American Freedoms

 American Freedoms

Thomas Allen

The 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence has arrived. Now is the time to reflect upon the liberties, freedoms, and rights that the Founding Fathers fought for and sought to preserve. Unfortunately, Americans have lost many, even most, of these liberties, freedoms, and rights. Sadly, people born in recent decades never had a chance to enjoy most of them. A short list follows.

1. Bill of Rights. People enjoy all the rights guaranteed and protected by the Bill of Rights unless the federal government disagrees. The Founding Fathers believed that the rights identified in the Bill of Rights were absolute and transcended and existed before government. However, today’s ruling oligarchs consider them relative, that is, governmentally granted privileges that can be withdrawn at any time and for any reason.

2. Freedom of Travel. The Ninth Amendment and its equivalent in State constitutions prohibit the federal and State governments from preventing or otherwise hindering the popular means of travel. In the early days, travel was by means of horses, boats, and then trains. Now, it is by automobiles and airplanes. Today, Americans are free to have governments hinder and even prevent travel by the present popular means (automobiles and airplanes). People need the government’s permission to travel by automobile; they need a driver’s license, insurance, etc. 

Additionally, they are free to travel on commercial airliners if the federal government allows them. Moreover, if they travel by air, they are treated like criminals but with fewer rights than a criminal. The federal government presumes all passengers are terrorists until proven otherwise, i.e., passengers are guilty until they prove their innocence. Also, the federal government violates their right to privacy with unconstitutional searches. (What would people have done in the nineteenth century if the federal government required stagecoach passengers and their luggage to be searched before they were allowed on a stagecoach? They probably would have beaten, if not killed, the agent.)

3. Freedom to Promote One’s Heritage. People are free to defend and promote their heritage and culture if that heritage and culture are not White, especially Southern. White, especially Southern, heritage and culture do not have the right to exist.

4. Schools. People are free to send their children to public schools where they can graduate with a high school diploma, despite some graduates being so illiterate that they cannot read their diplomas. Moreover, people are free to have public schools indoctrinate their children to be obedient slaves of the ruling oligarchs. Sadly, most do not even realize that they are slaves.

5. Welfare. The unproductive are free to enslave the productive to support them.

6. Corporate Welfare. People are free to be forced to bail out banks and other companies run by incompetent or greedy managers who have political influence or are deemed by the federal government to be too big to fail.

7. Money. Instead of deciding for themselves how much money the economy needs, the people have the freedom of the federal government, in collaboration with banks through the Federal Reserve System, to decide the quality and quantity of money. Moreover, people are free to be forced to use debt, Federal Reserve notes, as money instead of commodities like gold and silver that are no one’s liability. Thus, people are free to live with and use money that continuously loses purchasing power.

For additional lost freedoms, see “Freedom” by Thomas Allen.

The Founding Fathers would rebel against the above freedoms and rights. They would be ashamed of their descendants for throwing away the liberties, freedoms, and rights for which they fought.

Copyright © 2026 by Thomas Allen.

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An Inquiry into the Amendments of the U.S. Constitution

An Inquiry into the Amendments of the U.S. Constitution

Thomas Allen

[Editor’s note: This article was submitted in 1985 to the “Southern National Newsletter” of the Southern National Party. Since this was originally written, another amendment has been added to the U.S. Constitution.]

Does the present constitution for the United States reflect the principles embodied in the original document approved by the States between 1787 and 1790? No, the amendments that have been added to it since 1865 have materially changed it. The amendments adopted before 1865 limited the powers of the United States government and preserved the rights [i.e., powers] of the States and the liberties of their citizens.

The first ten amendments, commonly called the Bill of Rights, protect the liberties of the people by limiting the power of the United States government. The Tenth Amendment is the States’ rights amendment. It reserves the powers not delegated to the United States government for the States. Unfortunately, this amendment is now almost forgotten.

The Eleventh Amendment, which was ratified in 1795, is another States’ rights amendment, but it is the last States’ rights amendment. This amendment prevents a State from being sued against its will.

The Twelfth, Twentieth, and Twenty-fifth Amendments are technical in nature. The Twelfth Amendment, which was ratified in 1804, changes the method of voting for President and Vice President. The Twentieth Amendment, which was ratified in 1933. changes the date on which the Presidential and Congressional terms begin. It also clarifies filling the office of the President and Vice President should they become vacant. The Twenty-fifth Amendment further clarifies filling of the offices of the President and Vice President should they become vacant. It also describes the procedures to be followed if the President is temporarily unable to discharge his duties.

The Thirteenth Amendment, which was ratified in 1865, outlaws slavery and does change one of the principles in the original Constitution. However, slavery was a dying institution, and the economics of this institution would have soon ended it. Thus, slavery would have ended in fact even if this amendment had never been ratified. Therefore, this amendment has no real effect on the Constitution because the principle it removed, slavery, would have been voluntarily abandoned anyway.

The Fourteenth Amendment, which was ratified in 1868, is one of the three most pernicious amendments ever adopted. This amendment is rivaled only by the misconstrued commerce clause in Section 8 of Article I in destroying the States and the liberties of the people thereof. The Fourteenth Amendment is the foundation of most civil rights laws, forced integration, federal control of schools, and the other miscreant legislation that has extinguished the liberties of the people in their social and political affairs. This amendment legalized the concept of dual citizenship. Heretofore, a person was a citizen of a State and owed his loyalty to that State. Through this amendment, the United States courts have applied the first eight amendments to the States. (Actually, the United States courts do not apply the first eight amendments in toto. Whimsically, they sort of pick and choose what to apply. The guiding light seems to be using the first eight amendments to protect criminals from actions by the States while not protecting law-abiding citizens from encroachment on their liberties by the States.) Also, this amendment disenfranchised most of the loyal political leaders of the South. Moreover, it began the formal conversion of the United States government from a republic to a democracy. Perhaps more than any other amendment, the Fourteenth Amendment has undermined the basic principles of the Constitution. [Moreover, the Fourteenth Amendment was never lawfully adopted. Therefore, it should be given no weight in constitutional arguments.]

The Fifteenth, Nineteenth, Twenty-fourth, and Twenty-sixth Amendments are also blows to States’ rights and contrary to the principles in the Constitution. The Fifteenth Amendments, which was ratified in l870, eliminates race as a qualification for voting. The Nineteenth Amendment, which was ratified in 1920, eliminates sex as a qualification for voting. The Twenty-fourth Amendment, which was ratified in 1964, eliminates the payment of taxes as a qualification for voting. The Twenty-sixth Amendment lowers the voting age to eighteen. [Ironically, an eighteen-year-old can vote himself into despotism, but he cannot legally buy a bottle of whiskey to celebrate his vote.] Heretofore, each State determined the qualification of its voters. These amendments deny the States this right. The qualification for voting in most States may comply with these amendments even if they were not part of the Constitution, but not all. Obviously, the voting qualifications of some States would be contrary to one or more of these amendments, or else they would not be needed, Thus, a majority of the States have coerced a minority into accepting their voting qualifications. The coerced minority has been mostly the Southern States. Not only does the doctrine of States’ rights suffer from these amendments, but these amendments add to the subversion of a republic to a democracy.

The Sixteenth Amendment, which was ratified in 1913, has done much to destroy the liberties of the people and rob them of their  property. It is one of the three most pernicious amendments adopted. This amendment gives the United States government the power to levy income and inheritance taxes. It is contrary to Part 4 of Section 9 of Article I, which prevents the United States government from levying any direct taxes unless these taxes are levied in proportion to the population of the State. The enforcement of this amendment has virtually vetoed the Bill of Rights. The Sixteenth Amendment is of the envious, by the envious, and for the envious. It is obviously contrary to the basic principles of the Constitution.

The Seventeenth Amendments which was ratified in 1913, has done more than all the other amendments combined to destroy the Republic and convert it into a democracy. This amendment removes the election of Senators from the legislatures of the States and makes Senators popularly elected. Thus, the States are no longer represented. The last check against the tyranny of the majority has been removed. (The Electoral College ceased being a check long ago. It was supposed to be the best men in each State electing the best man in the United States to be President. Now it is a gang of party hacks electing another and bigger party hack who is often a demagogue.) Without a doubt, this amendment has utterly shattered the doctrine of States’ rights and has put the remaining liberties of the people at great risk. Clearly, this is one of the three most pernicious amendments adopted.

The Eighteenth Amendment, which was ratified in 1919, is the prohibition amendment. It is contrary to the basic principles of the Constitution and has been repealed by the Twenty-first Amendment.

The Twenty-second Amendment, which was ratified in 1951, limits the term of the President, It makes mandatory the long-standing tradition of no one serving more than two terms as President. This tradition had been violated by a liberal Yankee Democrat. This amendment is in keeping with the basic Constitution.

The Twenty-third Amendment, which was ratified in 1961, gives the District of Columbia the right to participate in the Electoral College. The intent of the Constitution is to keep the District of Columbia out of federal politics since it is the seat of the United States government. This amendment violates this intent and is an affront to States’ rights. It makes the District of Columbia equal to the States in selecting the President and Vice President. Thus, it is another blow to States’ rights.

[In 1992, the Twenty-seventh Amendment was adopted; it had been proposed in 1789 as part of the Bill of Rights. Therefore, it is in accordance with the basic principles of the Construction. It delays laws affecting Congressional salary from taking effect until after the next election of representatives.]

The Constitution as it now stands with its amendments does not reflect the principles for which our forefathers fought in the 1770s and l860s. It does not reflect the principles for which most people  believed that they were fighting in the four wars of this century [that is, World War I, World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War]. The amended Constitution is completely alien to the Constitution as originally adopted.

The amendments to the Constitution since 1865 have destroyed the basic principles embodied in it to the point that it is amazing that any remnants of republicanism, States’ rights, and individual liberty still exist. The only hope that Southerners have to regain these lost ideals of republicanism, States’ rights, and individual liberty is a free and independent confederation of free and independent Southern States.

Copyright © 1995, 2021 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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Gutzman on the Constitution

 Gutzman on the Constitution

Thomas Allen

In The Politically Incorrect Guide™ to the Constitution (2007), Kevin Gutzman provides some interesting information related to the US Constitution. Some of this information follows.

High Crimes and Misdemeanors. The phrase “high crimes and misdemeanors” appears in Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution: “The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.”

Most people believe that this phrase means various types of homicides and thefts and other indictable crimes. It does mean these things, but it also means more than these.

When the States ratified the Constitution, this phrase was understood to cover physical disability and mental and psychological impairment. However, the complete meaning of this phrase was forgotten, and it became limited to indictable crimes and petty corruption. Consequently, the impeachment process has become a highly ineffective means to remove judges and other civil officers from office. (The twenty-fifth amendment establishes a procedure for removing the president, but not other civil officers or judges, from office because of physical disability and mental impairment.)

Vetoing State Laws. The Constitutional Convention rejected giving Congress the power to veto State laws, which implied that the judiciary, which is the least responsible institution of the federal government, also lacks such power. However, the US Supreme Court soon usurped this power. 

First, it used the Contract Clause (Article I, Section 10: “No State shall . . . pass any . . . Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts. . . .”). The purpose of the Contract Clause was to prohibit States from adopting laws preventing lenders from collecting debts for a stated period. This clause was not intended to prohibit States from enacting economic regulations. However, federal courts have used it to veto State laws that regulated the economy.

About 130 years later, the Supreme Court replaced the Contract Clause with the Interstate Commerce Clause (Article I, Section 8: “The Congress shall have Power . . . To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes”) to veto State laws that the Supreme Court did not like.

After World War II, the Supreme Court began using the Incorporation Doctrine (applying the first nine amendments, the Bill of Rights, to the States) to veto State laws that it did not like.

(Federal courts seldom veto State laws because they are unconstitutional; most are constitutional under the original intent of the Constitution. Federal judges veto State laws because they do not like them; they conflict with the personal prejudices, preferences, and biases of the judge.)

Eleventh Amendment. The purpose of the eleventh amendment is to reassert the independence, sovereignty, and supremacy of the States. Specifically, it denies federal courts jurisdiction over lawsuits initiated against a State by a citizen of another State or country.

Its original intent was to limit the jurisdiction of federal courts to those specifically named Article III. The Supreme Court has circumvented the intent of the eleventh amendment by allowing people to sue State officials who carry out the policies of the State in lieu of the State itself.

Two Views of the Nature of the Law. Gutzman describes two views of the nature of the law: Thomas Jefferson’s and John Marshall’s, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (1801–1835). “For Jefferson, law was the framework of rules by which the people agreed to be governed; a judge's role was simply to apply the clear meaning and original understanding of the Constitution (or other legal document)” (p. 98). Jefferson’s view is republican in nature.

However, Marshall believed “that law required judges who could see beyond the written law to the ‘natural law’ that was superior to it” (p.98). (Abolitionists also claimed that natural law as they interpreted it was superior to the Constitution and all other laws.) Marshall’s view is aristocratic and clerical in nature. The fatal flow of Marshall’s view is that “no two men agreed about the particulars of the ‘natural law’; instead, they tended to use ‘natural law’ as a justification for their own policy preferences” (pp. 98-99).

Two Types of Due Process. The Supreme Court has created two types of due process: “procedural due process” and “substantive due process.” Due process appears twice in the Constitution: once in the fifth amendment and once in the fourteenth amendment. Due process as used in the Constitution is procedural due process (according to pre-established procedures). Substantive due process is used as an excuse for judicial usurpation. (Substantive due process is the doctrine that legislation is needed to carry out fairly due process in the fifth and fourteenth amendments.) When the Supreme Court legislates under the banner of due process, it is using substantive due process.

Gutzman’s The Politically Incorrect Guide™ to the Constitution is an excellent book on the Constitution. He focuses on how the Supreme Court has subverted the original intent of the Constitution, has usurped the legislative authority of Congress and the States, and has prohibited authorities of the States that the Constitution allows.

Copyright © 2021 by Thomas Coley Allen

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Four Poisonous Clauses

Four Poisonous Clauses

Thomas Allen

Since the end of the American Revolution, two political factions or philosophies have fought each other for supremacy: the centralists and the decentralists. For the most part, the centralists have prevailed.

With the adoption of the Constitution, the centralists gained dominance. Lead by James Madison, James Wilson, Alexander Hamilton, and Gouverneur Morris, the centralists maneuvered the people of the States (the bodies politic) as represented in State conventions to ratify the Constitution. The goal of the Federalists, the centralists of that time, was to consolidate all power into the federal government, called the general government in the Constitution, and to reduce the States and the people thereof to insignificance.

(Those who favored adoption of the Constitution were called Federalists, and those who opposed, Antifederalists. Ironically, the Antifederalists, who were decentralists, were true federalists, and the Federalists opposed true federalism.

Later, the Federalists became the Whigs, such as Daniel Webster and Henry Clay. Following the Whigs were Abraham Lincoln and the Republicans. After them came the Progressives, such as Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson. Following the Progressives were the liberal Democrats beginning with Franklin Roosevelt and followed by all Presidents since including Republican Presidents.)

Fortunately, for people who value and love liberty, the Antifederalists got the Bill of Rights added to the Constitution. The first nine amendments prevented (in theory) the federal government from encroaching on the unalienable rights of the people. The tenth amendment limited (in theory) the federal government to those powers that the States delegated it by reserving all powers not delegated to it to the States or the people thereof (bodies politic).

(Some argue that the second through the ninth amendments apply to the States as well as to the federal government. However, federal courts did not apply them to the States until the 1920s when federal courts began to apply them to the States with the incorporation doctrine via the fourteenth amendment. Since then, federal courts have applied the second through the ninth amendments to the States with much more vigor than they have applied them to the federal government. Although the first amendment is worded clearly and strictly to apply to Congress, federal courts have applied it to the States. Thus, federal courts zealously apply the first through the ninth amendments to the States. However, federal courts are reluctant to apply the first through the tenth amendments to the federal government — especially the tenth amendment. Since all State constitutions contain a bill of rights, the only reason for federal courts to apply the first nine amendments to the States is for the federal government to gain more control over the States and the people thereof.)

Despite the Antifederalists’ attempts to restrain the federal government, the Constitution contains four clauses that have achieved the Federalist goal of concentrating all power in the federal government and reducing the States and the people thereof to insignificance. These four clauses are the General Welfare Clause, the Interstate Commerce Clause, the Necessary and Proper Clause, and the Supremacy Clause. (Antifederalists objected to these clauses but they failed to eliminate or modify them to protect the States and the people thereof from a metastatic cancerous federal government.)

General Welfare Clause

Article I, Section 8, Paragraph 1: The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

“General Welfare” is also mentioned in the Preamble to the Constitution. However, preambles do not and are not intended to grant any authority or power. Preambles serve to state the purpose of a document in broad strokes. Consequently, the Preamble of the Constitution cannot be used as a grant of power to the federal government.

Expanding the General Welfare Clause beyond its intent, the federal government has established the welfare state and everything else that it claims benefits the welfare of the people. This clause has been used to extend the powers of the federal government far beyond those explicitly listed in the Constitution.

Contrary to popular beliefs and court rulings, the General Welfare Clause was intended to restrict the powers of the federal government — not to expand them. This Clause was never intended to give the federal government boundless, unspecified powers. According to Madison, the purpose of the General Welfare Clause was to restrain Congress in the exercise of the powers delegated to it — primarily the power to regulate commerce with foreign countries and taxation. According to Hamilton, the General Welfare Clause did not grant the federal government any powers beyond those specifically listed.

Thus, any law enacted was to benefit all the States and the people thereof. Consequently, no law was to benefit one State, region, or group of people more than another. For example, protective tariffs and import quotas benefit the protected industry at the expense of others. Likewise, subsidies to agriculture benefit one segment at the expense of others. Other examples are guarantying loans; making loans; forgiving student loans; unemployment insurance; preventing people injured by vaccines from suing vaccine manufacturers; replacing the gold-coin standard with a fiat-money standard; bailing out banks; constructing roads, waterways, and airports; giving grants to States, universities, and private organizations and businesses; pursuing foreign interventionism; and favoring some States, regions, or groups over others. All these benefit one easily identifiable segment at the expense of others. Even welfare-state programs violate the General Welfare Clause because they forcibly take from producers and give to nonproducers, and, by that, they benefit some at the expense of others.

According to Roger Sherman, who got the General Welfare Clause inserted in the Constitution, its purpose was to clarify that taxes could only be collected to carry out the specifically delegated powers in Article 1, Section 8. Thus, the intent of this Clause was to limit the power to raise money by taxes, duties, and imposts. According to Madison, the intent of this Clause was also to limit spending money to carrying out the powers delegated to Congress.

The General Welfare Clause requires that federal laws benefit all the States and the people thereof — not to expand the power of the federal government. Its intent was to preserve State governments and not to govern individuals. Its purpose was to keep the federal government within narrow limits.

  If the General Welfare Clause was as broad as the expansionist claim, the enumeration of powers that follows it would not be needed. Moreover, if citing the General Welfare Clause can justify any purpose, then the entire Constitution is reduced to this one phrase; the remainder of the Constitution becomes merely a redundancy.

As can be seen from the above discussion, the General Welfare Clause has come to mean the opposite of its original intent. Before the twentieth century, federal courts interpreted the General Welfare Clause narrowly. Beginning in the 1930s, federal courts began giving it a broad, nonrestrictive interpretation. Now, the General Welfare Clause justifies the federal government taxing and spending on whatever it desires. Moreover, this Clause can be and has been used to force States to comply with whatever national standard of which the federal government can dream. Thus, the General Welfare Clause has been used to further reduce the States to insignificance and to further limit the liberties of the people.

Commerce Clause

Article I. Section 8. Paragraph 3: To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;

One of the most misconstrued and misapplied clauses of the Constitution is the Commerce Clause. This Clause has been expanded to cover not only intrastate commerce but also personal activities that do not involve trade or exchanges for value. With this Clause, the federal government has usurped the power to regulate every conceivable activity in the country.

Part of the problem in understanding the intent of the Commerce Clause is that the terms “regulate” and “commerce” have changed meaning.

“Regulate” as used in the Constitution means to “make regular,” i.e., to remove conditions that have a negative impact. Now, most people use “regulate” in the sense of control, restrain, or subdue, i.e., to impose conditions that have a negative impact.

When the Constitution was written, “commerce” was understood to mean “trade” or “exchange” of goods. As such, it did not cover manufacturing, agriculture, mining, and other means of producing goods for trade or exchange. Moreover, it did not cover consuming, discarding, or doing anything else with goods besides exchanging them. (The States retained the authority to regulated these production and consumption activities.) Thus, the Commerce Clause covers the exchange of goods, but it does not cover the production or consumption of goods. Now, the federal government uses this Clause to regulate every conceivable economic or gainful employment.

The original purpose of the Commerce Clause was to prevent the States from restricting trade across state lines and to authorize the federal government to restrict international trade for the benefit of domestic businesses. Domestically, the intent of the Commerce Clause was to create a free trade zone between the States and, by that, encourage commerce between States. As for foreign trade, the Clause enabled the federal government to enact trade barriers against countries that restricted shipping and imports from the United States. Thus, the intent of the Commerce Clause was to promote trade by preventing the States from restraining interstate commerce and by authorizing the federal government to retaliate against countries that restricted trade with the United States.

However, federal courts, especially in the twentieth century, have corrupted the Commerce Clause to justify the federal government enacting all sorts of laws that restrain commerce. Examples are minimum-wage, price controls, limitations on the production of crops, preventions of farmers raising crops for personal use, criminalization of growing cannabis for personal use, endangered species laws, and environmental laws. It has also been used to create most federal regulatory agencies, such as the FTC, SEC, EPA, and FDA. Constitutionally, these activities come under the jurisdiction of the States.

Necessary and Proper Clause

Article I, Section 8, Paragraph 18: To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.

With a long history of misinterpretation, the Necessary and Proper Clause has become one of the most transformed parts of the Constitution. Federal courts have used this Clause to justify nearly everything that the federal government wants to do — especially in conjunction with the General Welfare Clause. Giving this Clause a broad interpretation, federal courts have given Congress extensive power to enact any law that it fines convenient or useful. With the blessings of the federal courts, Congress has used this Clause to enact any law that it claims is necessary and proper.

The Necessary and Proper Clause was never intended to create any new powers or any implied or inherent powers. (If Congress has implied powers, no one would know where Congress’ powers stopped, and constitutional restrictions on Congress’ power become meaningless.) Its intent was to allow incidental acts that were necessary for implementing the powers delegated to Congress.

Nevertheless, federal courts have interpreted the Necessary and Proper Clause to vest complete and unlimited legislative power in the federal government. Using this Clause, the federal government has seized private property in the interest of historical preservation, has restricted the medical use of alcohol, has detained indefinitely lawbreakers, and has even established centralized banking.

Although the Necessary and Proper Clause was not intended to destroy the States, it has been used to reduce the significance and importance of the State by expanding the power of the federal government far beyond its constitutional bounds.

Supremacy Clause

Article VI, Paragraph 1: This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which they shall make, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.

With the Supremacy Clause, the federal government has reduced the States and the people thereof to insignificance. Using this Clause, especially in conjunction with the Necessary and Proper Clause, the federal government has nullified the tenth amendment.

Originally, the purpose of the Supremacy Clause was to ensure that unconstitutional laws were not supreme or binding. Only federal laws implementing the powers specifically delegated to Congress were constitutional; all other laws that Congress enacted were unconstitutional (today, the vast majority of the US statutes are unconstitutional).

Now, the federal government uses the Supremacy Clause to ensure that federal laws and treaties have precedence over State laws and State constitutions except in the few incidences where the federal courts have declared the federal law unconstitutional. No longer do federal laws have to be made pursuant to the Constitution, i.e., be constitutional, to have precedence over State laws. Using this Clause, the federal government has preempted or limited States regulating healthcare, medicine, banking, securities, transportation, labor, employment, meat inspection, and a host of other activities that are constitutionally reserved for the States. Thus, Congress, the President, and the federal courts have used this clause to impose their predilections on the States and people thereof.

Unlike today, the Supremacy Clause originally acknowledged that the Constitution was a compact among the States. It acknowledged that the federal government had only the few powers that the States delegated to it. All other powers, the States retained. Now, the federal government uses this Clause to subordinate the States and the people thereof to its whims.

Using the Supremacy Clause to justify the doctrine of judicial review, federal courts have declared a monopoly on deciding which laws and acts are constitutional and which are not. However, this Clause does not give the federal courts such a monopoly. It merely requires federal courts to uphold the supreme law of the land. Consequently, the States individually also have the right to rule on the constitutionality of a law — and even more so because they created the federal court system.

(Oddly, the US Supreme Court has ruled that although when a statute of Congress does not preempt a State’s law, regulations of regulatory agencies can preempt State laws. Apparently, regulations of federal regulatory agencies trump both Congressional laws and the Constitution.) 

Conclusion

With these four clauses, the centralists have expanded the federal government beyond the wildest dreams of the Federalists. Using these four clauses, federal courts, Presidents, and Congresses have greatly concentrated power in the federal government. Along with the fourteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth amendments, these four clauses have reduced the States and the people thereof (bodies politic) to insignificance. Now, the States have only those powers that the federal government condescends to give them. Likewise, the people have only those freedoms that the federal government condescends to allow them. Thus, liberty dies! The spirit of 1776 is no more. The spirit of 1984 has risen.

References

Abbott, Greg. Restoring the Rule of Law with the States Leading the Way.

Benner, David. Compact of the Republic: The League of States and the Constitution. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Live & Liberty Publishing Group, 2015.

Rothbard, Murray N. Conceived in Liberty: The New Republic, 1784–1791. Volume V. Editor Patrick Newman. Auburn, Alabama: Mises Institute, 2019.

Copyright © 2021 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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COVID-19 — The Political Virus

COVID-19 — The Political Virus

Thomas Allen

COVID-19 is not a biological virus: It is a political virus. It is being used to destroy the country by destroying its economy, and, by that, to bring down President Trump and especially the deplorables who support him.

Even worse, the Chinese Virus is being used to destroy the Bill of Rights. Political leaders and their owners are attempting to use this plandemic to establish a tyrannical, despotic regime modeled after Communist China — with the Democrats and their masters in charge.

As one commentator notes, if Trump wins the presidential election, the Chinese Virus will be attacking us until January 2025. However, if a Democrat wins, the Chinese Virus will vanish by January 2021.

Democrats like to present themselves as the party of the little guy. Only they care about him. Yet, they declare many little guys nonessential, that is, they are unnecessary. To Democrats, barbers, hairdressers, waitresses, bartenders, sales clerks, and many more little guys are nonessential and, therefore, of no importance.

Moreover, the Democratic party claims to be the party of the blue-collar worker and the union man. Yet, it declares many of their jobs nonessential, i.e., not necessary for the economy. Its deliberate destruction of the economy has caused many of these people to lose their jobs permanently.

President Trump and many of his supports are predicting a rapidly growing economy before the end of 2021. Others are expecting that the recovery of the economy will take years.

If the nonessential federal agencies and their programs were abolished, i.e., if 80 percent or more of the US government were abolished, the economy could recover within 18 months. Moreover, the world would witness an economic boom the likes of which has never been witnessed.

Unfortunately, the US government will follow the precedent of Presidents Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt and try to micromanage the economic recovery. (Yet, Hoover and Roosevelt managed to turn an economic downturn that would have ended by 1931 into a depression that did not end until 1946.) Thus, recovering from for the COVID-19 economic destruction will take years, if not a decade or more.

Worse than the deliberate destruction of the economy is the deliberate destruction of the Bill of Rights. Most political leaders took an oath to protect and uphold the US Constitution of which the Bill of Rights is the most important part. Nevertheless, most of these same political leaders have gone out of their way to violate their oath by destroying the Bill of Rights.

The Bill of Rights prohibits governmental interference with the exercise of religion. Yet, most governors have dictated how religious services are to be exercised. Some have even prohibited religious gatherings and even baptismal ceremonies. What is even more reprehensible is that most religious leaders have not protested this destruction of religious liberty. Likewise, most Christians have cowed before the tyrants with hardly an objection. Muslims have been far bolder in defending their religious practices than have Christians.

Fortunately, a few brave pastors have rebelled against the megalomaniac political leaders and have held religious services in violation of the governor’s or mayor’s ukase — although most of these were outside the church building. Moreover, some Christians have protested the destruction of religious liberty. Regrettably, most have not.

Likewise, the political leaders have destroyed the freedom of assembly by limiting the size of gatherings to some arbitrary number that has no basis in science. Again, protests against this loss of liberty have been scant. At least, some young people are beginning to gather at beaches and without contracting the Chinese Virus, as political leaders and presstitutes claimed would happen. (If any had contracted the Chinese Virus, the presstitutes would have made it headline news for weeks.)

Furthermore, political leaders have interfered with the right of assembly with the infamous six-foot spacing rule. Where is the science that shows that 183 centimeters (about 6 feet) is safe, but at 180 centimeters, one is at high risk of contracting or transmitting the Chinese Virus? (In Germany, safe social distancing is 150 centimeters. The World Health Organization’s recommendation is 100 centimeters. What is the safe distance? Moreover, is the real objective behind social distancing to prevent Trump rallies?)

Besides freedom of religion and freedom of assembly, political leaders have violated many other provisions of the Bill of Rights. For example, they have violated the due-process clause and the taking-without-compensation clause.

Since World War II, two pandemics hit the United States harder than has the Chinese Virus. They were the Asian Flu (a.k.a. H2N2 or influenza A) and the Hong Kong Flu (a.k.a. H3N2).

The Asian Flu appeared in the United States in 1957. By the time it departed, it had killed about 116,000 people in the United States. Fatalities per million people from the Asian Flu were 674. (Fatalities per million people from the Chinese Virus  are about 225, and this is an overstatement because the deaths from the Chinese Virus are overstated.)

The Hong Kong Flu appeared in the United States in December 1968. When it left the following year, it had killed about 100,000 people in the United States. Fatalities per million people from the Hong Kong Flu were 500.

As with the Chinese Viruses, most of the people who died of Asian and Hong Kong flues were elderly, especially those with heart or lung disease. Both flues killed many more people per capita than has the Chinese Virus. Yet, unlike today, political leaders did not shut down their economies — business continued as usual. Even the Woodstock concert with more than 400,000 attendees was held in August 1969. Further, political leaders did not destroy the Bill of Rights by banning crowds and restricting religious practices.  (Before one claims that the lower number of deaths from the Chinese Virus is the result of the shutdown, he should remember that the proponents of the shutdown claimed that it would not reduce the number of deaths; it would merely spread those deaths over a longer period.)

Moreover, the press did not spend 24-hours per day terrorizing the people into hysteria. Instead, they sought to calm them and instruct them in basic hygiene. Also, unlike today, people did not seek a political solution to a medical problem.

The official COVID-19 deaths include pneumonia, influenza, and the Chinese Virus. Of these deaths credited to COVID-19, COVID-19 accounts for only about a fifth of them. Even this number is too high because the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) encourages hospitals and doctors to overreport COVID-19 deaths by paying them more for COVID-19 patients and deaths. Moreover, with some hospitals facing bankruptcy because they can on longer do so-called elective surgery (surgery that is scheduled, such as removing kidney stones or nonemergency heart surgery), which accounts for most of the revenue of many hospitals, they overreport COVID-19 patients and deaths to stave off bankruptcy.

At least one good thing has come from this political war against the Chinese Virus, and that has been closing schools. However, not only do children not transmit the Chinese Virus, they have a low probability of becoming ill from the disease and even much less chance of dying from it. Consequently, closing schools was unnecessary. Nevertheless, closing schools has been one of the few good things to come from this plandemic. It has shown that expensive school buildings and busing are unnecessary. Most important, it has separate students from their indoctrinators, and, thus, making their socialistic indoctrination more difficult.

Franklin D. Roosevelt, the godfather of today’s liberal Democrats, said, “Only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Based on their actions, most Democrats and many Republicans have ignored Roosevelt. Fear leads them. Moreover, they have let political leaders and presstitutes terrorize them into total hysteria. Fear has become their god. As a result, most will have to learn to live in poverty, and all will have to learn to live in a tyrannical police state.

Appendix: Governor Cuomo of New York
To Governor Cuomo of New York goes the ignominy of the most despicable and reprehensible action taken during this Chinese Virus plandemic. Forcing nursing homes and kindred facilities to accept people known to be infected with COVID-19, he has greatly increased death from COVID-19. Thus, he has deliberately and knowingly exposed people who are the most vulnerable to COVID-19 and most likely to die of it to the Chinese Virus. He is responsible for their death and their blood is on his hand. He should be executed for murder. If Dante’s Inferno, is ever rewritten, it will have to have a special place in hell for Cuomo, which is below that of Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot. Likewise, Michigan’s Governor Gretchen Whitmer deserves to be burning beside Cuomo for the same crime of forcing nursing homes to accept people infected with the Chinese Virus.

Copyright © 2020 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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