On Anna Nicole Smith's Death:
(Musings of your humble servant at Rerum Novarum)

It probably seems odd at first glance that your host decided to write on this matter rather than numerous other newsbits at the present time. It will also seem odd perhaps that this post will be as short as it will be. Society has had a fascination with the rich and powerful -or those perceived as such- as long as there has been a civilization and that will not change anytime soon. There is also the attraction of people to tragedies of those same people which plays into issues such as class warfare and other such subjects which we may well discuss again in the future as subjects worthy of consideration. But right now, consider if you can the tragedy of Anna Nicole Smith.

I say "tragedy" because by all societal standards, she had it made. She had money and fame, she was physically appealing to look at,{1} -basically you name it and she had it. But she was found dead in a situation where it does not appear to have been foul play. And if not the latter, then suicide is a likely reason. There were probably many contributing factors to this -the loss of her eldest son last year to whom she was apparently close may have had something to do with it. But in her passing, she left another young child who now will be without a mother.

I am sure a lot of people find the focus on this by the present writer to seem odd -after all, people die everyday that do not get a headline in the paper or elsewhere. People a lot poorer than Anna Nicole, a lot less "attractive", a lot less of a lot of things that she had. My point in focusing on her passing right now is to point out the problem with "happiness" as it is commonly perceived in society.

"Happiness" is viewed as an elusive commodity which is "obtained" or "lost" through the acquisition of possessions. Now it is one thing to acquire stuff that one likes but this has to be done with the proper disposition; namely, that happiness cannot be attained from without but must start from within. Possessions, relationships, family, etc. can enhance one's happiness but they are not where happiness is derived.

By all common societal standards, Anna Nicole should have been one of the happiest people on earth, but she was not. Those who heard her in interviews talking about personal demons would have known this{2} The happiness that must exist from within was not there. And if it is not, then no amount of external additions will compensate for it. Oh sure, numerous external additions can act as numbing agents to a degree much as escapes into alcoholic binges or various drugs, etc. can. But none of that is a genuine solution -instead, it is akin to putting a bandaid on a wound gushing with blood.

These sorts of events tend to generate predictable commentary from a lot of people. Of a particular annoyance is those who are poor who use this as an excuse for remaining poor -as if there is some virtue in poverty. But there are also those who are richer who act as if people passing on from this life who are poor somehow could have been "happier" if they had more wealth. In both cases, the core of the issue is missed because the focus is external instead of internal.

A person can be happy in any financial or social state in life. A person can also be miserable in any financial or social situation in life. Happiness is derived intrinsically from a person's security in themselves. Someone who is secure in themselves, who is capable of being rationally and emotionally self-sufficient to a certain extent, is in a much better position to be happy than someone who is not. A person who can think for themselves and does not have to depend on others to think for them will have a security in themselves that those who cannot do this will not have. Someone who has a strong faith in a loving God likewise can have a security in themselves that those who do not have it will not have. It can come from a variety of sources internally but that is my point: it must come from within.

It is unfortunate that Anna Nicole apparently killed herself and had to suffer the kind of dispair that many people do because of looking to the wrong things or people for happiness. More could be said on this and maybe I will in the future. But right now, this is adequate so I will wrap this post up praying that God may rest the soul of Anna Nicole Smith and her son -along with give the strength to her other children to perservere despite this tremendous hardship they are and will be facing. May He lead them to that happiness that can be enhanced from without but must originate from within.

Notes:

{1} Well, for most of the time she was in the public spotlight anyway.

{2} I heard a bit of this both from a little viewing myself but mainly via some friends who are attuned to celebrity stuff.

Remembering a President and Learning From History:

In celebration of the birthday of the late Ronald Wilson Reagan (40th President of the United States), I want to mark the occasion by drawing the reader's attention to two threads. The first is a book review I wrote back in July of 2004 for Dinesh D'Souza's biography of Ronald Reagan. The second is the full text ot a landmark speech delivered by Ronald Reagan on behalf of Barry Goldwater at the Republican Convention of 1964. Titled Rendezvous With Destiny many of its criticisms and forecasts are still applicable today. For example, in today's war on terror, many of the same problems are involved on the side of those who favour appeasement with Islamic fanatics that were around in the days of the Cold War. Consider if you will the following principles from the aforemetioned speech:

Alexander Hamilton said, "A nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master, and deserves one." Let's set the record straight. There is no argument over the choice between peace and war, but there is only one guaranteed way you can have peace--and you can have it in the next second--surrender.

Admittedly there is a risk in any course we follow other than this, but every lesson in history tells us that the greater risk lies in appeasement, and this is the specter our well-meaning liberal friends refuse to face--that their policy of accommodation is appeasement, and it gives no choice between peace and war, only between fight and surrender. If we continue to accommodate, continue to back and retreat, eventually we have to face the final demand--the ultimatum. And what then? When Nikita Khrushchev has told his people he knows what our answer will be? He has told them that we are retreating under the pressure of the Cold War, and someday when the time comes to deliver the ultimatum, our surrender will be voluntary because by that time we will have weakened from within spiritually, morally, and economically. He believes this because from our side he has heard voices pleading for "peace at any price" or "better Red than dead," or as one commentator put it, he would rather "live on his knees than die on his feet." And therein lies the road to war, because those voices don't speak for the rest of us.

You and I know and do not believe that life is so dear and peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery. If nothing in life is worth dying for, when did this begin--just in the face of this enemy? Or should Moses have told the children of Israel to live in slavery under the pharaohs? Should Christ have refused the cross? Should the patriots at Concord Bridge have thrown down their guns and refused to fire the shot heard 'round the world? The martyrs of history were not fools, and our honored dead who gave their lives to stop the advance of the Nazis didn't die in vain. Where, then, is the road to peace? Well, it's a simple answer after all.

You and I have the courage to say to our enemies, "There is a price we will not pay." There is a point beyond which they must not advance. This is the meaning in the phrase of Barry Goldwater's "peace through strength." Winston Churchill said that "the destiny of man is not measured by material computation. When great forces are on the move in the world, we learn we are spirits--not animals." And he said, "There is something going on in time and space, and beyond time and space, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty."

Those are the same challenges that we face today and which mankind will always face: the question of whether or not there are truths which the defense of is a duty of those who profess them to recognize lines which cannot be crossed. Anyway, I hope you find them to be of some interest today on the anniversary of the birthday of Ronald Wilson Reagan.

Rest in peace Mr. President.

Points to Ponder:
(On Some Limits of Reason and Logic)

For all my focus on the importance of reason and logic for a proper apprehension of what can be called objective reality, there is an important element that may appear to receive short-shrift in this approach and it is something that goes beyond what reason and logic can deduce. Namely, it is the area of faith.
Faith is hardly limited to the religious sphere -indeed people place faith in non-religious persons, ideas, etc. all the time. The root of faith however is the same in all cases though. Theologically, faith involves aspects that are not contrary to reason and logic but to some extent transcend them. On the human level, it involves noting that sometimes a person however they present themselves to others may have a contradiction in how they present themselves and what they feel.
To put it another way, sometimes a person can unknowingly convey a sense or impression towards others that they do not intend to convey. Certainly as a rule one must presume continuity in these areas. Nonetheless, at the same time, there are exceptions whereby the actions and statements of a person do not necessarily correctly reveal their inner intentions. And while one should strive at all times to verify things by objective criteria; at the same time, the evidence does not always point to the reality of something as it subsists in the mind of the other party involved in a dispute.

With that in mind, and however it may appear to contradict objective manifestations, greater care at times needs to be given to what someone says they intend however appearances to the contrary may fail to countenance it. In other words: faith is required to some extent that an individual's assessment of their intentions is correct because by non-normative criteria it cannot be ascertained. This is not always easy to do mind you when there is a history of bad blood between persons. However, whenever an opportunity to put things right presents itself that manifests the possibility of success (however remote), I have always viewed it as something to be seized upon because one never knows when such opportunities may present themselves again if ever. [I. Shawn McElhinney: Notebook Musings (circa February 5, 2007)]

On Fundamental Rights, Common Law Principles, and Abortion:
(Musings of your humble servant at Rerum Novarum)

[Prefatory Note: For a prologue of sorts to the material to be covered in this posting, please see this thread. -ISM]

In the usual round of calls for "celebration" of a legal case that directly violates one of the three fundamental rights of man, the predictable "stare decisis" canard was brought out in some circles to justify the decision of the Supreme Court in 1992's Planned Parenthood vs. Casey decision upholding Roe vs. Wade. This is in essence an indirect appeal to common law to justify this stance as that is where stare decisis has its legal foundation. A problem with this premise is that it ignores certain key factors which went into proper common law interpretation. To explain this a bit, a consideration of where common law originated would be a good idea so I will sketch it out briefly before picking up this thread on the other side with the assistance of a short online chronology:

Until the 12th century, law in the western world consisted of written laws, called Civil Laws, all traceable to Roman Law. This basic system still prevails in many countries as well as in the state of Louisiana.

However, after the Norman conquest of Britain in 1066, a legal tradition called the "common law," different from that of civil law, began to develop in England. In the 1100s during the reign of the legal reformer, Henry II, court decisions were written down and catalogued according to the types of cases. When the courts were called on to decide similar issues later, they reviewed the earlier decisions and if one was found that covered the earlier decision, they applied the principle of the earlier decision. They called this doctrine, "stare decisis," a Latin term meaning "to stand by the decision."

Under this rule of stare decisis, once a legal issue has been resolved as it applied to a particular set of facts, a court did not reconsider that legal issue in a later case where the factual circumstances were substantially similar. But this did not mean that every decision stood forever. However, the principle of stare decisis was a strong one, and judges were reluctant to discard well-established rules, and took great pains to explain a significant departure from a precedent.

During America's colonial period, most of the English common law tradition did not change, and the new country continued to follow English common law. When the U.S. Constitution was ratified in 1789, the Constitution, based upon the common law inherited from England, became the new foundation on which the American legal system was built. [From Understanding Common Law (circa 1994)]

We know of course that the Founding Fathers of America were men of a high degree of education and were thoroughly familiar with common law -most of them either being born in Great Britain or first generation removed from Great Britain. And roughly thirty-five of the fifty-five odd participants of the Constitutional Convention either were experienced barristers or otherwise had training in the law. I outlined some of the more significant figures here and believe me, they are far from the only ones I could mention. And when you consider the predominately English background of so many of the Founding Fathers, it is only logical to conclude that so many educated barristers would have a solid understanding of what common law did and did not involve would it not???

Now then, if stare decisis is a core principle of the common law, than one has to look to how that principle was understood in common law and not merely say it applies without providing any evidences. A good place to start is to ask what the foundational principles that under girded common law actually were. According to a certain Richard J. Maybury, they were as follows:

Do all you have agreed to do;

Do not encroach on other persons or their property. [From Understanding Common Law (circa 1994)]

The first premise would form the fundamental point of reference of what is called "contract law" as that branch of jurisprudence deals with what people have agreed to do amongst one another and the myriad of ways this is signified both explicitly and by logical inference. The second premise ("[d]o not encroach on other persons or their property") is perhaps the fundamental point of reference for all criminal and tort law.

Now then, if the interpretation of the above premises is correct{1}, then common law involves protection of the fundamental rights of man which are life, faculties, and production. Or to quote Claude Frederic Bastiat's magnum opus The Law on these matters:

We hold from God the gift which includes all others. This gift is life-physical, intellectual, and moral life. But life cannot maintain itself alone. The Creator of life has entrusted us with the responsibility of preserving, developing, and perfecting it. In order that we may accomplish this, He has provided us with a collection of marvelous faculties. And He has put us in the midst of a variety of natural resources. By the application of our faculties to these natural resources we convert them into products, and use them. This process is necessary in order that life may run its appointed course. Life, faculties, production-in other words, individuality, liberty, property this is man. And in spite of the cunning of artful political leaders, these three gifts from God precede all human legislation, and are superior to it. Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: The Law (circa 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]

Now then, consider the theory{2} of fundamental rights which I have reiterated at this weblog not to mention developed further{3} in light of contemporary realities and applied to a whole plethora of issues in years past. The premise is that there is a gift from God given to us which encompasses the physical (life), intellectual (faculties), and moral (production) spheres of existence. This gift precedes all human laws and was the basis on which all human laws were constructed to begin with -whether those who constructed them realized it or not. From there a need to know what law actually is comes into play since to argue anything on the basis of stare decisis requires knowing what the function of law is. And again, let us consider Bastiat's synthesis on that subject before getting to the whole stare decisis issue:

What, then, is law? It is the collective organization of the individual right to lawful defense. Each of us has a natural right - from God - to defend his person, his liberty, and his property. These are the three basic requirements of life, and the preservation of any one of them is completely dependent upon the preservation of the other two. For what are our faculties but the extension of our individuality? And what is property but an extension of our faculties? If every person has the right to defend even by force-his person, his liberty, and his property, then it follows that a group of men have the right to organize and support a common force to protect these rights constantly. Thus the principle of collective right-its reason for existing, its lawfulness-is based on individual right. And the common force that protects this collective right cannot logically have any other purpose or any other mission than that for which it acts as a substitute. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: The Law (circa 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]

Think about that for a moment: the common force of law has the same purpose as the individual one. The logic behind this should be obvious but often it is not. Moving on...

Thus, since an individual cannot lawfully use force against the person, liberty, or property of another individual, then the common force for the same reason-cannot lawfully be used to destroy the person, liberty, or property of individuals or groups. Such a perversion of force would be, in both cases, contrary to our premise. Force has been given to us to defend our own individual rights. Who will dare to say that force has been given to us to destroy the equal rights of our brothers? Since no individual acting separately can lawfully use force to destroy the rights of others, does it not logically follow that the same principle also applies to the common force that is nothing more than the organized combination of the individual forces? [Claude Frederic Bastiat: The Law (circa 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]

Those who wonder why true conservatives worthy of the name{4} have an abhorrence of the federal government intervening everywhere and anywhere this is the reason in a nutshell even if those conservatives have never stopped to crystallize their instinct into a coherent principle before. The reason is an instinctive understanding that law is made for man not man for law: the understanding that law's purpose is to protect legitimate rights not to grant them and not to revoke them.{5}

The Founding Fathers had such a fear of putting too much power into the hands of a limited few that they created the "checks and balances" system we are aware of because of their knowledge of history and what power can do when it is abused. They may not have explicitly formulated their understanding in the manner that Bastiat did but certainly Bastiat had as a source of his inspiration the United States as it existed in his day.{6} But to sum up the purpose of law, it can be seen in the following way:

If this is true, then nothing can be more evident than this: The law is the organization of the natural right of lawful defense. It is the substitution of a common force for individual forces. And this common force is to do only what the individual forces have a natural and lawful right to do: to protect persons, liberties, and properties; to maintain the right of each, and to cause justice to reign over us all. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: The Law (circa 1850) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa October 3, 2002)]

By this understanding, any action by the law that goes beyond these boundaries is a perversion of law. And not only is any law that is contrary to the Constitution invalid but any active resolution taken by the judiciary likewise is invalid. Or as Alexander Hamilton explained in Federalist #78 on the powers of the judiciary as embodied in the Constitution that at the time of his writing still awaited ratification by a majority of states to become the law of the land:

The judiciary, on the contrary, has no influence over either the sword or the purse; no direction either of the strength or of the wealth of the society; and can take no active resolution whatever. It may truly be said to have neither FORCE nor WILL, but merely judgment; and must ultimately depend upon the aid of the executive arm even for the efficacy of its judgments...

The complete independence of the courts of justice is peculiarly essential in a limited Constitution...Limitations of this kind can be preserved in practice no other way than through the medium of courts of justice, whose duty it must be to declare all acts contrary to the manifest tenor of the Constitution void. Without this, all the reservations of particular rights or privileges would amount to nothing. [Alexander Hamilton: Excerpt from Federalist Paper #78 as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa July 1, 2003)]

In other words, the judiciary under the Constitution has the duty to declare all acts contrary to the manifest tenor of the Constitution as void. That includes so-called "right to privacy" which however nice it would be to have in the federal Constitution{7} nonetheless is not there in any way, shape, matter, or form.

As far as the common law understanding goes, if part of the understanding is not to encroach on persons or their property, than common law statutes such as stare decisis then we have an issue here that touches on the very heart of the issue in question. We need to know where life begins or at least have a consensus on a certain point of origin as the starting point before we can legitimately invoke stare decisis. Consider though what the court itself said in the majority decision handed down on January 22, 1973 on the matter of when life begins:

Texas urges that, apart from the Fourteenth Amendment, life begins at conception and is present throughout pregnancy, and that, therefore, the State has a compelling interest in protecting that life from and after conception. We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer. [Supreme Court: Roe vs. Wade (circa January 22, 1973)]

In other words, the decision was to be made without concern for a key element of what the common law was intended to do: not encroach on persons or their property. In order to determine whether common law (on which the Constitution is heavily based) is efficaciously fulfilling its role or not means that one has to determine if they are dealing with a life or not because a life is a person and common law is intended to protect persons.

We know of course that there is dispute over when life begins but if we do not try to resolve that inquiry to the best of our knowledge, then common law risks being misapplied. The very Declaration of Independence on which this nation was founded -and on which the Constitution properly understood would have to presume apriori for its own legitimization- had this to say about the issue at hand:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. [Excerpt from The Declaration of Independence (circa July 4, 1776)]

Now is not the time to point out that this principle was not always consistently applied in our Republic -indeed despite the Fifth Amendment in the Bill of Rights, there were still some people who were denied the right so outlined. The purpose of the Fourteenth Amendment itself was in part to remedy this with regards to persons previously denied these rights for reasons other than disenfranchisement for serious crimes committed against others. But just because a principle is not always applied consistently does not therefore make the principle itself suspect -something I have noted before on a few occasions and which bears recalling whenever issues such as this are discussed.

When Texas urges that a fetus is entitled to Fourteenth Amendment protection as a person, it faces a dilemma. Neither in Texas nor in any other State are all abortions prohibited. Despite broad proscription, an exception always exists. The exception contained in Art. 1196, for an abortion procured or attempted by medical advice for the purpose of saving the life of the mother, is typical. But if the fetus is a person who is not to be deprived of life without due process of law, and if the mother's condition is the sole determinant, does not the Texas exception appear to be out of line with the Amendment's command? [Supreme Court: Roe vs. Wade (circa January 22, 1973)]

This whole supposed "dilemma" is easily overcome by taking into account an ancient moral and ethical principle which the Founding Fathers would have with the greatest of likelihood had some familiarity with if not by virtue of it being a longstanding moral and ethical principle then arguably by virtue of the principles they used in crafting the Constitution itself.{8} I refer here to the moral and ethical principle of double effect.

But even if they were not explicitly familiar with it, it is not debatable that these men of uniformly high intelligence for not only their era but any other era would have the intellectual capabilities of understanding and appreciating the principles involved. As to whether or not the Supreme Court in 1973 would have had these capabilities is (of course) controverted to say the least but they sure betray a lack of familiarity in the words used to formulate the decision of their majority.

If we take seriously (i) Claude Frederic Bastiat's theory on the fundamental rights of man as well as (ii) the words of the Declaration of Independence on which the American Republic was founded on, not to mention (iii) the proper understanding of common law as a check against encroaching upon other persons or their property, then the idea of applying stare decisis to the Roe vs. Wade court interpolation of a presumed "right" to abortion is too ludicrous to be taken seriously.

For one thing, if the matter does involve life -and it seems more than a mere hypothesis to this writer that life is involved at some point between conception and birth- than it is important to ascertain as best we can and apart from personal agendas where we can determine life to begin and at that point, it is inviolable without due process. The question then becomes when does life begin??? Would one say it begins with a heartbeat??? With evidence of brainwave activity??? With the ability to feel pain??? If you have said yes to all three of these things, then we are looking at life beginning before the third month of pregnancy if not earlier.

Think about that for a moment: if the latter is the case, then abortion in at least the time frame where the latter three factors are in effect acts as a death sentence for a life which was denied due process: a violation of a fundamental God-given right (cf. The Law) and a right that the Founders saw as self-evident (cf. Declaration of Independence). On either standard alone it is to be rejected but the idea that the Constitution of the United States could be based on a premise contrary to the Declaration of Independence, and that the aforementioned Constitution could have a presumed "right" to take the life of anyone without the very due process which the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution{9} requires- it does not add up folks.

That is right, Roe vs. Wade is not only unconstitutional but also unconscionable. It does not matter that judicial whores and termites play with words and semantics: the taking of life without due process is not morally acceptable. And that the judges singing onto the majority decision of Roe vs. Wade claimed that it was not necessary to know when life begins in order to make a ruling is itself heinous because one must know when life begins if one is going to avoid taking it without due process. That those judges did not care to try and do this -and furthermore showed that they do not care about ruling in accordance with the Constitution but instead sacrificing lives on the altar of utility- is something that anyone who claims to respect people should find noxious to their very core.

It is illogical to presume that stare decisis as a principle of common law can be wielded to oppose the very intention of common law to begin with. And the idea of that the Founding Fathers who founded this nation and established its rule of law -most of which were well-educated in the field of law including common law- would have provided for such a heinous so-called "right" that contradicted the very foundation of the common law that they took for granted is more than just a little problem that the supporters of Roe vs. Wade have to deal with. They also have to deal with the argument that Roe vs. Wade violates the Constitution's Fifth Amendment right to not be deprived of life without due process,{10} it violates the right to life that the signers of the Declaration of Independence asserted was "self-evident", and it violates one of what Claude Frederic Bastiat called the "three fundamental rights of man."

Those who would take issue with any of these theses and claim that life is not involved have an obligation to provide a hypothesis of their own on when life does begin. Otherwise, they cannot complain when their position is opposed by people who do respect the right to life and who have taken a public stand (rightly or wrongly) on where life does begin -and use that stand as a foundational presupposition for how they approach the issue of abortion and other potentially life-related issues thereof.

Notes:

{1} And for those who would claim it is not, they are challenged to propose a counter-hypothesis or there is no need to take them seriously.

{2} [W]hen one is dealing with a theory, they are dealing with both abstract notions as well as coordinating dynamic principles of action. One of the author's intellectual mentors once defined a theory as "a set of non contradictory abstract ideas (or as philosophers like to call them 'principles') which purports to be either a correct description of reality or a guideline for successful action."...

Having established a working meaning of the term theory, it is worth noting also that the word thesis according to the Merriam Webster Thesaurus is related to the word theory. (Both of them having a foundation in the term assumption.) A good way of looking at this in the current context is to view a thesis as "an abstract principle or proposition to be advanced and maintained by argument" and a theory as incorporating a thesis -or a series of theses -with a guideline for successful action. The reason for this is because a theory by its nature must involve either (i) a correct description of reality or (ii) a guideline for successful action. For this reason, any viable theory involves several principles if you will which work together.

Or another way of looking at it would be to consider that a theory is being conceived of a series of non contradictory coordinative theses or points of presupposition. When viewed in this light, a theory clearly is only as strong as the theses which support it. [Excerpt from the Rerum Novarum Miscellaneous BLOG (circa January 14, 2004)]

{3} Now is not the time to go into how I did this but basically I explicated a premise that was heavily implied in Bastiat's work and added a non-normative verifying principle to the mix to assist in objective application thereof.

{4} Do not get me started on how few of these there are -particularly in politics.

{5} Part of the reason I developed Bastiat's theory further is to deal with the situations where it can be argued that someone can be deprived of one or more of their fundamental rights -but that is a subject for another time perhaps.

{6} As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose-that it may violate property instead of protecting it-then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious. To know this, it is hardly necessary to examine what transpires in the French and English legislatures; merely to understand the issue is to know the answer. Is there any need to offer proof that this odious perversion of the law is a perpetual source of hatred and discord; that it tends to destroy society itself? If such proof is needed, look at the United States [in 1850]. There is no country in the world where the law is kept more within its proper domain: the protection of every person's liberty and property. As a consequence of this, there appears to be no country in the world where the social order rests on a firmer foundation. But even in the United States, there are two issues-and only two-that have always endangered the public peace. [Claude Frederic Bastiat: The Law (circa 1850) as quoted in aRerum Novarum posting (circa October 24, 2002)]

{7} I actually favour this as a right but as it is not in the Constitution itself, an amendment would have to be proposed and accepted by three quarters of all the states (in this case, 38 states) in order to become a Constitutional provision thereof.

{8} This is a hypothesis admittedly but one which if time allowed for it I believe I could viably argue for the favour of.

{9} The Fourteenth Amendment is not mentioned here because it essentially remedied an inconsistency in the application of the Fifth Amendment clarifying the applicability of the right to due process being one for "[a]ll persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof."

{10} See footnote nine.

"Lions and Tigers and 'Neo-Cons', Oh My!!!" Dept.

After listening to a fellow blather on and on about certain parties being "definitive 'neo-cons'" on a radio show yesterday -coupled with the standard refusal to explain the meaning of this term and how it is properly applied- I decided to renew the so-called "neo-con" challenge reissued in October of last year. Once again, I request of those who froth at the mouth over this term to show proper respect for reason and logic and define what they mean by this term and how these so-called "neo-cons" are able to be identified. I have been running this feature unofficially since first sketching out the questions I have in October of 2005{1} and officially with a more systematical presentation since December of that year.{2} Here is that challenge as reissued last October:

"Tracking the Ever-Elusive So-Called 'Neo-Con'" Dept. --A Rerum Novarum Challenge Revisitation/Reiussuance Thread (circa October 2, 2006)

Some might find this challenge to be cute but I am doing it for a reason: to point out the problem with using terms that are not defined or not explaining how one who uses a term understands that term to be applicable. It is too commom for people to use terms as lazy expedients to avoid having to utilize the gray matter between their ears and that is a problem that is only increasing it seems as time goes by. The problem was summed up rather tersely in the following statement by one of our early{3} intellectual mentors:

[W]e are living in a new Dark Ages, we really are. Most people have no concept of logic and how to use it. How to use their intellectual faculties to distinguish between truth and falsehood. Most people are intellectually dependent. [Mike Mentzer (circa 1993) as quoted in a Rerum Novarum posting (circa February 12, 2006)]

This is a serious problem we face in society and it is one reason I see value in the challenge I am proposing here. So as definitions are the tools of thought,{4}, it would be nice if those who have a bug up their hind quarters about these supposed "neo-cons" actually explain what I have requested in the threads above. This is not that difficult to do actually but doing so would hold those who kvetch about these supposed beings to a certain standard. Thus far, only one party who has frequent recourse to this term has taken the time to formulate a definition of the term{5} but even they were trying to go beyond the boundaries they set down in applying it.

Notes:

{1} Miscellaneous Morning Musings on Blogging, the So-Called "Neo-Cons", and the Miers Nomination--An Audio Post (circa October 27, 2005)

{2} "Tracking the Ever-Elusive So-Called 'Neo Con'" Dept. (circa December 4, 2005)

{3} I touched on this a bit in the following post:

Responding to the Blogosphere Book Meme (circa June 14, 2005)

{4} Points to Ponder as posted to Rerum Novarum (circa December 17, 2004)

{5} That party for those who are interested was Dale Vree. Mr. Vree's proposed definition and application were addressed in a March 2006 posting to Rerum Novarum which is viewable HERE.

More From Moriel Ministries:

This text constitutes a slightly abridged version of my response to an email sent from one of their representatives regarding the material blogged HERE. The emailer's words will be in dark yellow font.

On 1/12/07, XXXXX XXXXXXXX wrote:

Plainly we regard your counter arguments as faulty.

I am not surprised. But anyone can say this of course. Assertions by themselves do not constitute proof.

Hoc Est Corpus Meum is merely the Vulgate translation of 'This Is My Body", I said nothing other. Neither did I assert that Aquinas initiated transubstantiation as a doctrine. He merely defined it in the form of Aristotelian alchemy accepted by the psapacy as its official explanation.

Fair enough but you raised it in the context of the liturgy (mass) and that is why I mentioned the liturgical wording of the phrase. As far as one theologian's explanation goes, Catholic theology is not monolithic in this area as you implied it was. The core issue here is your attempt to set the issue up as one that is either "proved" or "disproved" by science or reason alone. The ways in which a dogma is explained are always subject to improvements but truths are often explained by what is at one time viewed as adequate but at future times is viewed otherwise.

It is important when dealing with matters which are considered "revealed" to recognize that you will to some extent have an imperfection in natural language in trying to explain them. The same is the case for Jesus being "one in sameness" (Gk. homoousian, Lat. consubstantialem) with God the Father: an explanation that also relies on imperfect Greek physics to outline (in this case Platonic concepts). I do not see you rejecting the idea of Jesus as the Son of God and also as God (or the whole trinitarian concept as defined at Nicaea) which shows me that you are being arbitrary in rejecting one proposed dogma on this basis while accepting another.

Your revisionism re the condemnations of science as something that had to be done is frankly too ludicrous to warrant serious comment,

The difference between us is that I have read up on the cases and also reviewed papal statements in question with due care while you obviously have not. Because if you had at least reviewed them, then you obviously did not read very carefully. There is a serious danger in certain scientific approaches leading to a form of "empericism" which is intrinsically contrary to revealed truth. To the extent that this is the case, there is a requirement to proscribe them the same way it was with modernism in the early twentieth century which effectively denied the capabilities of man to know anything with certainty by the natural lights of reason.

You prefer it seems to write it off as ludicrous because it is a expedient way to not have to challenge your own foundational presuppositions. In that way, you act like the non-Christian who thinks that the idea of Jesus as saviour is too ludicrous to warrant serious comment. The subject is different but the principles involved are the same: one party refusing to re-assess the lenses by which they filter all information that comes before them. Benjamin Franklin called it "questioning one's own infallibility" and evidently you have no interest in doing that which is a pity.

Of course you passed over my comments about Copernicus and Galileo because you were caught with your hand in the cookie jar there and would rather say nothing than have me repeat my previous point. You said the Catholic Church condemned Copernicus and Galileo as heretics for postulating and proving the earth revolved around the sun and this assertion is a bald faced lie. Neither of them were condemned as heretics and Copernicus was not even censured. He in fact gave lectures on his heliocentric hypothesis at the great universities of his day and in the presence of a few popes none of whom censured him. (One of those popes -Paul III- was actually mentioned in Copernicus' book dedication.) It was the Protestants who were anti-science, not the Catholics though the latter at times did have to pronounce against certain scientific excesses as I noted earlier.

One of those was the attempt to infringe upon the realm of theology with scientific hypotheses presented as anything but a hypotheses but instead, as certain fact which is what Galileo did. But even so, Galileo was never condemned as a heretic but he did get in trouble for presuming to move the subject from the realm of science to that of theology. As one of the links I sent to you earlier noted, high ranking members of the Catholic Church (including Cardinal Bellarmine who was at one time prefect of the Holy Office) were more than willing to consider Galileo's hypothesis within its proper bounds. The problem is when scientists go beyond their limits and move into the realm of the theological. That is where every clash between the Catholic Church and science has taken place.

And you noted that Copernicus and Galileo prov[ed] the earth revolved around the sun when there has been no actual proving of the heliocentric theory. As Dr. Sippo noted in one of the links I sent you:

We must remember that none of the proofs for heliocentrism proposed by Galileo was convincing either then or now. His heliocentric model had as many epicycle problems as the standard geocentric model and failed to make accurate predictions of planetary movement. The one model that made accurate predictions was proposed by Kepler based on Tycho Brahe's measurements. This view was specifically ridiculed and rejected by Galileo. Furthermore, we now know that the sun is not the center of the universe and that according to Einstein's theories of relativity there is no absolute point of geometric centrality to the universe so that wherever the observer stands is the center for him. In essence the humanistic, phenomenological, and biblical approach to the question of the universe has won out after all.

The testimony of history is that Galileo got it wrong both in his own day and in retrospect. [LINK]

The problem with what you say about what Galileo supposedly prov[ed] is that it blatantly contradicts Einstein's theory of relativity which -while not endorsing a geocentric model is nonetheless much closer to it than a heliocentric one. If Einstein is right now, Galileo was wrong then and if Galileo was right then, Einstein is wrong now. Which is it???

I am interested in seeing if you are going to adhere to these areas where you obviously erred or if you are going to acknowledge that you were wrong in the examples you chose to give. Whether or not there can even be a good dialogue depends on how you respond to these points.

I have to say it but what is really too ludicrous to warrant serious comment is the shoddiness of the "scholarship" your site uses to substantiate its viewpoints. I noticed you did not comment on this part of the note. I have to ask if you have any interest in actual history or will any propaganda-piece that advances your cause (however full of lies) be considered an ally to you??? Inquiring minds want to know.

and your defense of Roman Catholic involvement with Fascism and The Third Reich is rather hideous.

I am always amazed at how many people can live in some kind of Gnostic fairytale land pretending that it is never necessary to deal with odious governments or odious people. To some extent, it was necessary to deal with the Fascists of Italy and the Nazis of Germany because failing to do so would put lives at risk. On a diplomatic level, some things were done which one could question the prudence of; however, what should the Catholic Church have done, stand back and do nothing to try and attain guarantees of religious freedom and the safety of her own???

I realize in this fairytale view of a "purely spiritual Christianity" that is what things should supposedly be like but reality is another thing altogether. Jesus counseled the Apostles when he sent them out as "sheep amongst wolves" that they were to be "wise as serpents and guileless as doves." To be "wise as serpents" involves having cleverness, prudence, discernment, and a kind of practical wisdom. It involves having a proper presence of mind, understanding, and a soundness of judgment in striving to act properly.

The problem is, so many of those who are critical of the Catholic Church's relationship at times during the twentieth century to Nazi Germany or Fascist Italy in toto do not show that they have any understanding of the reality of those times or the difficulties that were faced. That is not to say that the clerics of the Catholic Church always did everything in the best possible way of course, only that a proper criticism requires by its very nature an understanding of actual history and the difficulties faced, not criticism for criticisms sake by those who have such an agenda against the Catholic Church that they will stoop to any shoddy "scholarship" to substantiate their views. To say that I am less than impressed with your historical revisionism would be to put it too nicely. History is to be respected, not treated with contempt. Unfortunately, that is what your site has done.

It would require ages for an exchange of exhaustive polemics by e mail. If you wanted to meet sometime for a private discussion on these matters however, that would be possible.

That might work fine though a targeted correspondence by email would be a good place to start. Targeted meaning each deal with a particular point or two to get a feel for where to begin. It takes too long to unpack longer exchanges but focusing on a few basic points at a time could be a good basis for starting a dialogue. I am interested in dialogue with those who will willingly challenge their foundational presuppositions as I regularly do -to "challenge one's own infallibility" as Benjamin Franklin liked to say. If you are up for the latter, let me know.

Where are you based? Can we touch base some time?

I am in the Seattle area. Where are you at???

PS Though the rest of the text was written about ten days before today (and just reviewed prior to being sent), I found this article on the Pius XII "anti-semite" assertions in my email dated to January 25, 2007 from National Review. I already knew or otherwise strongly suspected a lot of what is in the thread but you may find its contents to be of interest.

Points to Ponder:

Every one knows on any given day that there are energies slumbering in him which the incitements of that day do not call forth, but which he might display if these were greater. Most of us feel as if we lived habitually with a sort of cloud weighing on us, below our highest notch of clearness in discernment, sureness in reasoning, or firmness in deciding. Compared with what we ought to be, we are only half awake. Our fires are damped, our drafts are checked. We are making use of only a small part of our possible mental and physical resources.[William James (circa 1906)]

Correcting a Post Number Numerical Miscalculation:

The counter on this humble weblog as of today registered a supposed "post number" of 2432. Though I have used the counter to note post approximations from time to time -almost always in passing- it was not until the new beta software was installed on the weblog where I have been able to verify the actual number with precision.{1} I knew that up to October 1, 2005 I had posted 1700 threads but it did not seem that I had actually published over 700 threads since that time -though I used the counter figure because I did not have another point of reference. Well, as I can now go back more than 300 posts with the new platform, I did a quick check and my assumption was correct: the actual post number is significantly less.

By official tallying, we hit the 2100 post mark with the publishing of the brief biographical bits on some Founding Fathers back on January 23, 2007. The official tally including this post and the one that will follow it will be 2110. The discrepency in numbers between the stated total at that time (2434) and what will be the actual number (2110) is that the software was adding to the published post total the various draft texts which number 324.{2} Anyway, I apologize for the misrepresentation of the post tallies at Rerum Novarum which have on occasion occured in the past year plus. And though it was an unintentional mistake, it was one nonetheless and therefore the present posting notes the required correction to the same extent that the previous numerical miscalculations were made.

Notes:

{1} Stricly speaking, I could have figured it out if I had lots of time and nothing better to do with it but I presumed blogger's number was accurate.

{2} While about two thirds of the drafts are posts in various stages of completion for future posting to this humble weblog -some of which go back as far as March of 2005 incidentally- about a third of them are versions of posts already completed and published. (I have not had time to weed those duplicates out of the system yet and do not know when I will find the time to do this frankly.)

Points to Ponder:
(From Those With Limited Visions)

"Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find oil? You're crazy." [Drillers who Edwin L. Drake tried to enlist to his project to drill for oil (circa 1859)]

"Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction." [Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse (circa 1872)]

"The abdomen, the chest, and the brain will forever be shut from the intrusion of the wise and humane surgeon." [Sir John Eric Ericksen, British surgeon, appointed Surgeon-Extraordinary to Queen Victoria (circa 1873)]

"Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." [Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, (circa 1895)]

"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value." [Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre]

"Professor Goddard does not know the relation between action and reaction and the need to have something better than a vacuum against which to react. He seems to lack the basic knowledge ladled out daily in high schools." [1921 New York Times editorial about Robert Goddard's revolutionary rocket work]

"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." [Western Union internal memo, (circa 1876)]

"The wireless music box has no imagineable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?" [David Sarnoff's associates in response to his urgings for investment in the radio in the 1920's]

"Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?" [H.M. Warner, Warner Brothers (circa 1927)]

"I'm just glad it'll be Clark Gable who's falling on his face and not Gary Cooper." [Gary Cooper on his decision not to take the leading role in "Gone With The Wind"]

"Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau." [Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics, Yale University (circa 1929)]

"Everything that can be invented has been invented." [Charles M. Duel, United States Patent Office (circa 1898)]

"You want to have consistent and uniform muscle development across all of your muscles? It can't be done. It's just a fact of life. You just have to accept inconsistent muscle development as an unalterable condition of weight training." [Response to Arthur Jones, who solved the "unsolveable" problem by inventing the Nautilus Exercise Equipment]

"The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn better than a 'C', the idea must be feasible." [A Yale University management professor in response to Fred Smith's paper proposing reliable overnight delivery service. Smith went on to found Federal Express Corp.]

"If I had thought about it, I wouldn't have done the experiment. The literature was full of examples that said you can't do this." [Spencer Silver on the work that led to the unique adhesives for 3-M "Post-it" Notepads. (And in fact, his experiment failed. He was looking for a super glue... )]

"A cookie store is a bad idea. Besides, the market research reports say America likes crispy cookies, not soft and chewy cookies like you make." [Response to Debbi Fields' idea of starting Mrs. Fields' Cookies]

"We don't like their sound and guitar music is on the way out." [Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles (circa 1962)]

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." [Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM (circa 1943)]

"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons." [Popular Mechanics, 1949, forecasting the relentless march of science]

"I have travelled the length and breadth of this country and talked with the best people, and I can assure you that data processing is a fad that won't last out the year." [The editor in charge of business books for Prentice Hall (circa 1957)]

"So we went to Atari and said, 'Hey, we've got this amazing thing, even built with some of your parts, and what do you think about funding us? Or we'll give it to you. We just want to do it. Pay our salary, we'll come work for you.' And they said, 'No.' So then we went to Hewlett-Packard and they said, 'Hey, we don't need you. You haven't got through college yet.'" [Apple Computer Inc. founder Steve Jobs on attempts to get Atari and H-P interested in his and Steve Wozniak's personal computer]

"[B]ut what....is it good for?" [Engineer at the Advanced Computing Systems Division of IBM circa 1968, commenting on the microchip]

"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." [Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp (circa 1977)]

"640K ought to be enough for anybody." [Bill Gates (circa 1981)]

The next time you hear anyone tell you something cannot be done -and for those who wonder why we at Rerum Novarum do not place much stock in the unsubstantiated opinions of so-called "experts", consider some of the examples above to understand our reasons for doing what we do here.

Oh and for those who wonder, the Arthur Jones referred to in the above examples is the one quoted in the side margin of this weblog.

One of the projects I manifested the intention of finishing last week is now completed in a form ready for posting. I hope to post it in the coming week but I have had to circulate it to some friends with sharp analytical knives to poke and prod first so that it reads as coherently and rationally as it does to these eyes.

The issue is not as much the arguments themselves individually but the systematic presentation of them that is the issue here. Considering the hectic weeks I had work-wise and the spare moments I had to put the piece together on lunch or short breaks, I want some fresh eyes and perspectives to review that piece before I post it. Anyway, I just wanted to note that up front and also that this weblog is not in beta form as of yesterday evening.

There are a number of things I like about the new platform -one of which is that there is a colour cube for different parts of the pot. Gone therefore are the days of manually entering that stuff in by hand and here are the days of time-saving and more diverse choices of coolour overall.{1} Unfortunately, it does not appear that there is an option for comments boxes on individual posts as I had previously assumed{2} it may have. Anyone who knows more about the platform and if my perception of its capabilities is wrong or not, by all means let me know.

One thing is for sure, publishing on this platform is a lot easier and I am able to better access my entire archives -something I have not been able to do since mid 2003 unless I could remember a key word or two when doing a post search.{3} Plus, future template adjustments will be a lot easier too so all I can say for those who have not upgraded platforms yet{4} to do it when you can. Unless you are off of blogger now then (of course) feel free to ignore this advice altogether.

Notes:

{1} Except on those days where I was feeling extra-HTML spiffy which was not often. (That explains why the colours on some posts are more creative than are the norm for past postings but I digress.)

{2} Now it is possible when I am able to transfer my blog to the new beta that I may have targeted comments allowed as that can be done on a post by post basis with the new software. But at the present time, I have too many posts for my archive to be moved to the new platform. We shall see when the time comes if a selective use of comboxes on a post by post basis is feasible to do or not. But that is as close as I will get to the comments box zeitgeist for reasons I noted in the text above. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa January 25, 2007)]

{3} I can usually remember approximately when I wrote on something or a key word or phrase I may have used to help in finding something with the archives search option. However, it has been over three years since blogger had a platform that enabled me to go through my whole archives start to finish and look more than 300 posts back for something. Sometimes I cannot remember key words or precisely what a subject I wrote on can be found in the archives but only when approximately it was written. The new format allows therefore for those kinds of posts to be found and that is a nice upgrade from the old format in my opinion.

{4} I only was able to do this with Rerum Novarum yesterday evening.

My Superbowl Prediction:

Go HERE for details.

The Comments Box Subject Revisited:
(Musings of your humble servant at Rerum Novarum)

On occasion, certain contentious sorts raise the subject of comments boxes and have the audacity to presume that our failure to have them at Rerum Novarum constitutes some sort of timidity on our part. It is asserted by these sorts that I have little if any confidence in the solidity of my positions and that somehow I have to "sift" what makes it to the weblog in a careful fashion to preserve some "illusion" or whatever.

Comments boxes for those of this sort of outlook are considered "interaction" or "dealing with others" and giving "freedom to express themselves" or whatever -even of a critical nature. Usually these kinds of criticisms of my approach come from people who try to evade arguments I have made but I am hardly going to presume that only those sorts have questions as to why we at Rerum Novarum utilize the weblog policy that we do. And as every once and a while it helps to remind people of why I do what I do, I will do so at this time to hopefully make it clear that the presumptions behind those who take a negative view of what I do on this matter are significantly off the mark.

To start with, those who want to have comments boxes can do what they like. I do not begrudge them at all personally but I do not agree with their use generally speaking for many reasons. For one thing, they are not strictly speaking required for interaction with others as there are many ways to get feedback. I interact with some of the more interesting emails or discussion list stuff on this blog -interesting to me that is and if I am not interested in the subject, it is not going to get dealt with here. Sometimes I get emails from people that they want posted as guest editorials and generally I am willing to do that too -even if I do not agree with viewpoint on the subject matter being posted. There are also times where I will interact with others on discussion lists, in chat logs, on message boards (occasionally) and in the comboxes of other weblogs: virtually none of which I have editorial control over and that is of no small significance.{1}

There are numerous ways to receive and interact with people's views much as there are numerous sources with which to come up with material for writing. I have discussed this before and at 2400 plus posts to this weblog have come nowhere near exhausting my well of subjects which I can discuss and do so in an intelligent and thought-provoking manner. Do I utilize "selected feedback" as some critics assert??? Yes I do but for a very good reason which may not be evident so I will say it here.

Before I started blogging, I perused various weblogs and observed the manner in which comments boxes were handled by their participants. I came to realize after a period of observation that they cause more problems than they are worth most of the time and therefore decided to find other avenues for interaction with others when I got around to starting a blog of my own. This is why I never have had and never will have comboxes at Rerum Novarum of a general nature.

As far as what my precise views on this matter is, it has been explained before on more than one occasion. I have noted the reasons most recently in this thread and I stick by them. Nor am I the only one to have taken this view -indeed others have come to similar conclusions as I have via experience with them personally which mirrored what I observed back in mid 2002. And what I have observed subsequently with comments boxes at other people's blogs -including those of some of my critics- has only solidified my view on this matter.

General comboxes on all posts{2} is not something I am interested in for reasons noted above both by myself and also the other party in question (Jonathan Prejean) whose correspondence was blogged at one of the links above. To quote part of that text at this time in dark red font:

[T]he quality discussion on email (which, naturally, provided motivation for me to blog about some subjects) far surpassed the interaction I was getting in comments. The process of thinking through a subject, as is customary when drafting more lengthy communications than idle responses in a comment box, tends to produce a higher quality of response. [Excerpt from Rerum Novarum (circa June 10, 2005)]

I did not say it quite as explicitly as he did but like myself, Jonathan realized that the quality of email responses was light years ahead of virtually all combox stuff except in very rare situations where there may be some parity. The question then becomes whether one wants to take the time to try and find the stuff of worth in that endeavour or instead find ways of trying to weed out the chaff and get to the wheat in a fashion much more conducive to the time constraints that are always on these endeavours for most of us.{3}

Truthfully, I have almost never seen a combox thread where the quality of responses is comparable to a decent email correspondence. Well, a number of my combox interactions are close to that quality but even then, if stuff is taken from the comboxes and eventually blogged, I almost always have to refine it a bit in spots and flesh out some points. There is also the need to string together as a rule a lot of shorter postings because of the time constraints -one reason why the nature of the combox format does not tend to allow for quality interaction as a rule.

So while comboxes can serve as a good source for blogging material (and I do use it sometimes), in the end whatever it produces of value even in my case needs a refining for blog presentation which private emails often do not.{4} And that comes from someone who actually tries to make good contributions to comboxes as a rule: something that only a minority of people actually do. If my critics want to take the time to pan for gold that way, they can be my guest. I though have far better ways of coming up with persons of substance to dialogue with than that.

The primary reason I do not use comments boxes is because combox stuff is rarely up to snuff and I do not want to take the time to dig in the coal mines to find the rare diamond or two there may be. Someone who is moved enough to send an email is usually (though not always) going to put some thought into what they send. And I only use the cream of the emails I receive because I have no interest in playing "erect the strawman and knock him down" which much too frequently is what many of those of an "apologetics" mindset do.{5}

There is a serious lack of interest in logic and rational thought out there and I do not want to contribute to it either explicitly or by implication. For that reason, my interest is in taking the best possible argument shots people want to throw my way. There is also the part where I discuss only what I want to discuss at a given point in time. Emails may sit for a while unresponded to until I want to respond to them -usually my stock response to emailers if it is something that I intend to respond to is that I am "working on a response." That lets them know that they will be taken seriously when I do get around to responding to them and not infrequently they send a follow-up email expressing gratitude for that.{6}

In the end, it is quality over quantity and I will take the former any day of the week. My critics can feel free to entertain the rabble who cannot put together a coherent argument all they want. I though prefer to deal with those who can much as I am interested in helping people become better thinkers and thus better contributors to the arena of ideas. That in short is why I take the approach to comments boxes that I do and why that will not change in principle -even if in the future certain new blog technology allows for an occasional deviation{7} from my ordinary blog protocol.

Notes:

{1} The truth is, those who have comments boxes are capable of manipulating the content there to suit their own agenda including banning people who raise strong enough arguments against the "prevailing orthodoxy" at a given weblog. Now obviously people who are genuine trolls do not need to be given the time of day but you would be surprised at how often those who laud their "willingness to interact with others" will put censors on their comments boxes that would make the monitors at Pravda in the days of the old Soviet Union blush.

{2} Now it is possible when I am able to transfer my blog to the new beta that I may have targeted comments allowed as that can be done on a post by post basis with the new software. But at the present time, I have too many posts for my archive to be moved to the new platform. We shall see when the time comes if a selective use of comboxes on a post by post basis is feasible to do or not. But that is as close as I will get to the comments box zeitgeist for reasons I noted in the text above.

{3} There is also the fact that some of these critics have more time than Big Ben for these sorts of endeavours whereas most of us do not. For that reason, it makes sense to use one's time as productively as possible and that is what my approach to these matters enables me to do.

{4} I say "often do not" because sometimes due to certain parts of an email which the writer may request complete confidentiality on, it requires rephrasing certain parts of the text to provide a reasonable flow to the content therein. I have no problem with people being highly critical of me as long as they show proper respect for basic ethics in the process. That includes (but is not limited to) scholastic integrity too which I already have pointed out several times not a few of my critics have shown a lacuna in on a few occasions.

{5} This is done even those who are more seasoned and are not mere neophytes so the problem is quite widespread.

{6} Though I almost never blog those unless they also involve a continution of the thread under discussion.

{7} See footnote two.

Rough Draft of a Book Review on Young Patriots For Amazon:
(Musings of your humble servant at Rerum Novarum)

[Prefatory Note: This text was written last year and I though I had posted it. However, when doing an archive search for the text to consider revising it -something I noted in a recent posting that I planned to do- I found only a draft text version dated to June 30, 2006. Anyway, I will post it at this time and set about doing an abridged version for posting at Amazon sometime before spring time-willing. -ISM]


* * * * *

The Founding Fathers Live!!!

Charles Cerami deserves credit for doing something that is rare for a historian and something that is essential: making the characters he writes on come to life rather than read as a collection of stale hagiography. I certainly saw some minor problems with the work but I would be remiss in not noting that the pluses of this work by far outweigh the minuses.

First of all, I cannot emphasize enough the way he covers the characters of the Founding Fathers -particularly Alexander Hamilton and James Madison the two main characters of the book. The Founders were complex personalities and too often they are written of in a simplistic fashion, which speaks as much for the biases of the writers covering them as it does anything else. That is not to say that Cerami is free from bias: he definitely has a liberal bias but he is careful to not let it colour too much of his treatment on these complicated subject matters. For that reason as well as the quality of his writing and overall analysis of the Founders as men and the issues they faced, I give this book five stars. To briefly touch on some of the points that I found of particular interest:

---The main forces behind the Constitution either in the ideas presented in the document or in building consensus for the ideas of other Founders which they believed should be included but (without such a consensus approach) never would have seen the light of day.

---Though Hamilton and Madison were the main characters covered in the book, Cerami also touches on George Washington and Thomas Jefferson (the latter was not even involved in the pre-convention or convention proceedings) but also dealt to some extent with the important contributions of Benjamin Franklin, Gouverneur Morris, George Mason, Roger Sherman, James Wilson, Elbridge Gerry, Edmund Randolph, Rufus King, Patrick Henry, the Pinkney's of South Carolina, John Adams, and various others figures -including some who were practically invisible except for a key decision they were involved in at points where their decisions changed the course of history.

---While often getting a bad rap on the slavery issue, Cerami points out the truth of the matter which to touch on briefly (since this is often misunderstood): there was no consensus amongst the Founders on the slavery issue. If anything, the currents at the time did not favour it even among the more favourable of the Southern states. There were however different opinions as to how this was to be dealt with and Cerami astutely noted that most of the Founders (even many who had slaves) viewed the institution of slavery as an unfortunate reality of the time.

--Despite that general viewpoint, the Founders generally viewed the slavery issue as a thorny one that could best be dealt with from within the framework of a stable government structure. This is why a man like Madison (who abhorred slavery with every fiber of his being) could agree to the kind of compromises that he did. (Hamilton was not present at those preliminary meeting and who probably would have vigorously opposed such compromises not because he disagreed with Madison's view on slavery but because he was more analytical than practical on these kinds of points than Madison was.)

---If not for following a protocol of secrecy, there would be no Constitution and thus no United States of America. Those who think every proposal should be run by the masses (read: journalists and other sensationalist sorts) and who whine about "constitutional protections of free speech" when their irresponsibility is pointed out to them should be better aware of the way they contradict themselves in their words and activities.

---The proposal for a more stable union in the late eighteenth century was as well as the Constitutional Convention and the informed meetings that preceded it was a matter involving the security of the nation. Cerami himself seems to recognize the conundrum of sorts that his more liberal approaches involved (he later argues briefly in the book for an approach to the freedom of speech that is a fairly blanket approach) and how the Constitution he so evidently loves would not exist if his principles were followed around the time of its crafting by the Founders. It seems to this writer that a differentiation between what does not involve national security and what does involve it is the logical points of distinction that need to be made on this issue but enough on that point for now.

I noted that Cerami is a liberal and he certainly presents his views on certain issues in that vein. He also has a presuppositional thread common to the Whig historian in his take to some extent which should likewise be noted in this review. However, to his credit, he generally sticks to the issues and avoids editorial comment when writing on the persons involved in the creation of the Constitution and in commenting on the labyrinth of issues that had to be navigated. His portrayal of the various characters --particularly Madison and Hamilton but also to a lessor extent Washington and (from his Paris vantage point: Thomas Jefferson) is detailed.

Every indication is given that Cerami wanted to present as complete a portrait of the subjects he wrote, the debates that shaped the document's crafting, the clashes of personalities, differing ideas, major principles involved, etc. as reasonably as he could. That he gets it all in a volume of approximately 320 pages with a well-footnoted text (and in a way that brings the characters and the issues to life) is no small achievement.

That Cerami's work will hopefully shatter forever the common misperception of the Founders as a bunch of slave-endorsing graybeards is certainly something to hope for. This misperception applied to some of the Founders is certainly true but the two men most influential for the ideas that shaped the Constitution and the process that saw that achievement through to its final form (not to mention getting it ratified as the law of the land) were indeed very young men. Alexander Hamilton for example was only 32 and James Madison was 36. The average age in fact was 43 - 39 if the two oldest Founders (Benjamin Franklin and Roger Sherman) were factored out of the mix.

In summary, this is a most excellent book which I recommend that everyone obtain and read for their own edification. Madison and Hamilton were not the only characters among the Founders who had disagreements and even passionately disagreed with one another. The book highlights well how many men of varying temperaments were able to put aside petty differences and work together for the common good of the nation they loved and to save it. Would that many of today's belligerents develop this kind of approach to the complicated issues of our day and age but I digress.

Drinking some water
Finished my blogging right now
Back to work I go

On Stem Cell Research and Fundamental Rights:
(Musings of your humble servant at Rerum Novarum)

A good post on amniotic stem cells was recently posted by The Holy Fool which is worth considering for anyone who is heavily into promoting stem cell research. It reminded me to some extent of an article Michael Kinsley wrote for Slate back around 2003 or so where he appealed to his own situation and asked those who refused to endorse stem cell research with embryos to basically tell him he deserved to die. He said this to those who refused to play into an attempt by the abortion lobby (which Kinsley supports) to pitch their position in moralistic overtones.

Readers of this humble weblog who were good at putting two and two together could probably have figured out that I would gladly have told Michael Kinsley this not out of personal dislike{1} or malice but instead out of principle. Indeed, the only pre-Rerum Novarum social commentary of mine which is linked to this weblog happens to be on the subject of stem cell research.{2} As obviously it would have served no fruitful purpose to say it directly in that way, I chose therefore not to.

But yes, those who recognize that life is sacred and that in the absence of definitive proof of where life actually begins{3} believe erring on the side of caution is important, that is the position that they have to take. However, as The Holy Fool has noted, there is now an alternative approach to this matter:

The institutionalization of pursuing illusion slowly strangles the collective conscience of our society. When we're cut off from the truth by our own denial, we lose the fundamental source of wisdom upon which our conscience depends. Thus, our institutions--like MSM--can celebrate a "freedom" whose fruit is murder while it condemns an ethical breakthrough in cutting-edge science. One that may save lives and improve the quality of life for countless others.

The question is, does amniotic stem cell research violate any of the fundamental rights of man -the first of which is life. I cannot see how it would considering that cells themselves do not constitute life and from all that we know about biology if these are cells which are shed by the embryo are easier to maintain in lab conditions than stem cells extracted from a fetus. Wherever or however we want to argue the issue of where life begins, it is not arguable that amniotic stem cells do not constitute life. And knowing that should make how we approach the stem cell research issue at Rerum Novarum both evident and obvious: amniotic stem cell research is fine while fetal stem cell research has more problems from a procedural standpoint and more potential Pandora's Box problems from both the moral and ethical realms. But watch as The Holy Fool noted those who are adamant about wanting fetal stem cell research as a moral banner to support federal abortion funding to ignore this good news and press on with their agenda. And when they do, you have all the proof you need that they are not children of light but instead are children of darkness.

Hopefully Michael Kinsley -a man who has shown evidence of taking reason and logic seriously- will jump on board this bandwagon at some point and chastise his liberal allies who try to pass over this breakthrough. And hopefully those who are opposed to abortion will stand solidly behind amniotic stem cell research as an alternative to fetal stem cell research.

Notes:

{1} Actually, I have long liked Michael Kinsley because while he and I disagree far more frequently than we agree, I always found his positional arguments to exceed others of his overall outlook in the areas of reasoning and logic. (This of course made me take greater consideration of his views than I otherwise might have and produce better arguments for my own positions.)

{2} Opening Pandora's Box, Yet Again (circa September 1, 2001)

Other articles or material around this time of a geopolitical or socio-ethical nature that I wrote either was either on sites which did not archive them or in texts on my old computer hard drive which crashed in mid 2002 and had to be reformatted. (Whether I will undertake the time expense to try and retrieve any of it in the future remains to be seen.) Nonetheless, I still agree with the overall position as enunciated in that thread (and substantially agree with the arguments set forth in it as well).

{3} And yes, this is a fair question to discuss because whatever one wants to say about theological speculation, the issue of life is a biological and scientific one first and foremost.

Some Biographical Bits on a Few of the Founding Fathers:
(Musings of your humble servant at Rerum Novarum)

[Update: The material originally contained in this posting on biographies and the accompanying footnotes were originally going to be published in another medium in its original form on the date of this update. However, I ended up expanding on every one of the biographies below for republishing the material -including eleven new footnotes of material. Since the product as it was published yesterday was in every respect significantly superior to what was originally cobbled together in the original posting here, I have decided to replace it with the new material which contains within it the material originally posted here following a principle I have adhered to on this weblog for a long time but only recently enunciated on the weblog in explicit form. -ISM 7/6/09 @1:00pm]

Partly to spur on my own intention to revise and abridge a rough draft of a review I wrote last year on Charles Cerami's Young Patriots which was blogged to this very weblog -and partly for another post the subject of which I do not want to reveal at this time- it seems appropriate to outline in a short sketch some pertinent information about seven key founding fathers of the American Republic. So here goes...

--James Madison was born in 1751 in Virginia to an aristocratic family and his intelligence (like that of his onetime ally and later rival Alexander Hamilton) was recognized early on. He attended Princeton College where he was trained in the law and was one of the contributors to the Virginia State Constitution in 1776 -serving in both the Continental Congress and also the Virginia Assembly.

James Madison was not the only Founder who realized the inadequacies of the Articles of Confederation early on but he did play key roles in the process that saw those articles abrogated in favour of the Constitution we now possess. For one thing, it was his idea to get a meeting together of widely-influential men from all the states to discuss the issue of trade. It was from a meeting standpoint an abject failure garnering only sixteen participants from five states. However, this abject failure has gone down in history as The Annapolis Convention serving as a milestone to a much more successful meeting eight months later in Philadelphia known to posterity as the Constitutional Convention.

Madison is widely referred to as the "Father of the Constitution" for his role in the planning of the Constitutional Convention (or "Convention"), setting forth in what was called The Virginia Plan a rough draft of a three part system of government that though there were a variety of changes to his proposal in specific details, the broad outline of the finished product was very much along the lines of Madison's original idea. Madison was also involved in directing the Convention proceedings to some extent, and also for being the official historian of the proceedings (taking down the only official set of notes on the proceedings). He was particularly instrumental in the finer detailed arguments in advocating strongly and against strong opposition at times for the role of the people in directly electing the members of the House of Representatives. He worked to get what would eventually become the United States Constitution (or Constitution) ratified in his home state of Virginia, contributed twenty-nine papers to the eight-five paper series known to posterity as The Federalist Papers, and also was the supporter of the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution (known as the Bill of Rights) which he wrote with his own hand.

After the ratification of the United States Constitution, Madison served in the House of Representatives in the 1st Congress for the State of Virginia where he opposed Alexander Hamilton's proposed Bank of the United States{1} based on arguments he had previously written against in The Federalist Papers.{2} Madison was also an early confidant of President George Washington but when Washington saw Madison's duplicitous nature on federalist matters, the confidence Washington had in him evaporated forever. Madison's struggles with former ally Hamilton resulted in the formation of the "Republican Party" -though not the party which we know of by that name today. During the administration of President John Adams, Madison and Vice President Thomas Jefferson sought to undermine Adams' policies in ways that were less-than-honest (to put it nicely) and in Madison's case it involved him continuing in his contradiction of his previously enunciated views on federalist principles.

In the administration of President Thomas Jefferson with whom he had been and would remain close (1801-1809), Madison served as Secretary of State. He was elected to the presidency in 1808 where his brilliance as a legislator did not translate well into his new role as president; to put it bluntly: he was our first mediocre president which considering his various gifts would be quite a surprise. He served two terms, saw the country through the War of 1812 and the demise of the Federalist Party, and also reverted once again to the views on federalism that he had prior to 1791, particularly on the second Bank of the United States which he fought to have chartered after lack of funding upon the expiration of the first bank's charter in 1811 proved to be detrimental in the war that followed. (This was achieved in 1816 towards the end of his second presidential term.) Late in his life, he spoke out against the secessionist rhetoric that had started to perpetuate asserting that the union of the states was "near and dear" to his heart. He died in Virginia in 1836.


--Alexander Hamilton was arguably the "Chief Defender of the Constitution" because he worked the hardest and against the greatest odds to secure its ratification once the document was finalized and ready for voting by the states. He was born in the West Indian island of Nevis in either 1755 or 1757. He spent his childhood being educated far ahead of his years and was running a trading post efficiently and profitably before he was a teenager. After he was sent to the mainland for further education, he took up with the cause of liberty signing onto fight with the colonies against Great Britain.

Hamilton served as captain of artillery under General George Washington rising to become the General's chief of staff and responsible for a huge portion of the latter's correspondence -most of which he was authorized to draft and send in the General's name. He also saw some military action -particularly at Yorktown when General Cornwallis surrendered in 1781 and Hamilton was given a command and elevated to colonel in which he performed admirably.

After the Revolutionary war, Hamilton received legal training and was a successful lawyer in private practice for many years.{3} He was elected to the Continental Congress in 1782 but resigned the following year to practice law where he made quite a reputation for himself. He also founded in 1784 the Bank of New York which existed as one of America's more significant financial institutions until 2007 when it was merged with Mellon Financial. But even more significantly was his involvement in the aforementioned pivotal meeting of business-minded men at Annapolis on September 11, 1786. It was called to discuss trade and failed in three days to reach a quorum but the ever-audacious Hamilton proposed that the men present plan for an even bigger meeting the following year to discuss trade and various other issues of a national nature -embodying these ideas into a report he wrote for the group. Copies of Hamilton's report were sent in the name of all present to every state legislature requesting them to send representatives to Philadelphia and the rest is history.

Hamilton played a much smaller role in the Constitutional Convention -due in no small part to the New York delegation voting contrary to his positions on every ballot. He also was absent for stretches at a time while he tended to his legal practice. However, he did make a couple of important interventions including a major speech advocating a monarchial form of government that while it had broad support amongst the participants at the same time was not capable of being practically implemented. However, Hamilton did influence the thinking of most of those whose roles there were much more significant in the main crafting stage and presumably his advocacy for a strong executive resulted in the role of the president being given greater strength than many of the participants coming into the Convention may have wanted to give it. Later on, in the final stages of the document's development he was selected to be on key committees (such as the Committee on Style) to shape the final product.

Hamilton's main fame as it pertained to the United States Constitution specifically was in defending the final product which he did better than anyone else. In the widely read compendium of the time called The Federalist Papers --originally written as newspaper editorials to explain various parts of the Constitution in the face of significant misunderstandings being floated about by the "Anti-Federalists"-- Hamilton wrote at least fifty-two of the eighty-five texts -some account as many as fifty-five of them to him. The other two contributors to The Federalist Papers were James Madison and John Jay who wrote twenty-five to twenty-eight and about five texts respectively. Hamilton worked doggedly to get it implemented in his state debating Anti-Federalists for weeks at a time while writing his contributions to The Federalist and running his legal practice. He finally succeeded in winning over a key Anti-Federalist debater (Melancton Smith) to their cause which helped secure its ratification in New York. Overall, Hamilton was as important to the defense and ratification of the Constitution as Madison was in the overall planning and direction of its creation.{4}

After the Constitution was ratified and became the law of the land, Hamilton served as Treasury Secretary to President George Washington (1789-1797) from 1789-1795 and was instrumental in constructing the first Bank of the United States, securing a solid financial foundation for the infant nation, setting up the first system of tariffs for government revenue, establishing the United States Coast Guard, writing many of President George Washington's speeches (including his Proclamation of Neutrality and the lions share of his famous Farewell Address) and also influencing Washington's decisions on many key policies that set precedents for future presidents who would follow.

Hamilton retired from government service in 1795 and almost immediately was forced to defend himself against charges of financial corruption. He vindicated himself from these but at a price; namely the integrity of his political life was spared by a major black mark on his personal life. For to spare his ethics in handling the treasury funds of the United States, he was forced to admit to a private indiscretion; namely, an affair with Maria Reynolds and her husbands financial blackmail of him as a result. Even this would not have been the problem it ended up being if not for the fact that Hamilton was so concerned for preserving his political integrity that he embellished in typical Hamiltonian detail the elements of the affair.

Despite these political setbacks, Hamilton continued to have an influence on the policies of both the Washington administration and also indirectly the later Adams administration -though the latter was not to be realized until the final year of President Adams' term. When the Quasi-War broke out with France, Hamilton was reluctantly promoted to Major General when George Washington refused to serve as Supreme Commander of the military forces without his longtime trusted adviser being close at hand and able to do in person the sorts of things the elderly Washington was no longer capable of doing. As it was however, President Adams was able to successfully avoid war with France via a peace treaty with Napolean though this happened too late to help President Adams at the polls in the 1800 election. And as he was involved in nearly every other major event of his time, Hamilton was also for better or worse involved in the 1800 election as well.

Hamilton's involvement in the aforementioned election was (to put it nicely) less-than-tactful political machinations to bring down the administration of John Adams in favour of another Federalist candidate (Charles Cotesworth-Pinckney). In doing this, Hamilton basically insured a major division in the Federalist Party that led to the election of their political opponents. Hamilton was subsequently to become more religious after one of his sons died in a duel (1801) on the same field where he was himself to die three years later in a duel with then-Vice President Aaron Burr{5} after refusing to fire at his challenger. Burr himself had no such scruples and Hamilton died about a day after he was shot. Gouverneur Morris (to be profiled next) eulogized Hamilton at his funeral.


--Gouverneur Morris was one of the more important contributors to the Constitutional Convention both in ideas suggested or supported and also in a few other key ways. He is also one of the least-known even though he represents in many ways what America has become -both the good and the not-so-good. Morris was born in 1752 and given his mother's maiden name as his first name. Like Alexander Hamilton, Morris was a child prodigy of sorts enrolling in King's College (now Columbia) at the age of twelve and graduating with a masters in 1768 at the age of sixteen.

Morris became a barrister{6} and when the conflict with Great Britain was pushing the colonies towards declaring their independence, Morris found himself in a family with divided loyalties. His initial sympathies were with forming a reconciliation of tensions with Great Britain but the continual encroachments of the British Parliament finally made him throw in with the cause for independence. Morris could have avoided fighting in the Revolutionary War for legitimate reasons, he chose to fight. However, when he was offered a second on command of the state Minutemen, he declined when the latter refused to transfer to the Continental Army in the fight for independence from Great Britain.

Despite this development, Morris' prodigious talents both at committee work and also his prowess with the pen made him a valuable ally both for the legislatures and also for the military forces. He played a key role in the drafting of the Constitution of the State of New York (1777-1778) and also served as a delegate to the Continental Congress from 1778-1779. He was sent by that legislative body to Valley Forge in 1777 to assess their condition and found them a freezing band of starving and near-mutinous men. Both legislatively and financially he fought for their behalf in the Continental Congress improving their financing and acquisition of needed supplies. When there was a refusal to fight without some financial restitution, Morris got through the legislature a bill to guarantee them half pay for seven years. He also signed the Articles of Confederation (1778) and suffered a tragic accident in 1779 where he lost one leg below the leg. However, he did not let this misfortune get him down nor did his peg leg effect his tomcat reputation.

When financier Robert Morris{7} was appointed Finance Minister to France, G. Morris served as his assistant and when the nations finances threatened the fight for independence, G. Morris assisted R. Morris in establishing the Bank of North America saving the cause from financial ruin. He also as a result of attempting to get a national sales tax passed got on the bad side of General George Washington for a time. In 1785, he played a key role in stabilizing US currency on the basis of the decimal system and saw his political apex at the Constitutional Convention where he represented the state of Pennsylvania.

Few of the participants were as involved as he was in these proceedings. He came in with a view shared by several others that there needed to be a strong executive but Morris more than most of the others viewed it as a necessity that the states needed to take a more national than state-dominated view of themselves. He was instrumental in the system of referring thornier issues to smaller committees to hash out which saved the Constitutional Convention from disaster or dissolution on more than one occasion, was on many of those constitutional committees himself, was involved in a healthy number of interventions in the convention.{8} Morris was one of those who advocated for a strong executive and also led him during the contentious arguments for how the president was to be elected to suggest the Electoral College system which remains with us today. (Morris in this bridged the gap between those advocating direct election by the people and those who distrusting the people favoured appointment to the presidency by the congress.) Finally, once everything had been systemized into a coherent form by a Committee of Detail and a subsequent Committee of Style{9}, Morris was the selection by the other delegates{10} to write the final draft

Affixed to the beginning of the finished product was a preamble that Morris conceived of with which to majestically introduce the material and also the construction "we the people of the United States" rather than a roll call of the states themselves: reflecting Morris' view that the focus had to be more on the nation as a whole rather than the kinds of provincial state-focused mentality which was more common for that time. After the final draft was signed by 39 of the 55 participants of the Constitutional Convention, Morris then wrote the cover letter that General George Washington would sign and use to formally submit the material to the Continental Congress then convening in New York. Hamilton would later on request Morris' aid in drafting texts for The Federalist Papers which was not to be forthcoming.

After the ratification of the United States Constitution, Morris' political life began winding down to a certain extent though he did serve as President George Washington's Minister to France for three years (1791-1794) of a near-ten year sojourn to that country. He also assisted his friend Alexander Hamilton in creating the Federalist Party and served as a Senator in 1798.{11} After losing an election in 1800, he helped lead the efforts to create the Erie Canal, was a vocal critic of the Jefferson Administration and the latter's economic policies though he did support the Louisiana Purchase of 1803. When the War of 1812 arose under President James Madison, Morris opposed the attempts of the government to put in what he viewed as unnecessary controls in place for national security. A lifelong bachelor with a reputation as a "ladies man", Morris finally settled down and got married towards the end of his life and sired a son in 1813. Morris died in New York in 1816.


--Rufus King was born in Maine in 1755 to a wealthy merchant father. He enrolled in Harvard in 1773 but his education was interrupted by the Revolutionary War stirrings of 1775 and the need of the colonial military to use the school buildings for barracks. When the British forces were evacuated from Harvard in 1776, he resumed his studies receiving a degree in law in 1777. King served briefly in the state militia and saw action in the Battle of Rhode Island after which he was admitted to the bar where he practiced law (1778). He was elected to the local legislature in 1780 where he served until 1783. In 1784, he was elected to the Continental Congress where he was reelected in 1785 and 1786.

When the Constitutional Convention (or Convention) was convened in 1787, King was sent as a representative of Massachusetts where he played an important if often not appreciated role. Though brilliant in his own right, King came to the Constitutional Convention with reluctance to change anything in the defective Articles of Confederation. He claimed after arriving to have had his mind "transformed" by listening to Alexander Hamilton speak at the Convention: probably Hamilton's greatest contribution to that event prior to the finalizing of the text itself because Hamilton missed a lot of the Convention due to legal and family matters and while he spoke brilliantly, he did not speak often. King however did speak often and at pivotal moments.

King had a role on several important Constitutional committees for dealing with the more thorny areas of controversy and also in refining the various parts into a somewhat cohesive first draft for further work. (Such as with Madison, Hamilton, and Morris on the five member Committee of Style.) He also kept his own set of notes of the proceedings which while not official like Madison's notes nonetheless are helpful to compare with Madison's notes as well as the notes of New York delegate Robert Yates who also took notes of the proceedings. After the Convention, King worked to get the United States Constitution accepted by his home state of Massachusetts and also to be seated in the United States Senate for his state. He succeeded with the first endeavour and failed with the second one. Alexander Hamilton after his failure to win election to the Senate persuaded him to move to New York where he did and was elected in 1788 to the New York state legislature. Hamilton pitched King for a senate seat from New York and surprisingly, Governor George Clinton{12} also supported King's candidacy and he won serving from 1789-1796.

King was appointed Minister to Great Britain (1796). He later ran unsuccessfully as Charles Cotesworth Pinckney's vice presidential candidate when Pinckney faced off against President Thomas Jefferson in the election of 1804 and against James Madison in the election 1808. King unsuccessfully sought the Federalist nomination in 1812 and ran again for the senate out of New York in 1813 and won. He was nominated for the Federalist Party for president in 1816 losing to James Monroe but retained his senate seat.{13} King authored the Navigation Act in 1818 and ran again for the Senate where he served until 1825. He died in Jamaica, Queens in 1827 and was renowned by his contemporaries for his intelligence, his integrity, and his capabilities as an orator.


--Roger Sherman was born in Newton, Massachusetts in 1721. To list the many shifts in his life would take well over a page as he was a renaissance man in many respects; however, they will be briefly listed here. He was mostly self-taught though that included reading from his father's extensive library and he had a special aptitude for mathematics.

After his father died, he and his family moved to New Milford, Connecticut where in 1743 at the age of 21 he opened a general store with his brother. Like George Washington, Sherman was successful in business to a degree that many other Founders of more shining intellectual gifts{14} were not. Sherman later became town clerk for New Milford. Due to his math skills, he was appointed town surveyor in 1745 and in 1748 he started providing astronomical calculations for almanacs.

Though lacking formal training he was encouraged to read for the bar and he was accepted in 1754. The town of Milford sent him to represent them in the Connecticut General Assembly from 1755 to 1758 and again from 1760 to 1761. The Connecticut General Assembly elected him to their upper chamber in 1766 where he served until 1785. During this time, he was also elected as justice of the peace in 1762, judge of the court of common pleas (1765), and justice of the Superior Court of Connecticut from 1766-1789: a position he vacated later on to serve in the US Senate out of Connecticut. Sherman was one of those who was appointed to revise the Connecticut statutes which had become confused and in some respects outdated in 1783. And during the national issues of his time, he was involved like virtually no one else.

Sherman was involved in national politics being elected to the Continental Congress in 1774. He was a signer of the original Articles of Association in 1774 which was a combined effort by all the states to boycott trade with Great Britain. He was later a contributor along with John Adams and Thomas Jefferson to the final draft of The Declaration of Independence in 1776 (which he signed his name to) as well as contributor and signer of the original Articles of Confederation. In fact, if the United States Constitution is included with those three documents, Sherman can claim to be the only Founding Father who contributed to as well as signed his name to all four of them. The cumulative effect of all of his activities caused a strain on his health, which caused him to have to petition the governor of his state to relieve him of state legislative duties to allow him to continue to serve in the Continental Congress which he did until 1781 returning in 1783. He further dabbled in the fields of finance and theology as if everything else he was involved in was not sufficient.

Sherman was one of the oldest representatives to the Constitutional Convention in 1787.{15} Though of limited education formally, he was by this time in his life known for his intelligence, his powers of negotiation, and also as possessing an adaptability of mind that in some respects surpassed the other convention delegates. In 1787, he was a solid player at the Convention making over one hundred floor interventions and crafting several important compromises to keep the various factions on the same page and moving towards a final product.

Of particular note in this area was what has come down to us as The Great Compromise or The Connecticut Compromise hammered out on recess and in the evening hours over the weekend after a particularly tumultuous week of disputations with fellow Connecticut representative Oliver Ellsworth. The dispute which required settlement was representation in the houses of congress and the larger states wanted representation by population while the smaller states wanted representation equally. The rift on this issue alone threatened to tear the convention proceedings apart when Sherman proposed that the lower house be elected as the larger states wanted and directly by the people with the upper house be elected as the smaller states wanted and by the legislature.{16} As additional incentive, Sherman threw in the tidbit that all bills for raising revenue must originate in the lower house but the Senate can propose or concur with amendments as on other bills. This was a significant concession to the larger states but Sherman was an astute negotiator and politician and this compromise saved the Convention on one of its more explosive issues so that the work to fashion the eventual United States Constitution could continue.

Sherman did not live long after the Constitution was adopted but he was a pivotal figure in the founding of this great nation whose abilities and broadness of mind were respected by many of his contemporaries who are better known to us today. He died in 1793 from typhoid at the age of 72.


--Charles Cotesworth-Pinckney was born and died in Charleston, South Carolina. (His birth was in 1764.) His education included a stint at Westminster prepatory school in London and a degree in law from Oxford University. He was admitted to the bar in 1769 and when he returned to the colonies was a successful landowner and barrister. His first involvement in politics was an election to the state legislature in 1770.

His family was aristocratic and attached to Great Britain participating in the colonial government. However, in 1775 when it was clear that there was going to be an uprising against Great Britain, Pinckney was among those who pledged his "life, fortunes, and sacred honour" to the cause. He was among the few who recognized the importance of a strong national government early on. Though he had previous militia experience, he volunteered for the Continental Army and served as a senior field commander. After participating in the successful defense of Charleston in 1776 from British forces, Pinckney was promoted to full colonel. When things cooled down militarily in South Carolina in 1777, Pinckney actively sought out General George Washington to have a more active role in the proceedings. He saw action in the military campaigns of Brandywine and Germantown and in the process forged important associations with people outside of the deep south which would later on prove to be valuable.

In 1778, Pinckney returned to South Carolina to resume a role when things got active in that area again. He fought in several successful military battles but eventually was captured in Charleston in 1780 in a losing effort to the British. As an officer, he was treated much more harshly than the average soldier but he refused to compromise the cause. After nearly two years of captivity, he was released in a general exchange of prisoners in 1782 and returned to active duty until 1783 when the southern regiments were disbanded.

After the war, he threw himself into his law practice, represented South Carolina in the lower legislative house, and enlisted in the militia. When the Constitutional Convention was called, he was sent as a delegate from South Carolina. He played key roles in keeping the Convention together when the volatile issue of slavery threatened to rip it apart -all the more remarkable when you consider how much he personally abhorred slavery.{17} Pinckney also had a role in forming many compromises -an endeavour to which his previous connections outside of the south proved their value. He was active in securing the ratification of the United States Constitution by South Carolina as well as forming a state constitution heavily based on the federal model to which he contributed.

After some time out of politics, he agreed to serve as Ambassador to France in the second administration of President George Washington. He had an unsuccessful bid for the Vice-Presidency in 1800 when President John Adams ran for re-election and lost to Thomas Jefferson. He then had two unsuccessful attempts at the presidency in 1804 and 1808 losing to Thomas Jefferson and James Madison respectively. He remained a Federalist to the end dying in 1825 at the age of 79.


--John Dickinson was born in Maryland in 1732. He was educated by private tutors and was admitted to the bar in England in 1757. He returned to the states and spent time as as a barrister and solicitor until hewas elected to the Pennsylvania State Legislature in 1764.

Dickinson was involved in the Stamp Act Congress of 1765 which was the start of the rumblings of discontent with Great Britain in the colonies.{18} He was elected to the First Continental Congress in 1774 and to the Second Continental Congress in 1775 and 1776. He was a late bloomer to the cause of the colonies for independence -though he was involved in the authorship of key documents during this period including Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms co-written with Thomas Jefferson and also a last-ditch effort at reconciliation with King George III called The Olive Branch Petition. He refused to sign the Declaration of Independence when it was ready for signature because he believed that the unfinished Articles of Confederation should be finished first -the first draft of which he had authored. His refusal to be involved in the drafting and signing of the Declaration meant he had to resign from the congress and he enlisted in the Pennsylvania militia afterward.

After the colonies had voted for independence and needed a charter to govern them, the Articles of Confederation was compiled and completed in mostly out of drafts Dickinson had prepared. He was re-elected to the Continental Congress in 1779 and affixed his name to the final product of the Articles of Confederation, served in the Delaware Assembly in 1780, and was a delegate to the Constitutional Convention from the state of Delaware. He later moved to Pennsylvania and was elected as President of Pennsylvania -a position which was basically a weak version of a governor. His experience in this position probably was part of what prompted him to want a stronger executive and thus his support for this during the later Convention in 1787 where he also played a role. Dickinson's main contribution to the fashioning of the United States Constitution was probably his coming up with the original idea for what Roger Sherman eventually and in a more favourable moment proposed a much more developed concept of: the idea of proportional representation in at least one of the proposed houses of congress.

After the Constitution was signed by 39 of the 55 Constitutional Convention participants -Dickinson wanted to sign but was ill so his signature was dubbed in later on- his state of Delaware voted immediately and unanimously for its adoption. Dickinson later in 1791 helped redraft the Delaware State Constitution which was approved in 1792. Dickinson returned in 1793 to the Delaware State Senate where he served one year before having to step down to health issues. His final days were spent fighting for the advancement of the slavery abolition movement. He published two volumes of his works on politics in 1801 and died seven years later in 1808.

These are only seven of the thirty-five participants of the Constitutional Convention who had legal training. Those who wonder why I am bringing this issue up will find out in the coming days eventually if they have not figured it out already.

[Clarification: What I originally thought I would post "shortly" ended up for various and sundry reasons becoming a process that resulted in one part becoming several parts spanning between nearly three months (April 17, 2007) until one follow up thread, the summer months of 2007 for a separate series of Founding Father "points to ponder" threads loosely related to the original idea, roughly ten months for a rather serendipitous posting within the matrix of general thread material originally planned (December 26, 2007), and over two years for the final part (February 6, 2009) of what I had in mind at the time this post's original material was published. -ISM 7/6/09 @12:55pm]

Notes:

{1} President Washington concurred with Hamilton signing the bill into law.

{2} A contradiction that Hamilton made no small light of when the two were battling for the ear of President George Washington on the matter at hand.

{3} From 1782 all the way to the end of his life -interrupted only by his service in the first term of President George Washington.

{4} This is in one sense remarkable as Hamilton himself was not entirely thrilled with the final result. He wisely recognized however that the principle that a potential stability in the new format was far more preferable to the anarchy that was developing due to the inability of the Articles of Confederation to bind together the nation. Preferring greater stability over anarchy -even if not by the manner in which he would have preferred- shows someone who put the welfare of the nation over his own whims: something many people today could well learn from.

{5} Burr had also been on the losing side of many a political fight against Hamilton including as president in 1800 when there was a tie of Jefferson and Burr in the electoral votes which exposed a weakness in the original election mode for president. Hamilton was the one who persuaded a tie-breaker on the thirty-sixth ballot where a few Federalists who previously voted for Burr to stymie Jefferson changed their votes. Hamilton was viscerally opposed to Jefferson but believed Jefferson was the lesser of two evils: essentially wrong but at least not corrupt whereas he believed Burr was both wrong as well as unstable and of low moral character. Hamilton also derailed Burr's bid for governor of New York and it was in part due to the latter machinations that Burr challenged Hamilton to a duel.

{6} Morris had legal training and was admitted to the bar in New York City in 1771.

{7} They were not related to one another.

{8} Morris had more floor interventions than anyone else and often at key moments where he demonstrated a kind of warmth and wit to his arguments that eased tensions between various factions.

{9} Where he sat with Madison, Hamilton, and three others.

{10} Morris' selection for this task met with the enthusiastic endorsement of both James Madison and Alexander Hamilton.

{11} He was appointed to fill a vacancy.

{12} Clinton and Hamilton were political adversaries. Clinton's support for King unlike Hamilton's was very discreet.

{13} King's defeat in 1816 was the death-knell for what still remained of the Federalist Party after 1812.

{14} For example, Madison, Hamilton, and Thomas Jefferson were all blessed with greater intellectual talents but were also much poorer businessmen overall than either Washington or Sherman whose intelligence was of a more pragmatic kind.

{15} Sherman was sixty-six years of age at the time. Only Benjamin Franklin (at eighty-one) was older.

{16} The election mode for the Senate as Sherman proposed was accepted into the final product but later superceded by the Seventeeth Amendment (1913) which made the Senate subject to direct vote by the people as the House was.

{17} Pinckney was astute enough to realize that a functioning government which could be weaned away from slavery was preferable to a situation where there was no effective government and the threat of anarchy.

{18} He drafted the resolutions of that congress which were the first attempts to file complaints against the Crown -viewed by some as a precursor to the American Revolution.