"Posterity, you will never know how much it cost the present generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it. If you do not, I shall repent in heaven that ever I took half the pains to preserve it." -John Adams


Welcome to Patriot's Lament. We strive here to educate ourselves on Liberty. We will not worry ourselves so much with the daily antics of American politics, and drown ourselves in the murky waters of the political right or left.
Instead, we will look to the Intellectuals and Champions of Liberty, and draw on their wisdom of what it is to be a truly free people. We will learn from where our Providential Liberties are derived, and put the proper perspective of a Free Individual and the State.
Please join us!

Sunday, October 30, 2011

What do veterans know?

Interesting poll here.
These Vets just need to quit whining and let the fat cats in Washington do the thinking and deciding what's worth what. You know, the scum who sit in a nice office and risk little more than indigestion while they make decisions on who to kill and who to send to die.
Yes, I am being sarcastic.
About the Veterans anyway.

Thursday, October 27, 2011

A Letter Concerning Toleration

John Locke
Bumping back to the top.
This letter is a concise and correct thought on the way we should view other people's religious thoughts, and whether or not we should use government force to make people believe and act the way we want.
This letter was written during the time that the Puritans were ruling Massachusetts Bay colony.
We have here in America reverted back, in a sense, to the ways of the Puritan Oligarchy, and this letter correctly refutes that.


Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Matt Want (part 2), Religious Freedom, and Self Ownership

Matt Want joins Steve, David, and Josh in studio for another discussion about using violence to deal with differences in opinion (voting) or pursuing peaceful action instead.

A caller also takes the show towards a discussion of religious freedom when he implies that Natural Law is not something that we are always discovering, but instead something that some specific Christians have complete knowledge of.

The libertarian premise of self ownership is also questioned by this caller, but any logical debate is dismissed because it is asserted that logic is not a valid tool with which to examine premises ... a curiously common viewpoint for the followers of the modern American religion of Christian Statism.

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Ron Paul speaks out against the TSA

Ron Paul speaks out against the jack booted Nazi thugs of the TSA doing random roadside searches. Wake up people. The link is here.
Anyone who tells me "driving a car is a privilege" deserves this. This is what happens when you let your RIGHTS become mere state granted privileges.
And they tell us, " well if your Rights are violated then you can take it up in court."

No! You are not a Serf! You are the Master!

Please read these next paragraphs and UNDERSTAND them!


“The privilege against self-incrimination is neither accorded to the passive resistant, nor the man who is ignorant of his rights, nor to one indifferent thereto. It is a fighting clause. Its benefits can be retained only by sustained combat. It can not be retained by attorney or solicitor. It is valid only when insisted upon by a belligerent claimant in the flesh.
“The one who is persuaded by honeyed words or moral suasion to testify or produce documents rather than make a last ditch stand, simply loses the protection. Once he testifies to part, he has waived his right and must on cross examination or otherwise, testify as to the whole transaction. He must refuse to answer or produce, and test the matter in contempt proceedings, or by habeas corpus.”
– United States v. Johnson, 76 F. Supp. 538, 540 (District Court, M.D. PA. 1947)


Saenz v. Roe, 526 U.S. 489 (1999). "For the purposes of this case, we need not identify the source of [the right to travel] in the text of the Constitution. The right of free ingress and regress to and from' neighboring states which was expressly mentioned in the text of the Article of Confederation, may simply have been conceived from the beginning to be a necessary concomitant of the stronger Union the Constitution created."' Id. at 501


 "The use of the highway for the purpose of
travel and transportation is not a mere privilege, but
a common fundamental right of which the public and
individuals cannot rightfully be deprived." Chicago
Motor Coach v. Chicago, 169 NE 221. 
 
"The right of the citizen to travel upon the
public highways and to transport his property thereon,
either by carriage or by automobile, is not a mere
privilege which a city may prohibit or permit at will,
but a common law right which he has under the right to
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Thompson
v. Smith, 154 SE 579.
 
"The right to travel is a part of the liberty
of which the citizen cannot be deprived without due
process of law under the Fifth Amendment." Kent v.
Dulles, 357 US 116, 125. 
 
 "The right to travel is a well-established
common right that does not owe its existence to the
federal government. It is recognized by the courts as
a natural right." Schactman v. Dulles 96 App DC 287,
225 F2d 938, at 941. 
 
   
  

Monday, October 24, 2011

The friend

Let's say you have a friend. This friend comes into your house and never leaves. This friend, who has nothing of his own, and anything he has he has gotten from you or other friends, (and he lives quite well on that!) constantly tells you how to live your life, tells you how to spend your money, never mind the fact that he himself is bankrupt and he steals to stay alive (he even takes your money when you're not looking and spends it on things you would disapprove of), gets into your business and tells you all the things you are doing wrong in your business, (he doesn't even have a job much less run a business). In fact, everything he has tried to run has failed miserably. This friend is always telling you how neighbor so-and-so is living wrong and doing things he doesn't approve of and "there ought to be a law against that"! This friend is so arrogant he tells you how to raise your kids, and tries to turn your own children against you so they will buddy up with him.
 How long until you say: ENOUGH! OUT YOU GO! and throw the bum into the street? "Well," you say, "that is not a friend at all! I wouldn't tolerate that for one minute from anybody. How does he know what is good for me?!!"
Really?
Now let's say your friend's name is government. Do you still feel the same way about him? Government is just a group of our "friends" who do the exact same things as our made-up friend. How are they any different than you? How are they better than you? How do they know what is good for you? How do they know how to spend your money better than you? Run your business, live your life, raise and teach your kids?
The fact is, they don't.
But they have the one thing our friend didn't have. They have guns, they have a lot of them, and they point their guns at you. Of course, all the while telling you to live a peaceful life... or else! What does peace mean to them? Your servitude.
So they run your business, steal your money, spend your money on things you don't want or need, tell you and your neighbor how to live your lives, take your children to raise them the way they want, and what will you do?

Dare you resist?


"The time has come at hand, whether Americans will be free men, or slaves." George Washington

Which will you be?

Sunday, October 23, 2011

Anne Hutchinson; matriarch of individualist anarchism in America

Anne was another Puritan who came to America in search of religious freedom. But her search would take her on a journey that reached far beyond that. While in Massachusetts Bay colony, she started promoting an individualistic approach to worshiping God, that one's conscience should dictate how one worshiped, not a bunch of man-made rules and conditions. This teaching swept through the colony, much to the dismay of the ruling class of the Church. Remember, the Church policies were enforced by the civil magistrates, and any teaching that contradicted church policy, not only threatened the so-called church, it threatened the rule of the civil government as well, which received all of its authority from the church.
The church rulers (an oxymoron in my mind, rulers of the church?) moved swiftly to stop this heresy. On a side note, we have to remember that these rulers were not so much concerned about the spiritual well-being of their colony, (and definitely not their physical well-being, as I will point out later) as they were with retaining their power over the colony. We know that forcing one to follow a certain creed or practice or religion isn't doing that person any good if he doesn't believe it for himself, and by enforcing this practice, the church rulers were themselves committing the very heresy they were supposedly against.
Anne was hauled before the magistrates and leaders of the colony. The accusations flew, but she held steadfast in her convictions.  She was convicted by the court of sedition and contempt, and banished from the colony. The magistrate moved now against her followers, and banished from the general court the two who spoke up for her at trial. Banishment was postponed due to the harsh winter, and she was kept under house arrest at the home of one of her greatest enemies, while the elders of the church daily argued with her to recant.
Several of her followers left the colony to start another colony, and under the guidance of Roger Williams, purchased land from the Indians in the Rhode Island area.  The significance of Williams' flight and settlement of Providence was now becoming clear: Williams set an example to all others who sought religious Liberty, and for the extension of the logic of Liberty, once Liberty is experienced, it's difficult to restrain. Anne joined them and her husband in the spring.
Anne soon became more concerned and aware of the freedom of conscience than advancing her own religious views, pushed to have the new colony's constitution changed, and eventually the colony of Portsmouth was born. No more Oligarchy, all the men in the colony were signers and voters, trial by Jury was established, and freedom of worship was guaranteed to all. Diversity of religion proliferated in the colony.
Anne Hutchinson, living in such freedom, soon took her belief in Liberty of conscience a step further, one that " pushed the logic of Roger Williams libertarianism far beyond the master." Anne persuaded her husband to leave his post as an assistant to the government, because of her opinion now that all magistracy was unlawful.
As Murray Rothbard put it, " the logic of Liberty and a deeper meditation on scripture had both brought Anne to the ultimate bounds of libertarian thought: to individualist anarchy." Winifred Rugg said of Anne, " She was supremely convinced that the christian held within his breast the assurance of salvation... and for such persons magistrates were obviously superfluous. As for the other, they were to be converted, not coerced!
She was later killed by warring Indians, much to the delight of the Massachusetts masters. But the spirit of Liberty that she carried was still much alive, and Massachusetts was soon to see that the Spirit of Freedom of Conscience and Liberty had taken hold in the hearts and minds of man, and torture and death could not stop it, as we will soon see.  

Friday, October 21, 2011

Fascist radio

It is truly amazing to me how many folks in this country are duped by the right wing radio talk show fascists.
You know, the ones who groan on and on about Obama and the democrats and their "unconstitutional acts" and blab about how "our Founders would roll over in their grave!"
The supposed "great one" who is called upon for his constitutional wisdom among the talk shows.
The same guys who thunderously applauded the Patriot act's implementation. The same ones who applaud aggressive wars. The same ones who scream about the wickedness of Obamacare, then have Mitt Romney on their show and laud his conservatism. The same ones who espouse family values, with special guest Newt Gingrich. Or the one who talks of family values and the next segment talks about his 4th wife, or is it his 5th? The same ones who double speak about being pro-life, and promote sending our kids into war, to kill and be killed. The same ones who blab about the left wanting to suppress religion, and then try to close Muslim mosques.
 Freedom of speech and assembly and they mock anyone who protests the federal reserve. How the "left" doesn't tell the truth and hides information from us that may be damaging to them, and blackball Ron Paul. Yes those republicans are the answer to all things good radio talk show hosts.
These flukes never speak of our revolution. But they do espouse obedience to the state. Do you ever hear the word "Liberty" come from their mouths? Would they know what it means?

What I am trying to point out is, they are lying stooges.

And I do believe the founders of the united States would surely roll in their grave, especially if they could hear these guys push their lies and attribute their wisdom to the wisdom of the Founders.

On Party politics:

I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the State, with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party generally.
This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled, or repressed; but, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy.... It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which finds a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passions. Thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another. George Washington


On foreign entanglements:


Observe good faith and justice towards all nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct; and can it be, that good policy does not equally enjoin it  It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and at no distant period, a great nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt that, in the course of time and things, the fruits of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages which might be lost by a steady adherence to it ? George  Washington


I have ever deemed it fundamental for the United States never to take active part in the quarrels of Europe. Their political interests are entirely distinct from ours. Their mutual jealousies, their balance of power, their complicated alliances, their forms and principles of government, are all foreign to us. They are nations of eternal war. All their energies are expended in the destruction of the labor, property and lives of their people." --Thomas Jefferson


Wherever the standard of freedom and independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will her (America) heart, her benedictions and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy.  She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own. John Quincy Adams


On the patriot act:
"Any people that would give up liberty for a little temporary safety deserves neither liberty nor safety." 
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 


"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is argument of tyrants. It is the creed of slaves."  William Pitt


On Liberty:


A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry. Jefferson 
 
"We base all our experiments on the capacity of mankind for self-government."  James Madison

The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government."

Patrick Henry  

On Morality:
"Can the liberties of a nation be sure when we remove their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people, that these liberties are a gift from God?  Thomas Jefferson

"Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."  John Adams

"(T)he foundation of our national policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality; ...the propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained..."  George Washington

And finally, man's Right to resist tyranny:

"If we wish to be free, if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending, if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained _ we must fight!"  Patrick Henry

And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to the facts, pardon and pacify them.... The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure."

Thomas Jefferson

"Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God."  Thomas Jefferson

"Government is not reason; it is not eloquence. It is force. And force, like fire, is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."  George Washington


So, the next time you turn on the radio and hear one of these guys blabbing on and on, and they bring up freedom, the Founders, the Constitution, or anything of the like, remember what you read here, from the Founders themselves, and you can disassociate yourself from the lies of the "right" and arm yourself with what Liberty is all about. Like we have said here before, don't take our word for it, and please, don't take the talking heads' word for it; look it up yourselves. 
  

Fascism?



From the always informative Lew Rockwell Blog.

Comment on Cain's 9-9-9 Plan

"You are eating a s__t sandwich, and someone offers you three little s__t appetizers instead. Turns out you still have to eat the same amount of s__t."

From Robert Wenzel's terrific Economic Policy Journal.

Interesting to see Peter Schiff being mistaken on this particular issue. Just goes to show, study for yourself and reach your own conclusions! Definitely don't believe what I post without digging into it.

Monday, October 17, 2011

Free Michael Anderson... a small Victory

Roger Williams



Roger Williams, an English separatist (one who advocated separating from the Anglican Church of England) and an apprentice of Sir Edward Coke, came to the Massachusetts Bay colony in 1631. He was immediately offered a teaching position which he turned down. He embarrassed the Puritan Separatists by claiming they should openly separate from the Church of England. He went further by denying the civil authority the right to punish infractions of religious rules or doctrines. This struck at the very core of theocratic principles, and the General Court replied that it was absurd to maintain that a church might fall into heresy and the civil magistrate could not intermeddle.
The mere thought that the state should be separate from the church was up to now unheard of, and the thought put fear into the Puritan rulers.
Williams also denied the right of the king to make land grants to the colonists. Williams maintained that the land belonged to the Indians and should be purchased from them. He went on to refuse the loyalty oath to Massachusetts and urged his congregation to do likewise.
The Puritans had enough. He was banished from the colony. Williams went on to purchase his own land from the Indians and started Providence colony. The heads of household were the voters of the colony, and there was complete religious freedom, free from the state. Free to worship, or not to worship, without fear of retribution. This became important for later fugitives of Massachusetts. Baptists, Quakers, and Jews were welcome to Providence.
According to Williams, coerced religion led sects to “slaughter each other for their several respective religions and conscience.” He believed that persecuting anyone for the practice (or non practice) of any religion was to persecute one for the Liberty of Conscience.
The logic of Liberty had, as we shall see, even more drastic implications. For, as some citizens of Providence began to reason, if the conscience of the individual was to be supreme in religious matters, if the state was to have no power to interfere with any actions determined by his religious conscience, why wouldn’t this extend to civil matters as well? Why shouldn’t the individual’s conscience reign supreme in all civil as well as religious affairs? Murray Rothbard, Conceived in Liberty       

Setting the stage, Individualism in America

 Liberalism, another word that has been taken hostage by political factions these days, or Classical Liberalism, Libertarianism and Individualism, or Anarchy,  has roots in America going back 400 years.
 The early Americans who we are told left England to find “religious freedom” created the exact opposite. The Puritans in Massachusetts had set up a religious oligarchy that was more oppressive than anything they had left. Not only was the Puritan theology forced on you from the church, but the civil government also enforced all the Puritan edicts. If you didn’t come to church, you were whipped.  Nothing could be said against either the church or the civil government, (which were one and the same) or you were whipped, banished, or put to death. You were free to believe what they wanted you to, but it ended there. The regulations put on the people were so extreme you could hardly move without violating a law (sounds oddly familiar). The Oligarchy saw the brainwashing of the youth as its best protection of its power, so it instituted the first mandatory public schools in America, with the stated intent of training “obedient” subjects.
Not all subjects were allowed to join the church, and only church members were allowed to vote for the rulers, another way to solidify their power.
The Reverend Urian Oakes gave the thought of the rulers of that day: “The loud outcry of some is for Liberty of conscience …I look upon this unbounded toleration as the firstborn of abominations.” So here is what was faced by the settlers of the new world.
But I would submit that wherever there is Tyranny, there is a Resistance, and these Puritans leaders suffered from an inner contradiction: their own protestant tenant of the Individual being able to interpret the Bible without ecclesiastical decree. And that Spirit of Individualism would soon spread not only to religion, but to civil society as well.  

The Revolution Will Be Televised

I think this is an appropriate song for the times we live in.


Welcome to the world of computer chips and manuscripts
Where everybody seals their lips
Wrong or right we came to clear your sight
Combat, better prepare to bust back
TV screens get you the satellite beams
Wrong or right we came to clear your sight
This type of game come as no surprise
Ready to rise
The Revolution will be televised


The Revolution will be televised
The Revolution will be a war of attrition
Waged against the sleeping
The Revolution will be fought in all forms of media
It’ll be fought on phone wires
On cable modems
On our cell phones
On our palm pilots
The revolution will be fought on CNN


We stand in the face of a quickening
And the great dumbing down of our people
And in our greatest minds
And we wage war by whatever means necessary
By punishing awakening
Into our senses and into our thoughts
Sparkling McDonald’s cookie-cutter Pleasantville
Out of our gray slumber


This revolution is not free
This revolution is not free


It's powerful
This revolution is our revolution
And we embrace our revolution
We decide beyond the shack of rules and lies and false information
This is our revolution and our revolution is secure

Saturday, October 15, 2011

A few quotes from John Locke

"Whenever violence is used, and injury done, though by hands appointed to administer justice, it is still violence and injury, however coloured with the name, pretences, or forms of law".

"Everyone has property in his own person. This nobody has any right to but himself. The labour of his body, and the work of his hands, we may say, are properly his."

"For a man's property is not at all secure, though there be good and equitable laws to set the bounds of it, between him and his fellow subjects, if he who commands those subjects, have power to take from any private man, what part he pleases of his property, and use and dispose of it as he thinks good."

"And thus the community perpetually retains a supreme power of saving themselves from the attempts and designs of anybody, even of their legislators, whenever they shall be so foolish, or so wicked, as to lay and carry on designs against the liberties and properties of the subject." 

"For there are no examples so frequent in history, both sacred and profane, as those of men withdrawing themselves, and their obedience, from the jurisdiction they were born under, and the family or community they were bred up in, and setting up new governments in other places...."

I really like the last one, VOTE WITH YOUR FEET!


Peter Schiff educates us on the Greater Depression

Thanks so much to Jeff Berwick for coming on as a guest for the first half hour of today's show. I will have that up on YouTube later this week for everyone to listen to at their leisure. Be sure to check out Jeff's newsletter and YouTube channel at the links below:
http://anarchast.com/

One of the topics that Jeff touched on that generated some interest from the callers was the current economic collapse (which is here now and going to deepen). The best presenter of the causes and solutions to the current situation in my opinion is Peter Schiff. I have linked to several YouTube clips of his below showing him calling the crisis, talking about what we should do now, and finally one where he talks about his book How an Economy Grows and Why it Crashes (click the link to purchase from Amazon). This book takes less than two hours to read and gives you all the information you need to know. You don't have to become an expert in economics to understand it.

Peter Schiff was Right:

Peter Schiff 2006 Mortgage Banker's speech (where he tells them housing is going to crash):

Schiff at the Mises Institute discussing the collapse and what's next:

Lew Rockwell interviewing Schiff on his book How an Economy Grows and Why it Crashes:

Some of these videos are long, but a couple hours of your time could save you a massive amount of money as this crisis deepens.

Friday, October 14, 2011

October 8 Radio Show with Matt Want

This was probably our most fun show yet! The whole playlist is below, so just click play and sit back for the next hour and enjoy!

Mises on Government (a note for Occupy Wall Street)

"The essential feature of government is the enforcement of its decrees by beating, killing, and imprisoning. Those who are asking for more government interference are asking ultimately for more compulsion and less freedom."

-Ludwig von Mises

Thursday, October 13, 2011

Government: a Violent Destructive Superstition

Let me start by saying that part of me hopes you do not end up agreeing with me and advocating this as you will end up very far out in the political wilderness (actually entirely beyond it in a barren land). It seems that most people need baby steps along the way. They refuse to reject theft and the initiation of violence against their neighbor on "merely ideological" grounds. What I advocate is peace. It is voluntary cooperation. It is society organized around mutual benefit, not mutually assured destruction. It is either seriously flawed, or it's way too much for the slaves still suffering from Stockholm Syndrome to accept. Potentially both. Read on and decide for yourself.

Orwell observed that the first step towards intellectual tyranny was when language was altered so as to make expression of heretical thoughts impossible. The word "anarchy" has been altered by the state. I will not let them have it.

Anarchy

Etymology
New Latin anarchia < Ancient Greek ἀναρχία (anarkhiā) < ἀν- (an-, “not”), + ἀρχή (arkhē, “power, authority”).
Pronunciation
• (UK) IPA: /ˈænəki/, SAMPA: /"{n@ki/
• (US) enPR: ănʹär-kē, IPA: /ˈænɑɹki/, SAMPA: /"{nAr\ki/
Noun
anarchy (countable and uncountable; plural anarchies)
• (uncountable) The state of a society being without authoritarians or a governing body.
• (uncountable) Anarchism; the political theory that a community is best organized by the voluntary cooperation of individuals, rather than by a government, which is regarded as being coercive by nature.
• (countable) A chaotic and confusing absence of any form of political authority or government.
• confusion in general; disorder


The state convinces us of the latter two definitions so that it can enslave us. Without the state there would be Chaos! Without the state the sun will not rise! Without the state you would have to be responsible for your actions! The most vocal opponents of liberty are our fellow prisoners (those ruled by the state). This means the state has done its job. It has convinced the prisoners to use social pressure in order to keep their fellow inmates from leaving, even though there are no guards and the door is wide open. The myth of anarchy as "chaos" is that political authority (government) is the only way in which chaos and confusion can be created and propagated on a large scale. Government creates chaos or convinces people that freedom is chaos so that it can impose rules which were completely unnecessary in its absence. This is called ordo ab chao, latin for "order out of chaos." Of course "chaos" is simply a word for order which we do not yet understand. The history of the state is one of oppressing that which it does not understand. The history of human progress is embracing and studying that which we do not yet understand. Murray Rothbard characterized this struggle as one between "Power and Market."

The formation of any codified "civil law" will be necessarily limited (imperfect) because it is implemented by man who is neither omniscient nor omnipotent. For example, because we are imperfect, none of us can actually perfectly understand and interpret the Bible. Christ himself had fun with this when he was a teenager in the temple ... the "experts in the law" hated him for it. Therefore, any codified law is imperfect, either in its wording or in its interpretation ... but once it is codified all the individuals within the jurisdiction are subject to it. Worse still, the ability to alter it in order to reduce the degree of imperfection is placed in the hands of those presumptuous enough to have imposed it in the first place. The individual seeking justice cannot take their appeal elsewhere. There are no market forces acting to improve law, there is no competition. Instead law is socialized from the moment it is codified. Socialism always leads to decreasing quality at an increasing cost due to the lack of a pricing mechanism (which would gauge supply and demand). All government is socialism.

The Constitution was never better than it was on day one. It was all downhill from there. Why was it good on day one? Why did some of the anti-federalists assume the authority to subject those they were "representing" to it? Because it represented fairly accurately the private law that colonists were observing at the time in order to conduct business with each other anyway. It reflected the norms at the time, but not for long, because once the authority to decide what law in the colonies was to be was taken from the people in their private interactions and centralized, it could become "out of step" with no meaningful recourse. The law before codification was dependent upon the moral character of individuals in their daily interactions with other individuals (thus providing immediate feedback ... "that guy is a scam artist, don't to business with him" ... etc). An immoral society would fail. A moral one would succeed. A shyster would be run out of town. People indeed "took the law into their own hands." Once codified however, the law became dependent upon the whims of those who actively seek power. The expectation of enforcement was also socialized. There were concerns when the NYPD was founded that it would result in a citizenry who does not feel it is their responsibility to defend their neighbor against crime. Years later there is the murder of Kitty Genovese.

So codified civil law may not be so bad at first when these men came from an educated and largely moral society, but I think it would be fair to say that the Federal officials have always been a step or two ahead of private criminals when it comes to violating what the vast majority of individuals consider to be their rights. Government theft in America has exceeded private theft for every year the Republic has existed. All government is theft.

All political systems imaginable and all those that have existed in history stand in violation of "love your neighbors as yourself" as they all violate this principle. All political systems are based on theft and apply justice asymmetrically in order to hide from their inherent moral and ethical dilemma. Libertarians are indeed mostly an "I've got mine Jack!" group, because libertarians are politically minded. The incentive for political participation is the possibility to take the reins of a system of coercion for personal benefit. This system has always appealed to the lowest in man. The market anarchist proposes abolition of this monopoly on the use of force so that all involved must succeed or fail based on their own merit and that no individual can live outside of the law by claiming to be part of the ruling class (which no longer exists). The market, being a cooperative social system based on voluntary participation, requires equal application of the law in order to operate most efficiently, thus the market anarchist must be concerned with how the law is being applied to his neighbors, because indeed his well being is inextricably tied to that of his neighbors (whereas under any political system, he can be better off by making them worse off through "legal plunder"). In contrast to market anarchy which is based on peaceful interpersonal exchange, all government is the initiation of coercive violence.

This is the contradiction that minarchists (libertarians) have to struggle with constantly. Republicans and Democrats do not have this struggle because at their core, they oppose voluntaryism and advocate authoritarianism. Their philosophy is consistent, but it is consistent only with tyranny. The libertarian wants to have it both ways. They want "liberty with minimal oppression." The anarchist however has a philosophy consistent with "equality under the law" ... which is only possible in a horizontally structured social system, the one we know as "the free market" as organized by the rules we call "private property" which is fundamentally based on our respect for everyone else's property, and only secondarily on the defense of our own. A fence is only effective if our neighbors respect it, which only happens if we respect theirs. In the absence of a state which grants exceptions to these social norms (natural law or the golden rule) violations are clear for all to see. Right and wrong are apparent to all. The blurring of these lines does not occur when arbitrary authority is abolished, but instead only when it is granted to a privileged few, which is the inevitable outcome of all systems of government.

With that, I will leave you with an observation that a wise man named Helio made in regards to journey to this philosophy (which mirrors my own).

"You know, I think the main reason most minarchist libertarians resist anarchism isn't academic an reason. They have a deep familial connection to America, its culture, history, symbols and general collectivism and it feels like cutting off your right arm to question it. So minarchism is really just a way to defend the institutions they love, while giving them the benefit of seeking more liberty. I say this because that describes exactly what I went through. If that is generally true, then the motivation to still participate and use the state to create more liberty comes from nationalism. A libertarian becomes an anarchist when they give up that superstition."
-Helio

If you choose to let go of that superstition by rejecting theft and violence on principle because they are immoral means regardless of the ends, and come join us beyond the political wilderness, there is one priceless benefit. There are no politicians, and there never will be.


Further readings:

Anarcho-capitalism (Wikipedia)

The Constitution of No Authority

"Inasmuch as the Constitution was never signed, nor agreed to, by anybody, as a contract, and therefore never bound anybody, and is now binding upon nobody; and is, moreover, such an one as no people can ever hereafter be expected to consent to, except as they may be forced to do so at the point of the bayonet, it is perhaps of no importance what its true legal meaning, as a contract, is. Nevertheless, the writer thinks it proper to say that, in his opinion, the Constitution is no such instrument as it has generally been assumed to be; but that by false interpretations, and naked usurpations, the government has been made in practice a very widely, and almost wholly, different thing from what the Constitution itself purports to authorize. He has heretofore written much, and could write much more, to prove that such is the truth. But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain – that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case, it is unfit to exist."

Christian Anarchy

"The rule of the state is the rule of death through the power of the law. It is man’s way and it accomplishes nothing toward delivering us from evil as it subjects humankind under the terror of violence and forceful coercion, which is to say, it is evil. Not only does it fail to solve our sin problem, it facilitates and exacerbates every aspect of our depravity and is the ultimate agent of human rebellion against the Creator. The state has always pitted the strength of man against the Almighty and is unable to do otherwise. Humanity strives through history to unite in opposition to God just as our ancestors first did on a plain in Shinar at a place called Babel. They tried to build a tower to heaven. We build bridges to nowhere, believing that our work will make us free. We have not yet managed to come together again as one since our languages were confused and our families scattered across the face of the earth, but always and everywhere we form centers of human power, consolidating the strength of many, yielding it up to the hands of a few and exchanging our freedom for an unholy independence from the very source of our existence."

The Myth of the Rule of Law

"Our long-standing love affair with the myth of the rule of law has made us blind to the latter possibility. Like the Monosizeans, who after centuries of state control cannot imagine a society in which people can buy whatever size shoes they wish, we cannot conceive of a society in which individuals may purchase the legal services they desire. The very idea of a free market in law makes us uncomfortable. But it is time for us to overcome this discomfort and consider adopting Socrates' approach. We must recognize that our love for the rule of law is unrequited, and that, as so often happens in such cases, we have become enslaved to the object of our desire. No clearer example of this exists than the legal process by which our Constitution was transformed from a document creating a government of limited powers and guaranteed rights into one which provides the justification for the activities of the all-encompassing super-state of today. However heart-wrenching it may be, we must break off this one-sided affair. The time has come for those committed to individual liberty to realize that the establishment of a truly free society requires the abandonment of the myth of the rule of law."

Hans Hoppe contrasts monarchy and democracy and the superiority of private law societies (under which the rules most congruent with the nature of existence would be the most successful)

Captain Midnight educates Glenn Beck and America

This guy distills down crony capitalism and the corrupt American economic system brilliantly. Enjoy.

Power=Force=Violence=Death =The State

Live Free or Die!

Patriot act... hows that working for ya?