Looks like an interesting book
It seemed to me as a historian that the concept of extremism begged a question: how do certain ideas, movements and political impulses come to be considered extremist? As a citizen whose political identity was shaped by the late twentieth century, I saw the militias’ assertion of a right to use armed force to change government policy as new, threatening, and beyond the pale of legitimate politics. But as a historian of early America I found achingly familiar their assertion of a right to take up arms to prevent the exercise of unconstitutional power by the federal government. As a historian, then, I was faced with a more specific question: how has the United States as a political society come to view the assertion of that right as extremist?
By conventional media wisdom, all of the Founders were “extremists.” But they have no problem with the big-government fascism taking hold of the country.
I suspect the shift started as the CPUSA sunk its KGB-funded hooks into “polite” society. That is, the very society type that protected Mack the Knife in the Three-Penny Opera.
When the left took control of the language. When your team mates are the MSM, Hollywood and academia, words pretty much become play doh.
People who think we should be governed by constitutional principles are rapidly coming to a cross roads. Either give it up as archaic in a modern world, or start getting off your butts and giving money, time and activity to take back the institutions that are the engines of repression.
“… start getting off your butts and giving money, time and activity to take back the institutions that are the engines of repression.”
I have been.
The Founders were extremists, even in their era. Governing by the consent of the governed was a radical idea.
The difference between the Founders and now is that now, we have a working and functional electoral system. In 1776, the Founders couldn’t get their rights from the ballot box. Now we can.
The Founders didn’t imagine that they could, or would want to, “get their rights from a ballot box.” They viewed rights as unalienable, and that they would be protected by a Republic. That has been all but lost, with increasing numbers of voters paying no taxes, and voting unconstitutional largess for themselves from the public purse. The Founders would be appalled.
They viewed rights as unalienable, and that they would be protected by a Republic
Providing you were the right colour, had property, weren’t a woman… blah blah blah….
Really Rand, you need to find a new glasses prescription, those rose tinted ones are getting to you.
I think it’s also a matter of threshold. How wrong does the US government need to be in order for armed rebellion to be justified? I dimly recall a few consider the income tax or the result of the Civil War to be sufficient pretext for armed rebellion.
For example, unelected tyrrant who massacres hundreds of thousands of US citizens is cause for armed rebellion. Lawfully elected president proposes universal healthcare or some other socialist program is not sufficient cause in my book. Other people will have different thresholds for what they decide is sufficient pretext. My view is that armed rebellion in a functional, even if poorly run, democracy is going to be considered extremist by most people.
How about attempting to confiscate the arms?
Rand – except that the Founders did try to get their rights from a ballot box, and every other means available until all those means failed. Read the Declaration of Independence.
the Founders did try to get their rights from a ballot box, and every other means available until all those means failed.
Yes, and I’m pointing out that when you have a political system that ignores the Constitution, and becomes a democracy out of control, you can no longer get your rights from a ballot box. Ballot boxes are irrelevant when the wolves are voting against the sheep about what to have for dinner.
The US political system is not ignoring the Constitution. We had a free and fair election in accordance with the Constitution and your side lost. Get over it, and see if you can do better in 2010.
The US political system, including the Supreme Court, has been ignoring the Constitution for decades, going back at least to the thirties. The Commerce Clause, for example has been misinterpreted to the point that Congress has essentially unlimited power to meddle in the national economy, something never intended by the Founders.