THE LATEST IN THE DESTRUCTION OF AMERICA: OUR CURRENT FEATURE ARTICLE
Table of Contents
FROM BEHIND ENEMY LINES:A Conservative Libertarian Inside Academia
SOUTHERN HERITAGE: Dedicated to the truth about the War of Yankee Aggression
Constitutional Law
NEW WORLD ORDER, UNITED NATIONS, ONE WORLD GOVERNMENT AND AMERICAN SOVERIGNTY
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Compiled and Summarized by
Dr. Jimmy T. (Gunny) LaBaume
Our Enemy, The State: A Study of Social Power vs. State Power and of The State in Colonial America by Albert Jay Nock. Available from the Mises Institute at www.mises.org
Chapter 5. Politics and Other Fetiches (sic) (Pages 111-131)
The continued existence of an institution is only due to the public's opinion of it. Our economic system exists due only to how men think about work—as something to be given. To the contrary, the opportunity to apply labour and capital to natural resources for the production of wealth is not a “right.” It is a concession. Changes in public opinion occur in roundabout ways. Any direct attempt to change it usually comes to nothing. In fact, it often has the reverse effect.
Why does the mass not see the State for what it is—”the common enemy of all well disposed, industrious and decent men?” Why does mankind regard the State as indispensable and beneficial instead of the anti-social professional criminal organization that it is? Instead of being repugnant and resentful of it he glorifies it. He does that because of the belief that he, as an individual, is somehow identified with (his) the State. Therefore, he feels that by consenting to, and even actively participating in, its aggrandizement, he is actually aggrandizing himself.
Any time any problem or conflict arises, the mass-man demands that the State intervene use its immense resources to find a solution. When the mass experiences any sort of ill-fortune (or feels a strong need for something) his impulse is to attempt to obtain everything without “effort, struggle, doubt, or risk.” It is the origin of this frame of mind (and its ramifications) that Nock is trying to discover.
The State depends on the maintenance of this attitude for its very life. It is so wide-spread it can be considered universal. It would not be possible to change or overcome it with direct effort. All that can be done is to allow it to work its own way out through generations of experience with calamity.
The end result will be fatal. The cost of State intervention is always paid out of production for that is the only source that can pay for anything. After sucking out the very marrow of society, the State will be left bloodless and dead. This was the fate of ancient civilization.
The Scramble for Access to the Political Means
The revolution converted thirteen provinces into autonomous political units held together by the Articles of Confederation. For eight-years administration of the political means was not centralized but performed by in the several sovereign units. No central authority had anything to say about how the political means would be distributed.
Almost immediately the scramble for access to the political means began within each State. Protectionism comparable to international commerce today was practiced for exactly the same reason—robbery of the domestic consumer. The quest for the primary monopoly of economic rent was redoubled. Land grants were as eagerly sought from local legislatures as they had been from the Stuart dynasty and colonial governors.
These two modes (tariffs and rent monopoly) illustrate the general attitude toward the State during the eight years of confederation. The principles of government described in the Declaration (the philosophy of natural rights and popular sovereignty) were beyond consideration. There is no trace of any idea of political organization other than the State during the eight years.
The Industrial Coup d'etat of 1789
State power was well centralized “under” the confederation. However, it was not centralized “in” the confederation federation and many (those who stood to profit by a redistribution) believed that this distribution of power was unsatisfactory. However, dissatisfaction was not general. The redistribution that took place in 1789 did so with great difficulty. It was accomplished only through a coup d'etat and methods which, in any field other than politics, would be considered unscrupulous and dishonorable.
At the time, American economic interests fell into two groups. The first consisted of the speculator, creditor and industrial-commercial interest “and their natural allies of the bar and bench, the pulpit and the press.” The other was composed of farmers, artisans and the debtor class. Just as every State in history, each of the thirteen units was a class-State with the sole function of enabling the economic exploitation of one class by another. However, the Articles of Confederation were objectionable to the first division because the federal scheme would permit closer centralization of control over the political means. It was, therefore, the more compatible with that group's interests—the greater the centralization, the larger the area available for exploitation.
On the other hand, farmers and the debtor class were all for leaving things as they were. Their domination in the local legislatures gave them adequate control of the political means. They immediately saw that this would shift the incidence of economic exploitation to them.
When a constitutional convention was finally assembled, it was under the distinct understanding that the method of amendment provided by the Articles themselves be followed. That is not what happened. All of the delegates were men that represented the first group. They planned and executed a coup d'etat by ignoring the provisions for amendment of the Articles of Confederation and drafting a constitution. This was accompanied by an audacious provision that the new constitution go into effect when ratified by only nine, and not all, of the thirteen units. It was further stipulated that the document not be submitted either to the Congress of to the local legislatures. Instead, it was to go directly to a popular vote.
Unscrupulous methods not withstanding, the document had to meet some very exacting requirements in order to gain ratification. This meant that “they had to contrive something that could pass as a good semblance of popular sovereignty, without the reality.” As a result, the constitution turned out to be a compromise document that did not satisfy either side.
The first group saw that it was not adequate to put them into a permanent position to exploit the second group. To accomplish this (secure the political means for the first group), certain permanent lines of administration had to be laid down. This was accomplished and, for the first ten years, the constitution was in administrative control of the men who made it—“the machinery of economic and political power was mainly directed by the men who had conceived and established it.”
The single most effective legislative measure for the rapid centralization of power was the Judiciary Act of 1789. This act created the federal Supreme Court and federal district courts and established federal oversight of state legislation. This device of so-called “interpretation” permitted the federal judiciary to nullify state legislative and/or judicial acts. It also made “federal judgeships appointive, not elective, and for life.” In addition, when John Marshall became chief justice, he “arbitrarily extended judicial control over both the legislative and executive branches of the federal authority.” This, in effect, completed the centralization of power just as the interests who framed the constitution had contemplated.
At that time, the idea of the State was exactly the same as it had been during the colonial period and the eight years following the revolution—not the slightest suggestion of the doctrine of natural rights and popular sovereignty as contained in the Declaration of Independence. In fact, we find said theories banished. Instead, a new and improved replica of the old British model was installed. The new version was stronger in the sense that it presented greater possibilities for capture and control. The idea was the same. It was the idea of the State as the organization of the political means ready to be used on behalf of one group of economic interests against another.
The Party System
What has become known as the “party system” was, from the very beginning, purely bipartisan simply because “the cohesive power of public plunder works straight towards political bipartisanship.” As this develops, party designations and issues become nominal and progressively trivial.
The party system turned into an elaborate system of fetishes which were put on show as “constitutional principles.” However the only real principal of party action was to keep the channels of access to the political means open. In the beginning, the Federalists were constitutional nationalists. Yet they threatened secession throughout the War of 1812. But then again, when the planting interests of the South made the same threat in 1861, they became fervid nationalists again. Such is the “fetishism” that makes up the party system.
Under the “fetish system” the State appears concerned with great principles. It assumes a sort of moral authority and, thereby, is able to dispose of any remnant of natural rights through “legalism”—whatever the State says is “right.”
All the popular terms of electioneering that we hear indicate apprehension about access to the political means. Once this access is threatened, the threatened start yelping about ”state rights” or “a return to the constitution.” Anytime the incidence of exploitation shows the first sign of shifting we hear that ”democracy” is in danger and we need more ”rugged individualism” or ”free competition.” While from another source, we hear that laissez-faire capitalists are to blame for “grinding poverty,” etc.
Nock summarizes: “The State is not…a social institution administered in an anti-social way. It is an anti-social institution, administered in the only way and anti-social institution can be administered, and by the kind of person who, in the nature of things, is best adapted to such service.”
Copyright ©2004, FlyoverPress.com
Jimmy T. LaBaume, PhD, ChFC is a full professor teaching economics and statistics in the School of Agricultural and Natural Resource Sciences, Sul Ross State University, Alpine, TX. He does not speak for Sul Ross State University. Sul Ross State University does not think for him.
Dr. LaBaume has lived in Mexico and spent extended periods of time in South and Central America as a researcher, consultant and educator.
“Gunny” LaBaume is a decorated veteran of the Vietnam War and Desert Storm. His Marine Corps career spanned some 35 years intermittently from 1962 until 1997 when he refused to re-enlist with less than 2 years to go to a good retirement. In his own words, he “simply got tired of being guilty of treason.”
He is also currently the publisher and managing editor of FlyoverPress.com, a daily e-source of news not seen or heard anywhere on the mainstream media. He can be reached at jlabaume@sulross.edu.
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