that the Nation could not expand its military forces fast enough to have an impact in that theater of war. Finally, the start of the US oil industry in the Middle East was demonstrating the ability to generate income from the region and Wilson had hard problems going to war and seeing those resources fall into the hands of the Ottomans completely.

The view of Teddy Roosevelt and others was that if the US did *not* take part as a full partner in war, then the US would have a greatly diminished say in the peace agreements. By being a 'junior partner' unwilling to fully commit to support of Allies in war, the US would be unable to help guide the peace. Out of this conflict would come one of the most noxious of ideas held by the United States to this day: that trade is more important than freedom.

While espousing this as a 'War for Democracy' President Wilson was unable to demonstrate that the US would carry through fully on that intention. As the war ground down to a close, the worse fears of many came slowly forward as the war ended and the US was left espousing ''The Fourteen Points plan', but being unable to demonstrate the resolve to carry through on it. Even worse was that the plan, itself, in an attempt to end warfare as a valid right of Sovereign Nations, was not grounded in this world but in some other where everyone actually *does* want to live peacefully with their neighbor. The preceding century alone should have disabused President Wilson of that, but his boyhood memories of the horror and aftermath of the US Civil War drove him on a quest to end warfare.

While some of 'The Fourteen Points' are laudable, like the Abolition of Secret Treaties and Freedom of the Seas, others that saw Disarmament and attempts to decolonize areas of the world ran head-long into the agreements already forming up by the UK and France. The resulting Versailles Treaty and follow-on Treaties to address the Middle East saw little deviation from the existing UK and French outlooks as the Ottoman Empire was carved up and sections put into semi-colonial 'mandates' under the control and protection of Britain and France. The US was left fighting to support an indigenous Turkish State, a homeland for the Jews and then demurred on taking up any mandate to protect the Armenian people as President Wilson did not think that the people of the US would agree to such a foreign activity.

The final piece that would be entered into this would be the League of Nations, which would attempt to forestall future wars. What President Wilson did not see coming was that this was alien to the United States as it involved the encroachment of National Sovereignty by a foreign body that was not held accountable by any direct or democratic means. Taken as a whole, President Wilson by being unable to be considered a full and equal partner in World War I was unable to push lofty goals after that war and fought for some few gains, such as a better alignment of National boundaries to ethnic ones but that was limited, and large areas of the Middle East and borders drawn that had no recognition of indigenous peoples or their ethnic backgrounds. And immediately after signing such Treaties, Turkey, in particular, started to abrogate them and push for some ethnic enclaves, like the Kurds, to be sub-divided into these new Nations.

What comes from this are some of the major problems that would become hallmarks of US Foreign Policy and a main problem for the US in the late 20th century and into the 21st.

First is 'Realism' in Foreign Policy further aided by the 'Arabist' part of the State Department. This co-joining of commercial interests to foreign policy would push that "stability" and primarily economic stability, was more important in pushing human rights than anything else in the Middle East and globally. This was the intent and goal of President Wilson and it has failed utterly and miserably in this region known as the Middle East and has been the cause to support tyrannical regimes and dictatorships in that region and sacrificing freedom and liberty to this idea that trade will gain liberty and freedom. By keeping everything 'stable' during the Cold War, the outlook was to not rock the boat and hope for the wiles of freedom to work their way into the hearts of people there. This, patently, did *not* happen until the US finally landed a real army in the Middle East with intent to take down a tyrant. The very thing that President Wilson could not think of nor sanction as worthy of doing is the *only* thing that has given any chance for freedom in that region outside of Israel. Those that push Free Trade to free people have gotten the order *wrong* and have forgotten that the US was founded on freedom allowing for the People to have a say on trade so that it could empower them. While it may provide more in the way of material goods, such trade has not stimulated a path to freedom and has, contrarily, made it easier and cheaper for the enemies of liberty to arm against it on a global and dispersed basis. When the 'Realists' could see no end to the USSR and predicted it would be around at least until 2030 if not longer, the entire foundation of 'Realism' vaporized along with the USSR when it collapsed. Those that continue to push for this concept have not addressed the global problems that it has caused nor demonstrated how they will ever get any accountability into the trade process to help secure liberty and freedom.

Second in this is the idea of global organizations being able to remove the capability of Nations to defend themselves via disarmament. While being a very lofty goal, the concept that humanity will not look at any tool as having a capability for harm is misguided in the extreme. Further, so long as there are individuals and groups of same that look to espouse and enforce doctrine and their own oversight on others, the need to be armed for self-defense alone is necessary and right. And as even a shield may bash, so it is difficult to find any defense that cannot be used in an offensive and provocative manner. By trying to entrust this to a larger organization of States, each with their own self-interest, what is developed is the least capable system for assuring liberty and freedom and a system that allows tyrants to befuddle those trusting such systems while they continue to expand their influence via force of arms. A misguided notion is that the League of Nations failed because the US did not join it. The League of Nations had no means or methodology to succeed, and in every case where the US had *no* stake in the goings-on, which was almost all of them, the actual influence of the US would have been, effectively, nil.

The moment a Nation has a stake in anything, then their position changes, and if they have *no* stake then they have no guide for justice nor for ensuring freedom as such a decision would be seen as imposed without input from those involved. And as those involved are the ones usually under the gun, they are the ones to suffer no matter *what* the decision would be. By relying solely on international good will, without any capability to demonstrate reciprocity and assurance that agreements would be adhered to, the League of Nations like the United Nations, fails constantly in its outlook. Such organizations become stumbling blocks to finding solutions and delay solutions so that they are seen as unjust no matter what is decided. This would, ultimately, lead to Transnationalism and the concept that the Nation State has outlived its usefulness

Third, and finally, is the thorough misjudging the character of the American People in wartime. President Wilson, wishing to avoid visiting the horrors of the Civil War on a new generation, did not take into account how the US was already reacting to the massacre and holocaust of the Armenian People in the closing decades of the 19th century. And while a number of religious schools opened in the Middle East, they promulgated a form of Nationalism that would turn into Pan-Arabism. Many of the very same kings and dictators that the US would have to oppose in the middle 20th century were taught at US backed religious schools in the Middle East. That flow of information, while still having a great rose colored tint to it due to religion, was bringing home the fact that the oppression of peoples in that region was ongoing and deep. The lack of freedom and liberty was highly apparent throughout the Ottoman Empire and some of its break-away components. The disgust that the American People had for the Kaiser was also reflected upon the Ottoman Empire which was seen as a key ally to Germany. Even after seeing the horrific cost paid by Australia and others to try and invade, Congress *still* pushed for going to war against Turkey, but bowed in this Foreign Policy arena to the President. By not showing the full will to fight *for* liberty and democracy, President Wilson was asking for a half-loaf from America when America was learning that the time to set things right that it had seen as wrong was arriving. The US Armed Forces increased eightfold in under one year and proved to be an aggressive fighting force in the trenches of France and prepared to die in thousands there to help remove the grasp of a tyrant. To do so in the Middle East would have required more resources, but at the end of the war the US was left with an Army with 1 million men in it which pretty much stood the Nation alone in the world at that point in time. The fast and poor demobilization of that Army would lead to more unrest at home in following decades, but to have that sort of capability left demonstrated that America had the will and fighting power to take on much more than just the European theater of war.

By 1919 the United States would see more personal rights removed than had previously been the case all the way up to 1909, a burgeoning economy which was growing larger than any of the remaining world powers, a Congress slowly sliding into an arthritic grasp that would not change much year on year, see the groundwork for the Second World War be built upon, and after that see the slow removal of Nation State legitimacy via those that pushed that no war is worth fighting, that no tyranny is worth opposing and that free trade will free people. When combined, these things have given us a tyrannical brew that is slowly grinding down liberty and freedom at home and abroad and disenfranchising the American People from their Government as that Government drifts more into the hands of permanent power that does not care about party affiliations, just the continuance of those people and families in power.

World War I was, indeed a bad war. It was poorly fought and when the US entered into fighting it did not stand by her ideals. America fought to not lose the war, not win it and the peace thereafter. And that un-lost war remains at the root of much of our modern problems as they stem from there and get nourishment from that vile mass that marks the first genocide of the 20th century. Leaving it un-lost would encourage many more and worse ones to follow. That can either be stopped by discontinuing the things that allow this, or continue on the path we are on which will end in global genocide bought cheaply by the enemies of human liberty.