[Peace-discuss] [Fwd: American history repeating itself]

[E. Wayne Johnson]

This from the Purdue Ron Paul meetup mailing list-

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: 	[ronpaul-207] American history repeating itself
Date: 	Mon, 3 Nov 2008 16:47:48 -0500
From: 	Kurt Fiech <kfiech at hotmail.com>
Reply-To: 	ronpaul-207 at meetup.com
To: 	ronpaul-207 at meetup.com



"If history has taught us nothing else through the centuries it should 
have taught us that the best forecasters of the future are the events 
which transpired in the past. Sometimes the past does not have to be 
that far removed from the present to give us an accurate glimpse of the 
future. Sometimes what happened yesterday, or last year will give us an 
inkling what's going to happen tomorrow, next week or next year. And, 
sometimes we have to look back to the birth of our nation to more 
clearly see its demise.

In 1797 Federalist John Adams, America's second president, pushed his 
super-majority Federalist Congress to enact a series of very repressive 
and very unconstitutional laws. Two of the laws targeted America's ally 
in the Revolutionary War. The first law was The Aliens and Sedition Act 
which made it a crime for resident aliens to ridicule the President. 
When the law was debated, its proponents, advocates of a stronger 
central government that did not answer to the States, declared the law 
was specifically and singularly crafted to protect the Executive and 
Legislative Branch from alien meddlers in American politics.

The Aliens and Sedition Act was the second of four super-majority 
Federalist laws that were enacted by Adams and repealed by Thomas 
Jefferson. First was the Naturalization Act of 1798 (enacted June 18, 
1798) that penalized French patriots who helped the Americans win their 
freedom from England. The law mandated that they would have to wait 14 
years to apply for citizenship rather than 7 years like immigrants from 
anywhere else. The Aliens and Sedition Act was enacted on June 25.

Third was The Aliens Enemy Act of 1798 (enacted on July 6, 1798). It 
allowed the president to seize and deport resident aliens if the United 
States was at war with their country. Adams wanted to deport the French, 
believing that shortly, the United States would be at war with France.

And, finally, the law which resulted in the Virginia and Kentucky 
Resolves—The Sedition Act of 1798 that applied specifically to natural 
born American citizens who spoke or published "...false, scandalous, or 
malicious writings" against the government or any of its officials." The 
act of speaking out against the President of the United States became a 
crime punishable by four months in prison and a fine of $1,000.

*Liberty lasted only a decade before the nation's first veto-proof 
Congress violated the Constitution and robbed the American people of 
liberty.* The State legislatures in Virginia and Kentucky issued 
Resolves negating the four laws. They reminded the central government 
that it served at the pleasure of, and as an agent of, the States. The 
Resolutions were written by James Madison and Adams' Vice President, 
Thomas Jefferson. The resolutions argued that the federal government was 
created out of an agreement between the States, and thus, was 
subservient to the States. Further, that central authority was retained 
by the States and the People, and that all power not specifically 
delegated to the federal government was reserved exclusively for the 
States and the People through the Senate and the House, respectively.

Rather than let the issue go to the US Supreme Court, Congress 
backpedaled and repealed the laws. In doing so, for the first and last 
time in history, the central government of the United States 
acknowledged its subservient role to the States.

Today, based on the interpretation of one word in what the Supreme Court 
decided was the "enabling clause" of the Constitutions during the New 
Deal, the federal courts now view the States as being subservient to the 
federal government. (That's what happens when you give one party 
supra-power over the three branches of government. That party will 
always steal the power of the people by promising them some grand 
gratuity.)

In 1801 the States did not move to curb the growing power of the federal 
government until at least five people were prosecuted by the Supreme 
Court. Four of them were jailed for violating the law. The first was 
Matthew Lyons, a Vermont newspaper publisher and Republican politcian. 
Lyons was the first to criticize Adams' attempt to expand his power. The 
fifth was a New York Judge, Jared Peck who circulated a petition to 
force Congress to repeal the Sedition Act. As he was collecting 
signatures, a New York grand jury indicted him for sedition. Police 
deliberately made a public spectacle of him when they arrested him at a 
family gathering. That was a mistake for the Adams Administration. Peck 
was one of Jefferson's most important political "friends." His arrest 
not only raised Jefferson's hackles, it raised the hackles of every 
American. Peck was acquitted. Peck's arrest ended Adam's political 
career, and it also ended the political strength of the Federalist Party 
which died an agonizingly slow death over the next two decades....

http://www.jonchristianryter.com/2008/081101.html

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