Voting has been much on many people's minds of late, especially given the recent presidential election, about which much was written.  One of the reasons that the presidential contest was so close was widespread vote fraud, mostly by the incumbent party.  Without  the support of the dead, multiple votes by people at multiple addresses, and the support of many of the more than 12 million illegal residents, I doubt the contest would have been remotely close.  When you add the large numbers of barely literate or functionally illliterate voters, the situation gets still worse.  So what ought to be done about this situation?

Clearly, enforcement of laws against illegal voting ought to be at the top of every freedom lover's list, but illegal voters are only part of the problem.  There are also those who are what may charitably be called 'low-information' voters, those who will cheerfully cast their ballot for whichever candidate promises them the largest amount of unearned swag.  How did we get to this pass?

It has been widely accepted in these presently united States that voting is a right, or at least the Left states that it is a right, and that the right to vote is one of the essential basic rights of human beings.  In many respects, the right to vote is a sacred cow that few dare to kick. I have no doubt, however, that allowing any and everyone to vote is arguably another one of the reasons why these presently united States are in such dire straits, nor am I alone in my thinking.  Alexis De Tocqueville warned of the dangers of unfettered democracy, and the Founders knew it well.  Robert Heinlein, author and inventor, warned of the dangers of allowing everyone to vote.  Just to remind you, O Gentle Reader, this nation, these presently united States, was constituted as a representative Constitutional Republic, not a democracy.  So, let us proceed to boot the sacred bovine and see what sort of wisdom or insight we can acquire in the event!

Remember the first question one ought always to ask- "What is the essential function of government?"  To protect individual rights.  Question-  Is voting, in and of itself, in fact a primary individual right?  Recently, the (occasional) resident of the Spite House has attempted to allow illegal immigrants to have the vote. If voting is a basic human right, that might be a defensible position; more on this shortly.  Another question- Who benefits from unrestricted voting? Clearly, the less productive members of a culture, whether they are the ruling class who hold political power because of the vote, or those dependent on government largesse, benefit from the power of the vote through legal means which take wealth from the productive, but there is more to voting than that.

While you are pondering those questions, how has voting been carried out in the past?  During my research on this topic, it's become clear, unsurprisingly, that voting is largely carried out using the technology of the time. There is a good website that touches on the topic HERE.  Whether by colored balls, hand-written paper ballots, preprinted party tickets, government printed secret ballots (the Australian secret ballot), or modern electronic voting machines, voting has been a part of Western civilization for centuries.

Before we tackle the main issue, let's think a bit about the whole idea of voting.  Why does it matter?  (Many will tell you that it does not. The narrow margins in the recent elections for President and many local offices argue otherwise.)  What does voting do? 

Voting matters because it ultimately is about using the coercive power of the state to require  or forbid individual action, to define the limits of the personal action of otherwise free people, or to limit and define the power of government. It is about making laws, in theory, at least, within the limits of what the State is allowed to do by both the Federal and State constitutions and the common law. Voting selects those who are supposed to represent us, and also can directly change the laws through ballot measures and the like.

But is it a right?  Lots of things in this culture at present are CALLED rights; many are not.  For example, health care is erroneously called a right, likewise, employment and many other things which are NOT individual rights. What did Ayn Rand, champion of individual rights, have to say on this subject?

'“Rights” are a moral concept—the concept that provides a logical transition from the principles guiding an individual’s actions to the principles guiding his relationship with others—the concept that preserves and protects individual morality in a social context—the link between the moral code of a man and the legal code of a society, between ethics and politics. Individual rights are the means of subordinating society to moral law.' (from "the Virtue of Selfishness" p92 by Ayn Rand) 

She goes on to say on page 93- "A 'right' is a moral principle defining and sanctioning a man’s freedom of action in a social context. There is only one fundamental right (all the others are its consequences or corollaries): a man’s right to his own life. Life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action; the right to life means the right to engage in self-sustaining and self-generated action—which means: the freedom to take all the actions required by the nature of a rational being for the support, the furtherance, the fulfillment and the enjoyment of his own life. (Such is the meaning of the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.)

The concept of a 'right' pertains only to action—specifically, to freedom of action. It means freedom from physical compulsion, coercion or interference by other men.

Thus, for every individual, a right is the moral sanction of a positive—of his freedom to act on his own judgment, for his own goals, by his own voluntary, uncoerced choice. As to his neighbors, his rights impose no obligations on them except of a negative kind: to abstain from violating his rights.

The right to life is the source of all rights—and the right to property is their only implementation. Without property rights, no other rights are possible. Since man has to sustain his life by his own effort, the man who has no right to the product of his effort has no means to sustain his life. The man who produces while others dispose of his product, is a slave. Bear in mind that the right to property is a right to action, like all the others: it is not the right to an object, but to the action and the consequences of producing or earning that object. It is not a guarantee that a man will earn any property, but only a guarantee that he will own it if he earns it. It is the right to gain, to keep, to use and to dispose of material values."  So that is what Rand has said about rights.

So if the primary function of legitimate government is to protect individual rights, which means, first and foremost, to protect the right to private property, how does voting become a right?  Does the freedom to own your life and the fruits of your labor include the right of choosing your political representatives?  We supposedly live in a constitutional republic, wherein the government is forbidden to do anything that violates individual rights, or anything  else for that matter, except that which is specifically permitted, and the people are free to do as they wish, except where constrained by the rights of others. Voting cannot, or at least should not, infringe upon anyone's rights in such a system.  Any such collective action which DOES infringe on actual individual rights would be struck down, at least in a just society with legitimate government.

Historically, both here in these presently united States, and elsewhere, various polities have restricted voting along various lines, by sex, race, education, and economic condition.  This began to change here after the War between the States.  The 15th Amendment, the last of the Reconstruction Amendments ratified in 1870, defined voting as a right and removed race as a criterion, but retained the prohibition against female voting, and continued to allow States to impose literacy tests and economic qualifications for voting. While some Western states allowed women to vote after the War of Northern Aggression, women did not get the vote nationwide until the passage of the 19th Amendment in 1920.  The 19th amendment reads "The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation."

This is interesting. Both the 15th and 19th Amendments do identify voting as a right, and forbids restriction of voting based on sex, but do not forbid other constraints on voting.  In fact, a variety of restraints on this 'right' exist-  if you are not a citizen of the US, you are not supposed to vote.  Convicted felons lose their 'right' to vote.  In the past, the franchise was limited to property owners, business owners, and journeymen tradesmen; there were also requirements that voters be literate.  Many of the literacy laws were part of Jim Crow efforts to prevent former slaves from exercising the franchise, but other similar restrictions antedated the Reconstruction era. Young people don't have the 'right' to vote;  it used to be that you had to be 21 to vote, now the age is 18. We don't allow corporations to vote, although legally they are considered 'persons' and can own property. 

Of course, people vote for infringements of their rights all the time, which argues strongly for a better class of voter.  And here we are again.  Is voting an unlimited individual right?

Historically, clearly the answer is 'No'.  Voting was constrained by the Founders to those who they saw had both the ability to comprehend the issues, and a significant stake in society.

Morally, again the answer is no.  Voting, insofar as it stays within the limits imposed on Government by a Constitutional Republic, has no ability to touch individual rights, and is therefore not a right, but rather a privilege. When voting degenerates to the point that it is used as a vehicle to enrich the wealthy through robbing the productive, it is a violation of individual right, not a validation.  Voting is using the power of the State to enact laws, and therefore has the potential to both violate rights and to enforce them, depending on the legislation.

From a practical standpoint, extending the franchise to the culturally illiterate  has been a disaster for these presently united States.  It is time to re cognize this and to try for something different, and hopefully better.

More anon,

With regard to all who serve the Light,
Historian


 

In my younger days, I spent a fair amount of spare time, back when I had such, playing computer games.  My two favourites were Civilization, and Railroad Tycoon.  While Railroad Tycoon taught valuable lessons in economics, Civilization, in particular, hammered home the idea that civilization had basic concepts that were prerequisites for further advances, and this was as true for types of government as it was for technological advances.  While the biases of the designers,  especially in later versions of Civilization, (combined with increasing demands on my time) eventually annoyed me to the point that I stopped playing the game, Civilization really brought home to me how much of what we enjoy today is founded upon intellectual and cultural developments decades, centuries or even millenia old.  Technology and politics interact in many ways and are symbiotic.

Just as a sample, consider how you would conduct a secret ballot while ensuring that only those who are eligible actually voted.  What is required?  Here is my starter list (Note that there are peripheral technologies I am not listing):

• You need writing implements, say a pencil or a pen;
• you need inexpensive widely available paper;
• you need a building in which to hold the election, or at least a tent to protect the ballots from inclement weather.  Buildings require a host of technologies and trade knowlege, ranging from foundations to masonry, woodworking, plumbing, heating, windowmaking and others;
• you need tables, and probably chairs, too.  These require a whole host of wood and metal working technologies, including but not limited to board making and smoothing, drilling, sawing, gluing and fastening, etc., etc.;
• a flat floor is pretty nice to have, so your tables don't rock;  this could be brick, concrete, or plank floors, either split and adzed or sawn lumber.  You also need a means to determine whether the floor is flat or level.  This means a long straight edge, or the ability to make string, and a bubble level, engineer's level or plumb bob and square;
• You need universal or near universal literacy, at least among the voters, if the ballots are written.  This takes books, (printing, cheap paper again and binding technologies,) teachers, librarians, and a way to teach people to read and write;
• You need printing, to produce identical ballots in quantity, or a lot of scribes and someone to check the work being done by the scribes;
• You need a list of who is eligible, from records of who has registered to vote.  This means technologies for record-keeping and record FINDING and organization, among others.
• We need people who are wealthy enough to have the time to spend to go and vote.
• The culture needs to be well-ordered and peaceful enough for people to be able to leave home long enough to get to the polls and back with little concern for the safety of themselves and their possessions;
• Voters have to have transportation to get to the polls.
• Lastly, there needs to be a certain level of trust and honesty in the culture, as well as mechanisms to verify that the voting process has been carried out impartially.  There has to be confidence that the system is more or less accurately reporting the results of the vote.

All of this and so much more besides for the relatively simple act of casting one's vote. One can begin to grasp how dependent voting is on high productivity;  Voting in a mass democracy would be too expensive without capitalism. 

So, with the above example in mind, what developments are required to support individual liberty?  While many of the prerequisites are intellectual, some are also technological.

Well, first off, there has to be recognition of the existence of individuals.  Ayn Rand examined this in detail in her novella "Anthem."  There needs to be a concept of what liberty is, and what individual rights are.  Property rights especially, the right to personal property is the foundation of civilization, in many respects.  There is a technological piece to this, too;  the individual needs to have weapons that allow him to defend those rights. 

The Welsh longbow was one of the seminal technologies that promoted the growth of liberty in England, for the longbow, relatively inexpensive, could defeat medieval armor and skewer an abusive aristocrat from a long distance.  The modern equivalent is the magazine fed self-loading rifle, which allows a trained individual to deliver a lethal blow up to 500 yards or more away.

But without the will to fight, possessing the means is useless.  The first battle in the American revolution was won by Thomas Paine, when he published "Common Sense" in January of 1776.  Until that point, despite the battles in Massachusetts in 1775, most colonists considered themselves Englishmen, who were being abused by a corrupt Parliament.  Paine's pamphlet, which printed over 100,000 copies in the first year (some estimates go as high as 500,000 copies over 25 editions) in a total population of about 2.4 million, of whom about 400-500 thousand were slaves. 

Before "Common Sense," the vast majority of Americans were aggrieved English colonials, interested mainly in getting the English government to treat them as Englishmen ought to be treated.  Afterwards, about a third of the colonial population favored separation from England. Without Thomas Paine helping to win the war of ideas, the subsequent military victories would not have happened.  The population would not have supported these actions.

QED, universal literacy and developing the ability to acquire knowledge outside of one's immediate environment is, if not essential to Liberty, very highly desireable.  Communication technologies are critical as well, to develop and promote individual rights and freedoms, and to engage in intellectual discourse and debate nationwide.  It is no accident that the invention of the printing press toward the tail end of the Renaissance preceded the Enlightenment.  Increased literacy resulting from the Renaissance created a demand for improved bookmaking technology.  Once printing made books affordable, then literacy increased further, leading among other things, to postal services.  Having common people able to read, understand complex issues and correspond with others outside of their city or village fertilized the development of the Enlightenment, which in turn fostered more and better means to write and record ideas, witness the computer I am using this moment to write this post.

So what else is essential to liberty?   I would argue that a culture that promotes individual self-reliance and hardihood is critical. Entitlement culture breeds slaves, not free men.  American independence did not spring newborn from the soil of the New World;  American independence was the child of English freedom, which in turn had its roots in Viking tradition, among other origins.  Planted in the New World, the rights of Englishmen, under the rule of a far-distant king, flowered into something new and different, something altogether American.  While Tom Paine's "Common Sense" sparked the Revolution, that spark would in turn not have burst into flame if it had not landed in tinder created by 200 years of English law and tradition transported to a remote land that required colonial people to develop their own traditions of self-rule.

Part of creating such a culture is allowing people the freedom to fail;  probably the most devastating blow struck by the forces of tyranny against American culture is the creation of the Entitlement culture, and placing the yoke of supporting it over the shoulders of the productive minority.  Reality can teach valuable lessons, if it is allowed to do so;  the longer these lessons are avoided, the more painful they will be when they can no longer be dodged.

But that is another article for another day; this has gone on longer than I originally contemplated, but I wanted to record my thoughts and see what comments you, O gentle reader, might come up with in response.

To be continued-

With regard to all who seek the Light.

Historian

   

In late 1908, a modest federal agency was started at the direction of the Progressive President of these united States in office at the time, Theodore Roosevelt.  It was known as the Bureau of Investigation, and was ostensibly created to enable the enforcement of regulations on interstate commerce, but in reality was an effort to exert closer control over Eastern European immigrants.  These folks had an alarming propensity to believe in individual liberty and took exception to the Progressive efforts to establish an American ruling class supported by a mechantilist economy.

The Justice Department did not have a separate enforcement arm at that time and this lack of field agents resulted in an inability of the Justice Department to extend their un-Constitutional attempts at over-reach.  This, of course, was not to be tolerated, and so Roosevelt used the power of the Presidency to create the first American secret police agency.  Sound familiar?  (Another lasting legacy, still more deadly than this piece of Progressive paranoia, was the establishment of centrally directed State funded public schools, and the destruction of the rich mix of educational options that had been part of American culture.  See John Taylor Gatto's "The Underground History of American Education" for more information.)  Roosevelt had no basis in the Constitution or the law to create such an agency, but he had a pen, and a bully pulpit.  (sound familiar?)  Eventually, Congress more or less recognized this arrogation of power by Teddy the First, and it began to grow, entwining itself into the American body politic, like many another governmental tumor.

At any rate, in 1924, after service with the Bureau and related agencies, J. Edgar Hoover was appointed head of the Bureau, renamed in 1935 as the FEDERAL Bureau of Investigation.  From the date of his appointment as Director until he died, Hoover relentless pursued two goals;  ensuring that he remained Director, and ensuring that the Bureau got all the funding he wanted.  He did this in a logical manner, by compiling detailed files on hundreds of thousands of Americans.  Every day, hundreds, and later thousands of field agents walked the streets of America, meticulously compiling facts and details about the daily lives of local people, especially those seeking political office. 

Hoover knew that, just like an egg-sucking dog, once a politician gets a good taste of the largesse available to a 'public servant,' it's hard to break the two-fold addiction of power and money offered by political office, and he also knew that like most addicts, politicians are prone to errors in judgment.  As the opportunities presented themselves over the years, Hoover's files, documenting in detail those errors, became more and more comprehensive, and as the politicians who starred in those files became more and more powerful, so did Hoover.  Several Presidents complained that Hoover spent more time on domestic intelligence gathering than on actual investigation of criminal activity, but none were able to make Hoover actually obey the orders of the chief executive, his putative superior. Neither politicians nor presidents dared to offend or threaten Hoover or the Bureau, for fear of the information contained in Hoover's files, the poisoned fruit of decades of patient snooping and spying.  Hoover was a power unto himself.

Upon Hoover's death, his detailed files, almost 50 years worth of documentation of potentially career-ending information about a large number of people, were destroyed, or so we are led to believe.  A great many politicians and other people heaved a sigh of relief, in the mistaken belief that the era of the tail of the Justice department wagging the dog of Government was over.  But there were those in the Executive branch, especially in the Intelligence services and the permanent bureaucracy, the fourth branch of government,  who remembered the lessons of Hoover's files.  When the opportunity arose to once again apply those lessons, they took full advantage, but we did not find out about it for years.

In 2013, however, we learned that at least one agency of the federal government of these presently united States has been collecting information on Americans for at least 15 years and probably longer, scavenging every telephone call, every email, penetrating encryption through backdoors in both hardware and software in targeted computers, and exposing all electronic communication to the relentless gaze of the federal government.  Most if not all electronic communication for at least the last 15 years has been penetrated.

Think about that for a moment.  Every prominent person or political figure of any sort can expect that ALL of their email and telephone communications have been monitored, and subjected to analysis.  Just as in Hoover's day, special attention is being paid to those seeking political office.  I wonder what sorts of embarrassing tidbits the Feds  turned up on Speaker Boehner?  On the other leaders of the so-called opposition?  Why do you suppose that there has been no meaningful opposition to the avalanche of totalitarian collectivism to which we have been subject these past five years?  Imagine what sort of leverage having access to the secrets of the wealthy and powerful would give you, and imagine how a power-junkie would react when threatened with being cut off cold turkey.

Think about this, too:  with all of this surveillance, and with all of the information being given to intelligence agencies and law enforcement agencies, how many terrorist acts did the intelligence community actually stop? 

None.  Not one.  They have admitted it. 

How is it that mass murders like Columbine went unstopped?  With all the data available, where were our supposed defenders looking?  The justification used for these unconscionable and utterly unConstitutional invasions of our rights has been national security.  What security has the creation of this monstrous police state brought to the people?  The government may think it is more secure, and their merchantilist lackeys may think that they have been able to suppress the people, but are we, the common people of these presently united States actually safer?

In fact, we are arguably less secure, because the encryption systems supposed to protect us from the real threats out there, and they do exist, have been violated by those who are supposed to protect us.  The attack on our cyber defenses by our own government has made it easier for our enemies to attack us.  This Progressive paranoia has perverted our putative protectors, and the perversion has been going on for a long time.  (Keep in mind that Abraham Lincoln had the Maryland State Legislature placed under house arrest for two years because he suspected that they would exercise their entirely Constitutional right to secede from the Union.)

So what to do?

First off, remember the Iron Law of Bureaucracy.  The Fourth Branch is fighting for survival and if you become sufficiently annoying or actively threatening to the powers that be, you will be dealt with.  Just ask Vince Foster.  Oh, wait..... So, be careful out there.

Second, be aware, O gentle reader, that you are being watched.  The simple fact that you have come here and read what I have written is sufficient to make you a suspect.  You are guilty, in the eyes of the Progressives, of being an Enemy of the State.  Follow that thought to its logical conclusion, keeping in mind the nature of your enemy, and take the needed precautions.  The question is not whether or not you are being paranoid in so doing, the question is "Am I being paranoid enough?"

Third, establish alternate communications channels.  Meatspace, trusted courier, one-time pads, steganography, there are all sorts of ways to make life more difficult for the Eye of Sauron to see what you are doing.  The more people who pursue these alternates, the harder for the peeping Progressives to see anything.  Even better is if you can establish such communications without advertising it to the opposition.  The harder they have to work, the better.

Fourth, think of creative ways to monkeywrench.  Be cooperatively uncooperative.  There are innumerable possibilities; be creative.  I'm especially fond of the idea that if you cannot avoid creating information, create a LOT of information. 

Fifth,  shun the Feds.  All of them not specifically authorized by the Constitution.  Any person employed by the Federal government in a position or exercising an authority not specifically granted by the Constitution is illegitimate.

Sixth,  every intelligence officer has an emergency plan, usually two or three.  You should too.  PPPPPP, as the saying goes.

Lastly, at least for now, spread the word.  If we are to win this war of ideas we need to spread ours!

With regard to all who serve the Light,

Historian