Join Convention of States
In late 2012, I found myself interested in the 17th Amendment a few months before its hundred year anniversary in April 2013. Having earlier read James Madison’s often sketchy notes… Read more »
Monthly Archives: April 2016
Men of Little Faith: Anti-Federalists and Article V Opponents
There is a parallel conservatism shared by the framing era Anti-Federalists and today’s Article V opponents. Conservatism in this sense is the tendency to hold on to what is known… Read more »
The Spirit of Governments
In a 1792 column in the National Gazette, James Madison* briefly touched on Charles de Montesquieu’s three operative principles of government: fear in despotisms, honor in monarchies, and virtue in… Read more »
To Retrieve Free Government, Part II
From yesterday’s post regarding thoroughly corrupted republics, Machiavelli* found that even when a few wise laws are passed, corrupt institutions in society and government will turn the law away from… Read more »
To Retrieve Free Government, Part I
Can free government be reestablished in a corrupt republic? Is there enough virtue remaining in America 2016 for renewal? For insight, I can’t help but return to a favorite read,… Read more »
Great Crimes, No Punishment
We honor our Framers as the greatest lawgivers in history, yet as a society we freeze at the thought of removing perhaps the greatest law-thief in history, Barack Obama. The… Read more »
Where the Presumption of Liberty?
Should I be charged with a felony, I know that as an American I am presumed innocent. This presumption of innocence means I will remain in possession of my God-given… Read more »
Article V and The Federalist No. 1
In my April 20th post, I connected our existing and dire situation with that of 1787. Despite the differences between then and now, there is at least one commonality: the… Read more »
Progressing the American Republic
The framing generation of 1787 agonized over how to form free government across an extensive territory that avoided the classic problem of republics: their degeneration into democracies in which various… Read more »
If Two States Convened
What if just two states set a time and place for delegates to discuss amendments to our Constitution? Several states have submitted applications to congress that call for limiting the… Read more »