On the Invasion of Private Rights

"The invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from acts of Government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts in which the Government is the mere instrument of the major number of the Constituents."
(-- James Madison (letter to Thomas Jefferson, 17 October 1788)

Reference: The Constitution of Liberty, Hayek (475); original The Complete Madison, Padover (253)


I thought this was quite appropriate. It does take some thought, however, to digest what Madison is saying here.

I am personally amazed that any Christian could countenance legislation like the Military Commissions Act signed into law on October 17, 2006 with the overwhelming support of both Democrats and Republicans.(VP Cheney has stated in the past few days that using torture techniques like "water-boarding" or simulated drowning is a "no brainer." He lovingly supports such hideous techniques, apparently.)

Despite other comments, this administration, and many before it, seek to gain their desired results by the use of fear and manipulation. In the present case, I agree with Vox Day in his recent article: we face demise from within before the "terrorists" without will ever touch us. The acceptance of the use of torture being the latest moral indicator.

In my opinion, defending the use of torture against people, any people, violates the very core of the historic American mind...at least the American mind that founded this country. Those great men and women were also the victims of torture and acts unspeakable...and even being "dunked" (water-boarded?) to get them to recant their "heresies." Such acts make us worse than the puported "enemy who is out to destroy us..." And America's hands are clean...and there is nothing we have allowed our government to do overseas and in these "enemy" countries which might be the reason for their animosity...right? Such willfully blind thinking will not pass muster at the judgment seat, I think.

I think the press of circumstance and our acceptance of the propaganda of the "fear machine" have made us non-sensical. We in fact are accepting as legitimate the very acts (torture) which drove our fore fathers to this country.

I believe the prophet Micah' words in Micah 3 are appropriate for the condition of the church in America:


Quote:
1 And I said, Hear, I pray you, O heads of Jacob, and ye princes of the house of Israel; Is it not for you to know judgment?

2 Who hate the good, and love the evil; who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones;

3 Who also eat the flesh of my people, and flay their skin from off them; and they break their bones, and chop them in pieces, as for the pot, and as flesh within the caldron.

4 Then shall they cry unto the LORD, but he will not hear them: he will even hide his face from them at that time, as they have behaved themselves ill in their doings.

5 Thus saith the LORD concerning the prophets that make my people err, that bite with their teeth, and cry, Peace; and he that putteth not into their mouths, they even prepare war against him.

6 Therefore night shall be unto you, that ye shall not have a vision; and it shall be dark unto you, that ye shall not divine; and the sun shall go down over the prophets, and the day shall be dark over them.

7 Then shall the seers be ashamed, and the diviners confounded: yea, they shall all cover their lips; for there is no answer of God.

8 But truly I am full of power by the spirit of the LORD, and of judgment, and of might, to declare unto Jacob his transgression, and to Israel his sin.

9 Hear this, I pray you, ye heads of the house of Jacob, and princes of the house of Israel, that abhor judgment, and pervert all equity.

10 They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity.

11 The heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money: yet will they lean upon the LORD, and say, Is not the LORD among us? none evil can come upon us.

12 Therefore shall Zion for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest.

As was the case with the nation of Israel, so now today, Zion, in America, is a plowed field.