When all government, in little as in great things, shall be drawn to Washington as the Center of all power, it will render powerless the checks provided of one government on another and will become as venal and oppressive as the government from which we separated. ~ Thomas Jefferson
If Mitt Romney becomes the Republican presidential nominee, he needs to sound more like Thomas Jefferson than Mr. Rogers. Hope and change haven’t brought a beautiful day in this neighborhood.
The Founders were brilliant political strategists who didn’t need focus groups to tell them that their fellow patriots wouldn’t be inspired to pledge their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to “throw off” a “nice guy who was just in over his head,” as Romney repeatedly refers to President Obama.
Civilized gentlemen of unwavering conviction were not above using condemnation to communicate the truth about King George and his tyrannical government. The Founders knew that insipid slogans would never carry the day.
Jefferson and the 55 co-signers of the Declaration railed against the “evils” committed by King George III. They inspired a revolution against the most powerful nation on Earth through the power of the pen?no radio, television, Internet, Facebook, Twitter, iPhones, or hiding behind tough talk by super PACs and surrogates. It was the Founders’ words in their names, sealing their own death warrants.
They laid out the substantive case against the King in 1,323 elegant, inspirational, compelling and radical words that birthed this nation. The King’s abuses of our God-given unalienable rights required more than moderate words:
• “A Tyrant … unfit to be the ruler of a free people”
• “A long train of abuses and Usurpations”
• “Destructive”
• “Evil”
• “Absolute Despotism”
• “A history of repeated injuries and usurpations”
• “Absolute tyranny”
Romney should emulate the Founders by stressing the similarities between the King’s “long train of abuses” and those of President Obama:
• “He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.”
o Obama’s Department of Justice refused to prosecute armed thugs from the New Black Panther Party who violated federal law by intimidating voters at a Philadelphia polling place on the day Obama was elected.
o Obama has sued to stop enforcement of immigration enforcement laws enacted by Arizona, South Carolina, Alabama, and Utah.
o Obama’s Department of Justice has launched a war against state voter ID Laws, as documented by the American Civil Rights Union. The DOJ has sued to stop enforcement of laws enacted by South Carolina and Texas despite a Supreme Court ruling in 2008 upholding an Indiana law requiring a photo ID to vote.
• “He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.”
o Obama appointed approximately 47 czars without congressional confirmation or accountability
o Obama created a myriad of new federal agencies, boards and commissions under ObamaCare, according to the Congressional Research Service.
o Obama issued executive orders exceeding his constitutional authority, such as his order to develop a scheme for oversight of oceans and their resources.
• “He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation.”
o Obama’s Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta informed a Senate committee that the administration “would seek an international legal basis,” such as approval by NATO or the UN, to engage in military action in Syria, but that it does not need congressional approval for military action.
o Obama’s Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in her report to the UN included a legal challenge by U.S. Department of Justice to Arizona's SB-1070 immigration law as of one the ways the U.S. was protecting human rights.
o The Obama Administration is pursuing a renewed relationship with international tribunals and other international bodies, including the International Criminal Court, without a constitutionally ratified treaty authorizing the relationship.
• “Taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments.”
o Obama is forcing individuals to contract with a private party to purchase government-approved health care insurance against their will in violation of the 10th Amendment.
o Obama is nullifying the religion clauses of the First Amendment to the Constitution by forcing private employers to provide employees with insurance coverage for practices that violate the employer’s conscientious beliefs, including abortifacients, sterilization and contraceptives.
o Obama’s Equal Opportunity Employment Commission counsel argued in the U.S. Supreme Court that there is no special protection for clergy in our Constitution.” A unanimous Court in Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission refused “to accept the remarkable view that the Religion Clauses have nothing to say about a religious organization's freedom to select its own ministers."
o Obama’s Attorney General Eric Holder refuses to defend a federal statute, the Defense of Marriage Act, claiming it is unconstitutional.
o Nine State Attorneys General have accused the Obama administration of using federal agencies to circumvent federal law: “Whether it is through the EPA, NLRB, Office of Surface Mining, FCC or other entities, the Obama Administration has aggressively used administrative agencies to implement policy objectives that cannot gain congressional approval and are outside of the law.”
o Obama usurped the constitutional authority of the Senate by making appointments to federal agencies without advice and consent of the Senate.
• “He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us.”
o Obama endorsed the OWS movement, and his failure to condemn its violent civil disobedience and destruction of private property has encouraged further unlawful behavior.
“Nice guys” get second chances?Obama must not. Making the case against a tyrannical king or the most radical president in U.S. history cannot be entrusted to faint-hearted moderates. Jan LaRue is senior legal analyst with the American Civil Rights Union.