Texas Fred Gets It Right #tcot #teaparty

Texas Fred is one of my favorite bloggers (second only to Kate), although I don’t necessarily agree with him on some things, I like his style. However, he (and Kate) have picked up on a rather ominous trend in the news media.

Many on the left are trying desperately to link the TEA Party to various anti-American groups, they are trying to convince the innocent viewer that the TEA Party is anti-government.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Please read the CORE VALUES and Mission Statement of The Rowlett TEA Party, then make your own decision. We are NOT anti-American anything, we’re not a part of the 9-11 Truther movement and we don’t support the enemies of America.

If everyone will recall, when “Tiller the Baby Killer” was shot at his Church, the news media was all over it as a prime example of the threat from “right wing extremists”. Then we had a Hitler-worshiper walk into the Holocaust Museum and shoot the place up shortly afterwards. The media was trying hard to associate both with the pro-Life and tea party movements. They really went nuts when some started showing up at town hall meetings and areas near President Obama’s visits with “assault rifles” and guns strapped to their waist. I guess it did not matter that the reason they did so was because SEIU and ACORN operatives had begun to physically attack tea party activists at such functions. So when they found out that the Pentagon was more of a “left wing” nut case than a “right wing” one, the story just pretty much died on the vine.

An AP reporter contacted me this morning and wanted to meet with me. He is doing a story about the impact of the tea party movement on elections this year. He left it to me to come up with the venue for the meeting, so I invited him to meet at Range USA. It seemed appropriate since on March 9th of last year, a number of local activists met to discuss getting the local tea party effort off-the-ground in one of their meeting rooms. As I arrived, I saw the “UN-free Zone” sign at the entrance and two plasma TV’s, one on FOX News and the other with NASCAR running. I sat down with the reporter inside the 1776 Grill with the Declaration of Independence, vintage flags (including the Gadsden flag) and portraits of the founding fathers draping the walls around us. Of course there were lots of guns scattered around too, on racks, in peoples hands, strapped to their sides, etc. The venue itself gave me much in the way of visual aids with which to make my arguments.

He did ask about the efforts by some to portray those in the tea party movement in a negative light, and I mentioned briefly the latest SPLC report. It is all about marginalizing those trying to regain control over the elective and legislative process, you know, that “Government for the People, by the People” thing? We are certainly NOT anti-government and I’ve heard no real calls for violent action by anyone, although many of us do retain “it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security” as an option outlined by Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence. However, at this point the tea party movement is more akin to the Jeffersonian Revolution of 1800 than to the Boston Tea Party.

The Federal government has simply over-stepped the boundaries laid upon it by the U.S. Constitution. The Tenth Amendment has for the most part just been thrown into the trash bin by those in Washington and ignored. There is no authority in the Constitution for the federal government to take over the health care system, only authority to insure that commerce between the States remains unhindered.  So if we are anti-anything, we are anti-law breakers, which many of our elected officials have become. Yes, this is supposed to be a nation of laws and the foundation of our law is the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution and the Federalist papers which expounded the principles and terminology used in those documents. There is NO ambiguity in what the documents say and/or mean. Yet for decades now, revisionists have twisted the meanings of key words such as “general Welfare” beyond the context in which it was used.

Some, who have not denied the necessity of the power of taxation, have grounded a very fierce attack against the Constitution, on the language in which it is defined. It has been urged and echoed, that the power “to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States,” amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defense or general welfare. No stronger proof could be given of the distress under which these writers labor for objections, than their stooping to such a misconstruction.

Had no other enumeration or definition of the powers of the Congress been found in the Constitution, than the general expressions just cited, the authors of the objection might have had some color for it; though it would have been difficult to find a reason for so awkward a form of describing an authority to legislate in all possible cases. A power to destroy the freedom of the press, the trial by jury, or even to regulate the course of descents, or the forms of conveyances, must be very singularly expressed by the terms “to raise money for the general welfare.”

But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon? If the different parts of the same instrument ought to be so expounded, as to give meaning to every part which will bear it, shall one part of the same sentence be excluded altogether from a share in the meaning; and shall the more doubtful and indefinite terms be retained in their full extent, and the clear and precise expressions be denied any signification whatsoever? For what purpose could the enumeration of particular powers be inserted, if these and all others were meant to be included in the preceding general power? Nothing is more natural nor common than first to use a general phrase, and then to explain and qualify it by a recital of particulars. But the idea of an enumeration of particulars which neither explain nor qualify the general meaning, and can have no other effect than to confound and mislead, is an absurdity, which, as we are reduced to the dilemma of charging either on the authors of the objection or on the authors of the Constitution, we must take the liberty of supposing, had not its origin with the latter.

The objection here is the more extraordinary, as it appears that the language used by the convention is a copy from the articles of Confederation. The objects of the Union among the States, as described in article third, are “their common defense, security of their liberties, and mutual and general welfare.” The terms of article eighth are still more identical: “All charges of war and all other expenses that shall be incurred for the common defense or general welfare, and allowed by the United States in Congress, shall be defrayed out of a common treasury,” etc. A similar language again occurs in article ninth. Construe either of these articles by the rules which would justify the construction put on the new Constitution, and they vest in the existing Congress a power to legislate in all cases whatsoever. But what would have been thought of that assembly, if, attaching themselves to these general expressions, and disregarding the specifications which ascertain and limit their import, they had exercised an unlimited power of providing for the common defense and general welfare? I appeal to the objectors themselves, whether they would in that case have employed the same reasoning in justification of Congress as they now make use of against the convention. How difficult it is for error to escape its own condemnation! – James Madison, Federalist #41

Madison penned the document and certainly knows quite well what was intended when he put pen to paper giving form to the consensus of debate at the Constitutional Convention. So the tea party movement is calling our elected officials to task for violating those restrictions also enumerated in the Constitution. The charge is that the federal government is in violation of the compact with the people upon which it has the authority to govern, and all three branches stand guilty in that regard.

However, just so it is not misunderstood, the States are the entities which entered into the compact on behalf of their people. I as a citizen have no right what-so-ever to take up arms against the federal government on my own accord or with others. In my case, I am a Tennessean by birth and privilege. It is the State of Tennessee which must act on my behalf against the federal government. In Texas Fred’s case, it is the State of Texas which must act on his behalf. Governor Perry of Texas has been a strong advocate in defense of Texas and its people against the federal government and as a result just won his primary for re-election quite decisively.

We are not anti-government. Quite the contrary, we all love the founding compact and our country. This is why people need to pay just as much attention to the Tennessee elections this year as the national ones. It is our governor and legislature in Nashville that ultimately will have to draw the line against the federal government if one is to be drawn. This past year I have been very proud of Nashville in this area and I hope to see even more attention paid to the issue next year. For that reason I will be looking very closely at the Tennessee State Representative District 93 (my representative) race, because it is important. I would suggest that everyone else do likewise.

Yes, many of us own and carry our firearms proudly. However, we do so as responsible citizens who believe in the rule-of-law. If I ever turn my gun against the federal government, I will do so under the Tennessee state flag. Or, if Texas decides to start a ruckus, then I might have to pull a Davy Crockett and run off to Texas to help ole’ Fred out. I would remind readers that the Minutemen who fired those first shots at Lexington did so to defend their elected leaders Samuel Adams and John Hancock and to insure their escape from British forces sent to arrest them.

WHEN King George heard of the Boston Tea Party his anger knew no bounds. This rebellious colony should be punished, and that right soundly.

The Boston port was closed to all trade until the destroyed tea should be paid for. And General Gage, with several regiments, was sent to govern the people of Massachusetts.

“We are outraged,” declared the colonists. “Such things are not to be endured.”

So they organized a new government quite independent of General Gage, with John Hancock and Samuel Adams at its head.

Nor was this all. Massachusetts decided to have an army of her own to defend her rights. “Minute men,” the soldiers were called, because they agreed to be ready to fight at a minute’s notice. Arms and ammunition were collected, and stored in Concord.

Before long, news of this hiding place reached General Gage. He determined to send a secret expedition to take the stores. Nothing seemed easier. Moreover, he knew that John Hancock and Samuel Adams were visiting in a town called Lexington. Why not kill two birds with one stone and direct his soldiers to march to Concord by way of Lexington? Thus they could seize not only the soldiers’ arms, but also their rebel leaders.

However, no sane person wants to see such a scenario develop or play out. The last time it happened it took more American lives than all of our other wars combined. Let’s just concentrate on a good ole Jeffersonian-style revolution this go around, at the ballot box, not the bullet box.