[Mb-civic] The Bill of Rights - Antipathy to Militarism

[ean at sbcglobal.net]

"Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be 
dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every 
other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and 
taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments 
for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, 
the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in 
dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the 
means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the 
force, of the people.... [There is also an] inequality of fortunes, and 
the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and ... 
degeneracy of manners and of morals.... No nation could preserve 
its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
--James Madison
  
The Bill of Rights - Antipathy to Militarism 
By Jacob G. Hornberger, 
http://www.fff.org/freedom/fd0409a.asp 
Posted December 3, 2004 
 
The Third Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides that "no 
Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without 
the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be 
prescribed by law." 
 
 
Obviously, the Third Amendment has little relevance today. But what 
is relevant for us today is the mindset that underlay the passage of 
that amendment - a mindset of deep antipathy toward militarism and 
standing armies. Our ancestors' fierce opposition to a powerful 
military force was consistent with their overall philosophy that guided 
the formation of the Constitution and the passage of the Bill of 
Rights. 
 
While the Framers understood the need for a federal government, 
what concerned them was the possibility that such a government 
would become a worse menace than no government at all. Their 
recent experience with the British government - which of course had 
been their government and against which they had taken up arms - 
had reinforced what they had learned through their study of history: 
that the biggest threat to the freedom and well-being of a people 
was their own government. 
 
Thus, after several years operating under the Articles of 
Confederation, the challenge the Framers faced was how to bring a 
federal government into existence that would be sufficiently powerful 
to protect their rights and liberties but that would not also become 
omnipotent and tyrannical. 
 
Their solution was the Constitution, a document that would call the 
federal government into existence but limit its powers to those 
expressly enumerated in the document itself. Thus, a close 
examination of the Constitution shows that the powers of the U.S. 
government originate in it. The idea was that if a power wasn't 
enumerated, federal officials were precluded from exercising it. 
 
Even that, however, was not good enough for our American 
ancestors. They wanted an express restriction on the abridgement 
of what had become historically recognized as fundamental and 
inherent rights of the people. In other words, they wanted what could 
be considered an express insurance policy for the protection of their 
rights. While government officials could not lawfully exercise powers 
that were not enumerated in the Constitution, the Bill of Rights 
would make the point even more emphatically that federal officials 
had no authority to abridge the fundamental rights of the people. 
 
The Constitution provided other measures to protect against the rise 
of omnipotent and tyrannical government. One was the division of 
government into three separate branches, with the aim of 
establishing a system of "checks and balances" that would prevent 
the rise of powerful centralized government. Another was the 
Second Amendment, which ensured that the people would retain 
the means of resisting tyranny or even violently overthrowing a 
tyrannical government should the need arise. 
 
Given their view that the federal government they were bringing into 
existence constituted the biggest threat to their freedom and well-
being, constantly on the minds of our ancestors was the primary 
means by which governments had historically subjected their people 
to tyranny - through the use of the government's military forces. 
That is the primary reason for the deep antipathy that the Founders 
had for an enormous standing military force in their midst. They 
understood fully that if such a force existed, their own government 
would possess the primary means by which governments have 
always imposed tyranny on their own people. 
 
 
Using armies for tyranny 
 
Historically, governments had misused standing armies in two ways, 
both of which ultimately subjected the citizenry to tyranny. One was 
to engage in faraway wars, which inevitably entailed enormous 
expenditures, enabling the government to place ever-increasing tax 
burdens on the people. Such wars also inevitably entailed "patriotic" 
calls for blind allegiance to the government so long as the war was 
being waged. Consider, for example, the immortal words of James 
Madison, who is commonly referred to as "the father of the 
Constitution": 
 
"Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be 
dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every 
other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and 
taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments 
for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, 
the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in 
dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all 
the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing 
the force, of the people.... [There is also an] inequality of fortunes, 
and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and ... 
degeneracy of manners and of morals.... No nation could preserve 
its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."

The second way to use a standing army to impose tyranny was the 
direct one - the use of troops to establish order and obedience 
among the citizenry. Ordinarily, if a government has no huge 
standing army at its disposal, many people will choose to violate 
immoral laws that always come with a tyrannical regime; that is, they 
engage in what is commonly known as "civil disobedience" - the 
disobedience to immoral laws. But as the Chinese people 
discovered at Tiananmen Square, when the government has a 
standing army to enforce its will, civil disobedience becomes much 
more problematic. 
 
Consider again the words of Madison: 
 
A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long 
be safe companions to liberty. The means of defence agst. foreign 
danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. 
Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, 
whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the 
armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved the 
people. The idea is that governments use their armies to produce 
the enemies, then scare the people with cries that the barbarians 
are at the gates, and then claim that war is necessary to put down 
the barbarians. With all this, needless to say, comes increased 
governmental power over the people. 
 
Sound familiar? 
 
 
The Founding Fathers 
 
Here is how Henry St. George Tucker put it in Blackstone's 1768 
Commentaries on the Laws of England: 
 
 
Wherever standing armies are kept up, and when the right of the 
people to keep and bear arms is, under any color or pretext 
whatsoever, prohibited, liberty, if not already annihilated, is on the 
brink of destruction. Virginian Patrick Henry pointed out the difficulty 
associated with violent resistance to tyranny when a standing army 
is enforcing the orders of the government: 
 
A standing army we shall have, also, to execute the execrable 
commands of tyranny; and how are you to punish them? Will you 
order them to be punished? Who shall obey these orders? Will your 
mace-bearer be a match for a disciplined regiment? When the 
Commonwealth of Virginia ratified the Constitution in 1788, its 
concern over standing armies mirrored that of Patrick Henry: 
 
... that standing armies in time of peace are dangerous to liberty, 
and therefore ought to be avoided, as far as the circumstances and 
protection of the community will admit; and that in all cases the 
military should be under strict subordination to and governed by the 
civil power. Virginia's concern was expressed by North Carolina, 
which stated in its Declaration of Rights in 1776, 
 
that the people have a Right to bear Arms for the Defence of the 
State, and as Standing Armies in Time of Peace are dangerous to 
Liberty, they ought not to be kept up, and that the military should be 
kept under strict Subordination to, and governed by the Civil Power. 
The Pennsylvania Convention repeated that principle: 
 
... as standing armies in time of peace are dangerous to liberty, they 
ought not to be kept up; and that the military shall be kept under 
strict subordination to and be governed by the civil power. The U.S. 
State Department's own website describes the convictions of the 
Founding Fathers regarding standing armies: 
 
Wrenching memories of the Old World lingered in the 13 original 
English colonies along the eastern seaboard of North America, 
giving rise to deep opposition to the maintenance of a standing army 
in time of peace. All too often the standing armies of Europe were 
regarded as, at best, a rationale for imposing high taxes, and, at 
worst, a means to control the civilian population and extort its 
wealth. In fact, as Roy G. Weatherup pointed out in his excellent 
article, "Standing Armies and Armed Citizens: A Historical Analysis 
of the Second Amendment" (www.saf.org/journal/ 1_stand.html), the 
abuses of their government's standing army was one of the primary 
reasons that the British colonists took up arms against that army in 
1776: 
 
[The Declaration of Independence] listed the colonists' grievances, 
including the presence of standing armies, subordination of civil to 
military power, use of foreign mercenary soldiers, quartering of 
troops, and the use of the royal prerogative to suspend laws and 
charters. All of these legal actions resulted from reliance on 
standing armies in place of the militia. Moreover, as William S. 
Fields and David T. Hardy point out in their excellent article, "The 
Third Amendment and the Issue of the Maintenance of Standing 
Armies: A Legal History" 
(www.saf.org/LawReviews/FieldsAnd Hardy2.html), the deep 
antipathy that the Founders had toward standing armies followed a 
long tradition among the British people of opposing the standing 
armies of their king: 
 
The experience of the early Middle Ages had instilled in the English 
people a deep aversion to the professional army, which they came 
to associate with oppressive taxes, and physical abuses of their 
persons and property (and corresponding fondness for their 
traditional institution the militia). This development was to have a 
profound effect on the development of civil rights in both England 
and the American colonies.... During the seventeenth century, 
problems associated with the involuntary quartering of soldiers and 
the maintenance of standing armies became crucial issues 
propelling the English nation toward civil war. 
 
Did the antipathy against standing armies mean that our ancestors 
were pacifists? On the contrary! After all, don't forget that they had 
only recently won a violent war against their own government and its 
enormous and powerful standing army. 
 
In their minds, the military bedrock of a free society lay not in an 
enormous standing army but rather in the concept of the citizen-
soldier - the person in ordinary life in civil society who is well-armed 
and well-trained in the use of weapons and who is always ready in 
times of deepest peril to come to the aid of his country - but only to 
defend against invasion and not to go overseas to wage wars of 
aggression or wars of "liberation." As John Quincy Adams put it in 
his July 4, 1821, address to Congress, America "does not go 
abroad, in search of monsters to destroy." 
 
 
U.S. foreign policy 
 
Are the ideas and principles of the Founding Fathers relevant 
today? They couldn't be more relevant. Many decades ago, 
President Dwight Eisenhower warned us about the growing power of 
the military-industrial complex in American life. Unfortunately, the 
American people failed to heed his warning. The result has been an 
ever-growing military cancer that is bringing death, ruin, shame, and 
economic disaster to our nation - just as our Founding Fathers said 
it would. 
 
More and more people are finally recognizing that the anger and 
hatred that foreigners have for the United States is rooted in morally 
bankrupt, deadly, and destructive foreign policies - policies that 
have been enforced by America's enormous standing military force. 
The resulting blow-back in terms of terrorist attacks, such as those 
on the World Trade Center in 
1993 and 2001, have been used as the excuse for waging more 
wars thousands of miles away, and those wars have produced even 
more anger and hatred, with the concomitant threat of even more 
terrorist counter-responses. All that, in turn, has provided the 
excuse for more foreign interventions, ever-increasing military 
budgets, consolidation of power, increasing taxes, and massive 
infringements on the civil liberties of the American people. 
 
It is not a coincidence that the president's indefinite detention and 
punishment of American citizens for suspected terrorist crimes 
without according them due process, habeas corpus, right to 
counsel, jury trials, freedom of speech, or other fundamental rights 
guaranteed by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are being 
enforced by the standing army that our ancestors warned us 
against. And make no mistake about it: Given orders of their 
commander in chief, especially in a "national security crisis," to 
establish "order" in America, U.S. soldiers will do the same thing 
that soldiers throughout history have done - they will obey the orders 
given to them. Just ask the survivors of the massacre at the Branch 
Davidian compound at Waco or the victims of rape and sex abuse 
at Abu Graib prison in Iraq or Jose Padilla, an American citizen who 
is currently in Pentagon custody, where he has been denied due 
process, habeas corpus, and other rights accorded by the U.S. 
Constitution. 
 
In determining the future direction of our nation, the choice is clear: 
Do we continue down the road of empire, standing armies, foreign 
wars and occupations, and sanctions and embargoes, along with 
the taxes, regulations, and loss of liberty that inevitably come with 
them? Do we continue a foreign policy, enforced by the U.S. 
military, that engenders ever-increasing anger and hatred among 
the people of the world, which then engenders violent "blowback" 
against Americans, which is in turn used to justify more of the same 
policies? 
 
Or do we change direction and move our nation in the direction of 
the vision of our Founding Fathers - toward liberty and the 
restoration of a republic to our nation - toward a society in which the 
government is limited to protecting the nation from invasion and 
barred from invading or attacking foreign nations - a world in which 
the United States is once again the model society for freedom, 
prosperity, peace, and harmony - a nation in which the Statue of 
Liberty once again becomes a shining beacon for those striving to 
escape the tyranny and oppression of their own governments? 
 
Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of 
Freedom Foundation. Send him email. 
 
This article was originally published in the September 
2004 edition of Freedom Daily.

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