The Principles of Liberty: Principle 17

The 28 Principles of Liberty: Principle 17

“A System of Checks and Balances Should be Adopted to Prevent the Abuse of Power”

After John Adams had sold the people on the separation of powers, it must have been shocking to him to see that they wanted to make the separation so complete that it would have made the system unworkable.

The individuals who took a puritanical view opposed the adoption of the Constitution because they wanted the separation complete and absolute. They missed the most important part, and that was that they were to be separate in their functions, but subject to the checks and balances of the other two departments in case it became abusive in performing those functions.

James Madison spent 5 of the Federalist Papers numbers, 47 to 51, explaining why the separation of powers should not be absolute, but should make allowances for a built-in system of checks and balances. He conceded that keeping the three departments separated was fundamental to the preservation of liberty.

“The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.”

The purpose of checks and balances is a constitutional control in the hands of each department of government to prevent any usurpation of power by another department or abusive administration of the power granted to it.

The failure to use the checks and balances effectively has resulted in allowing the judiciary to create new laws by pretending to be merely interpreting old laws. Failure to use checks and balances has also allowed the President to make thousands of new laws, instead of congress, by issuing executive orders. It has allowed the federal government to invade the reserved rights of the states on a massive scale. It has allowed the legislature to impose taxes on the people never contemplated by the Founders, or the Constitution. Each department of the government has the responsibility to rise up and protect its prerogatives by exercising the checks and balances which have been provided, and even more so, the people have the responsibility to be the watchmen over their representatives and elect ONLY those that will function within Constitutional boundaries.

James Madison said, “As the people are the only legitimate foundation of power, and it is from them that the constitutional charter under which the power of the several branches of government is derived, it seems strictly consonant to the republican theory to recur to the same original authority whenever an one of the departments may commit encroachment on the chartered authorities of the others.”

How do the people protect themselves? Madison sought many different avenues and found that the only protection was within the machinery of checks and balances provided in the Constitution as written.

The three departments are independent, yet reliant on each other to fulfill their functions, so they are mutually dependent. Their resulting system was far more complex then Montesquieu. Here are their provisions:

1. The House of Representatives serves as a check on the Senate since no statue can become a law without their approval.

2. The Senate also serves as the check on the House of Representatives since no statue can become a law without its approval.

3. A President can restrain them both by using his veto to send back a bill not meeting his approval.

4. The Congress has on the other hand, a check on the President by being able to pass a bill over his veto with a 2/3 majority of each house.

5. The legislature also has a further check on the President through its power of discrimination in appropriating funds for the operation of the executive branch.

6. The President must have the approval of the Senate in filing important offices of the executive branch.

7. The President must also have the approval of the Senate before any treaties with foreign nations can go into effect.

8. The Congress has the authority to conduct investigations of the executive branch to determine whether or not funds are being properly expended and the laws enforced.

9. The President has a certain amount of political influence on the legislature by letting it be known that he will not support the reelection of those who oppose his program.

10. The executive branch also has further check on the Congress by using its discretionary powers in establishing military bases, building dams, improving navigable rivers, and building interstate highways so as to favor those areas from which the President feels he is getting support by their representatives.

11. The judiciary has a check on the legislature through its authority to review all laws and determine their constitutionality.

12. The Congress, on the other hand, has a restraining power over the judiciary by having the constitutional authority to restrict the extent of its jurisdiction.

13. The Congress also has the power to impeach any of the judges who are guilty of treason, high crimes or misdemeanors.

14. The President also has a check on the judiciary by having the power to nominate new judges subject to the approval of the senate.

15. The Congress has further restraining power over the judiciary by having the control of appropriations for the operation of the federal court system.

16. The Congress is able to initiate amendments to the Constitution which, if approved by three-fourths of the states, could seriously effect the operation of both the executive and judicial branches.

17. The Congress, by joint resolution, can terminate certain powers granted to the President such as war powers without his consent.

18. The people have a check on their congressmen every two years, on their President every four years, and on their Senators every six years.

The Founders Device for Peaceful Self-Repair

In other nations that copied our constitution, they forgot to incorporate adequate checks and balances. Instead, when a usurper takes over, they must use an army and result to machine guns and bombs to get them out. What the founders wished to achieve in the Constitution of 1787 was machinery for the peaceful means of self-repair when the system when out of balance.

During Watergate, this peaceful process was used. The Congress threatened to impeach, and the President who used his high office for purposes that were outside his scope of authority and the ramifications of legal conduct, he resigned. There was no command of the army to allow him to stay in power; it was a quiet and peaceful transition. This was the primary purpose of the United States Constitution, to have a peaceful means in order to repair distortions of power. While it requires more patience then the use of force, its outcome is much more certain.

The 28 Principles of Liberty: Principle #10

"The God-given Right to Govern is Vested in the Sovereign Authority of the Whole People."

In 1890 John Locke published two famous essays on 'The original extent" and "End of Civil Government". In the second essay he wrote: "In all lawful governments, the designation of the persons who are to bare rule being as natural and necessary a part as the form of the government itself, and that which had its establishment ORIGINALLY FROM THE PEOPLE... all commonwealths , therefore, with the form of government established, have rules also of appointing and conveying the right to those who are to have any share in the public authority; and whoever gets into the exercise of any part of the power by other ways then what the laws of the community have prescribed have not right to be obeyed, though the form of the commonwealth be still preserved, since he is not the person the laws have appointed, and, consequently, not the person the people have consented to. Nor can such usurper, or any deriving from him, ever have a title til the people are both at liberty to consent and have actually consented, to allow and confirm in him the power he hath till then usurped."

There was definitely no room in the philosophy of the American Founding Fathers for the right of kings. They knew that rulers are the servants of the people and that all authority rested with the people to appoint or remove their rulers. They stressed that this had been the case from the beginning for the Anglo-Saxons.

Their leader, the chief, was only one among equals, the entire body of the freemen would gather together to discuss the issues of the day. The body could remove him and they had selected him. His position to garner respect, however, his opinion carried no more weight then any other freemen.

In the Federalist Papers Number 22 page 152 Alexander Hamilton states that the empire ought to rest on the basis of the consent of the people. This was also expressed by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in its proclamation of January 23, 1776: "It is a maxim that in every government, there must exist, somewhere, a supreme, sovereign, absolute, and uncontrollable power; but this power resides always in the body of the people; and it never was, or can be, delegated to one man, or a few; the great Creator has never given to men a right to vest others with authority over them, unlimited either in duration or degree."

Even if it is acknowledged that the People are divinely endowed with the sovereign power to govern, what happens if elected officials usurp the authority of the people to impose a dictatorship or some form of abusive government on them?

Principle 11 will reveal the fundamental principle on which the Founders based The Declaration of Independence.

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The 28 Principles of Liberty- Principle #7

The 28 Principles of Liberty- Principle #7

"The Proper role of Government is to Protect Equal Rights, Not Provide Equal Things."

During the days of the Founders in Europe, it was popular for people to proclaim that the role of government was to take from the 'haves' and give to the 'have nots' so that all might be truly 'equal'. However, the founders knew that this proposition contained a major fallacy.

People cannot delegate to government the power to do anything that they could not do themselves. We have the right to protect our life and property, therefore, we have the ability to delegate our protection to government through a police force, which would protect the lives and property of all the people.

Let's suppose that there is a kind-hearted man that saw that one neighbor had two cars, while another neighbor had none. What would happen if the kind man went to the neighbor with two cars, took one, and then generously gave it to the neighbor that had none? He would be arrested for theft of course! No matter how genuinely he cared about his neighbor with none, he has no right to steal from the neighbor with abundance and give it to another. The neighbor with abundance still has the right to their property. Of course, the prosperous neighbor could choose to donate the care to the neighbor in need, but it would be his decision, and not that of the kind hearted neighbor who wanted to rob from the rich to give to the poor.



Governments can sometimes commit 'legal' crimes. Let's say that the kind-hearted man asks the mayor and city council to give one of the cars from the prosperous neighbor to the man with none, does that make it anymore right? Of course not! And it is worse, because now, not only did the man lose his property, but now he also lost his right to appeal because the government did it. The Founders warned that anytime a government is allowed to start taking the possessions of others to start equalizing the distribution of goods, then the government thereafter will have been given the power to take away the right to enjoy life, liberty and property from ANY of the people.

Those who receive from this idea generally think that this is a just system. But what happens when government starts taking also from those that are poor? Then they will claim their right to their property, but the government will then say,"Now we decide who has rights in things." When the government was given the power to rob from the rich and give to the poor it immediately nullifies the principle of guaranteed equal rights, it opens the floodgates for government to meddle with everyone's rights.

When Communists seized power in Hungary, the peasants were delighted at first when the government seized the large farms from their owners, and then gave it to the peasants. But then later, the government seized 3/4 of the peasant land to create government communal farms, of course the peasants screamed about their property rights, but it was too late. If they continued to protest, they lost their liberty and in several instances their lives.

The Founders made sure that we could protect our freedom to prosper by protecting the rights of ALL people. There was no penalty for getting rich. The people would not be locked into the poverty level as they had in other nations. There would be some that would have more than others, but the entire nation could prosper. It was believed that man had an instinct to succeed and by having the freedom to prosper, the whole people would prosper together. People were encouraged to store up and save for a time when things were not prosperous, or to help their neighbors when they hit on rough times. Hard work, thrift and frugality were the key words for the American Ethic.

The Founders made these European theories unconstitutional. America became the most prosperous and most educated nation in the world, and consequently, the most generous. Samuel Adams said, "The utopian schemes of leveling (redistribution of wealth), and a community of goods (central ownership of all the means of production and distribution), are as visionary and impractical as those which vest all property in the Crown. (These ideas) are arbitrary, despotic, and in our government, unconstitutional."

Yet, there are still those who insist that compassion for the poor requires the Federal Government becoming involved and taking from the 'haves' and giving to the 'have nots'. Benjamin Franklin had been one of the 'have nots' and having experienced these welfare programs of 'counter-productive compassion', he wrote an entire essay on the subject. He called the programs a great evil in not only the way in which it operates, but also because it encourages idleness.

Franklin wrote: "To relieve the misfortune of our fellow creatures is concurring with the deity; it is godlike; but, if we provide encouragement for laziness, and supports for folly, may we not be found fighting against the order of God and Nature, which perhaps has appointed want and misery as the proper punishments for, and caution against, as well as necessary consequences of, Idleness and extravagance? Whenever we attempt to amend the scheme of Providence, and to interfere with the government of the world, we had need be very circumspect, lest we do more harm then good."

The Founders all had deep feelings about helping the poor and less fortunate, but they had guidelines, a calculated compassion:

1. Do not help the needy completely, simply help them help themselves.
2. Give the poor the satisfaction of earned achievement instead of rewarding without achievement.
3. Allow the poor to climb the 'appreciation ladder', from tents to cabins, cabins to cottages, cottages to comfortable homes.
4. Where emergency help is provided, do not prolong it to where it becomes habitual.
5. Strictly enforce fixed responsibility. First the individual is responsible for himself, the second level is the family, then the church, next the community, finally the country and in a disaster or emergency, the state. Under no circumstances is the Federal Government to become involved in welfare. The Founders felt that this would corrupt the government and the poor. There is NO constitutional authority for the federal government to participate in charity or welfare.

The Founders did this to protect the people from abuse by an overly-aggressive government.
Which brings us to the next principle.

The 28 Principles of Liberty are adapted from W. Cleon Skousen's Book "The 5000 year Leap". Charity Angel's official site is www.CharityAngel.com These articles in their entirety can be found at www.28principlesofliberty.blogspot.com

The Philosophy of Liberty

What is the philosophy of Liberty? We hear a lot of people these days talking about freedom and liberty, but how do we really achieve it? The Founding Father's achieved it, but what were the concepts behind it?

This video, called The Philosophy of Liberty is a great and simplified way to teach everyone about individual rights, and that we do not have the right to infringe on the rights of others. I refer to this in several ways in my writing. This is how we live 'The People's Law" rather than the "King's Law". I also say, this is how we live as 'Freemen" rather than 'King Men'.

We were designed to be a nation of freemen, and right now, we have a few that understand how to do that, and many that are voting for those that will take away the liberty of others. We also have organizations like The Federal Reserve that have been robbing all of us for almost 100 years now. They have enslaved us in perpetual debt. They are the money changers of our day, and the masters of this nation. Which, if you know your history, each of us are sovereigns, and we are the masters of our own selves, and we need to stand up and not let others continue to enslave us and our descendants.

One way that we can begin this process on a large scale, is to educate each other on The Philosophy of Liberty. When we have an educated public, we will once again have a free public. It is the PEOPLE and not the leaders that we need to focus our education on. There are many in positions of influence now who prefer the power, money, and influence over doing what is right. It is the PEOPLE that are our only hope for liberty, it is the PEOPLE that are the guardians of it.

Please share this blog with others, so that they too can learn these principles, and teach their friends and neighbors as well.

I give my permission for anyone who wants to share the content within this blog to do so. All I ask is that you link back to the original source. The articles on the 28 principles of liberty I also give permission to be shared in your own blogs. What I create in any of the blogs that I write, is for the purpose of sharing with others.