Tyrannos

"Sometimes 'The Majority' only means all the fools are on the same side."
- Ronald Reagan

“Tyrannos” is an ancient Greek word that initially meant nothing more than “master”. But, as free men will not endure masters, the meaning has changed through the centuries, and today the very word is hateful to free people. When John Wilkes Booth assassinated Abraham Lincoln at the end of the civil war, he shouted “Sic simper Tyrannis” --Thus be it ever with Tyrants!-- as justification for his heinous act, which it probably would have been had his fellow citizens believed that Lincoln was nothing more than a tyrant. After all, authorities of religion and morality both have openly proclaimed that tyrannicide is not murder. While most people didn’t agree with his act, Booth’s action did release a flood of real claimants to mastership on an unsuspecting nation, everything from carpetbaggers and raging abolitionists on the defeated southerners, to a quite vindictive US Congress on the rest of the nation. However, our Constitution, our laws, and our traditions were far to strong for that post civil war tyranny, and it faded into oblivion after a few short years… almost. The times planted the seeds of tyranny in our government, and while slow to mature, they’ve been growing ever since.

No nation and no people are safe from the grasp of tyranny. Governments force us to do things we’d rather not do, claiming that “it’s for our own good”, “it’s the will of the people”, or perhaps they’re just “redistributing the wealth”. Tyrants and tyranny rarely come with hands dripping blood, eyes burning with hatred, or dragging the chains of our servitude with them. Instead they claim to be friends of the people, workers for the public good, hero’s who will save the nation from the babble of political parties. They promise they will carry out the peoples will. Certainly they come with “heaven sent” promises. If we disarm ourselves they will provide professionals to protect us from evildoers. If we give over our property they will provide us with jobs and the means of a better life. The economy will be strengthened. Crime and poverty will vanish. Together we will build a new nation, worthy of our glorious new future. And of course they would never misuse their enhanced power. With such rhetoric (and the sword) Ferdinand of Naples, generally regarded as the worst despot in European history, took power, as did Adolf Hitler in Germany, Lenin and Stalin in Russia, Mao in China, and Kim Il Sung in Korea.

The tyrant does not just appear out of the blue, the ground must be prepared for him, either deliberately with malice aforethought, or by accidental circumstances as can be seen during the early days of the 20th century. The 19th century could be called the Century of Liberty, starting with the French Revolution. Countless nations cast off the chains of servitude and entered a golden age of individual freedoms. With the rise of personal wealth that individual liberty allows, came the seeds of destruction as well. The political and economic disaster that the western allies allowed to develop in Weimar Germany assured the rise of a political strong man. Adolf Hitler rose to the top of the heap, eliminated his opposition, and made a nearly successful effort to take over all of Europe. Six years of a particularly vicious war, tens of millions of needless deaths, and the expenditure of many trillions of dollars in treasure, finally saw the defeat of Nazi tyranny and the liberation of Europe. The same generalized conditions in Russia gave birth to Stalinist communism, mass murder, forced collectivization, the gulag, and a forty-five year long Cold War. Mao promised to end corruption in China… well, he pretty well did (except for the corruption of his cronies), along with ending a few million more human lives.

A republic of free men can only survive as long as the law of the land severely restricts the activities of the government, or until the common citizen can no longer understand the meaning of the law. When law becomes so complex that only specially trained individuals can make law (as they see fit), or interpret it’s meaning, the republic falls to a tyranny of elitists. It is no longer a government of “We the People” as stated in the preamble to our Constitution, it becomes “We the Congress” or “We the Majority”, and our free society dies at the hand of a “tyranny of the majority”, ignoring the rights of the minority that our political left has so long decried, and now utilizes to advance its own agenda. At some point the thirteenth amendment becomes meaningless because we become slaves to government. Instead of government working for us, government becomes our master. And once governmental authority is passed to unelected bureaucrats that remain in office long after we have voted out the politicians who imposed this illegal regime on us, even the basic right to control our own destiny is taken from us. Our nation’s Founders understood this proclivity toward tyranny; and that is why we have a Constitution of negatives. The Left doesn’t like this, and are willing to destroy our freedom and liberty in following their totalitarian ideology. If Congress, through our inaction, and by it’s assumption of powers outside their constitutional mandate, can compel us to take actions “for our own good” irregardless of our will, then Congress can compel our actions in any manner they so desire.

James Madison, Federalist Papers, no. 45, 313–14 26 Jan. 1788:
“The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the Federal Government, are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State Governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce; with which last the power of taxation will for the most part be connected. The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects, which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties and properties of the people; and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State.”

“The operations of the Federal Government will be most extensive and important in times of war and danger; those of the State Governments, in times of peace and security. As the former periods will probably bear a small proportion to the latter, the State Governments will here enjoy another advantage over the Federal Government. The more adequate indeed the federal powers may be rendered to the national defence, the less frequent will be those scenes of danger which might favour their ascendency over the governments of the particular States.”

It’s our watch, and we’re rapidly losing our Constitution, our liberty, and our country, to far left elitists. What are we going to do about it?