Today’s homily comes to us (in a roundabout way) from Chuck Baldwin, the former 2004 Constitution Party vice presidential nominee, and a pastor whose recycled sermons kill time over a handful of AM stations in the Deep South. Chuck, who calls himself “Dr. Baldwin” because he’s received two honorary degrees, also claims in his RenewAmerica bio that he’s “the host of Chuck Baldwin Live, a daily, two hour long radio call-in show on the events of the day,” although if you actually go to chuckbaldwinlive.com, you’ll see that:
Chuck Baldwin Live” aired its first program on August 1, 1994. The broadcast originated as a Radio Talk Show and continued in that capacity for eight years. The current format of the show features a recording of Dr. Baldwin’s sermons and commentaries.
In keeping with this loose approach to advertising claims, today’s sermon isn’t actually by “Dr.” Baldwin, it’s written by his son, Timothy, “an attorney who received his Juris Doctor degree from Cumberland School of Law in Birmingham, Alabama. He is a former prosecutor for the Florida State Attorney’s Office and now owns his own private law practice. He is married to the former Miss Jennifer Hanssen.” I’d complain about the bait-and-switch, but the only chores my Dad ever made me do were to take out the trash and mow the lawn, so I figure Tim has suffered enough.
On July 10, 2009, Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin became the second governor in these States United (Governor Phil Bredesen of Tennessee is the other one) to sign into effect a State Sovereignty Resolution. (See http://www.tenthamendmentcenter.com ). These Sovereignty-type bills, resolutions and laws are an obvious and rightful response that the super-majority of the States in the Union is expressing to and against the usurping powers of the federal government.
On the one hand, I feel obliged to note that two out of fifty doesn’t constitute a majority, let alone a super-majority; on the other hand, this is the kind of thing you always get when Bil Keane lets Billy draw the strip.
While the effects of federal tyranny are being felt more seriously than ever, history and human nature prove that the people of a society do not respond or revolt immediately against tyranny —
Most societies will wait at least a half an hour after eating before going revolting, so they don’t get a cramp.
Fortunately, the sleeping giant is being awakened, to the dismay of our Centralist-worshipers today.
Not to mention the dismay of the giant, who’d hoped to skip church this morning and sleep in.
[T]he Constitution of the United States of America was a compact assented to by the individual Sovereign States of America, and that the Federal government’s authority only extended to the specific and enumerated grants acceded to it by the sovereigns of each State. It was not until 1861 that this understanding of Constitutional government and State Sovereignty was seriously challenged.
You mean when Lincoln objected to the slave states seceding from the Union and setting up their own He-Man Yankee & Manumission Haters Club?
Oh oh…!
Since the Reconstruction period after the War Between the States…
Really? You’re really gonna go there, huh?
…the philosophical acknowledgements of what State Sovereignty means, implies and mandates has been flipped on its head, to where the States seem to believe that they are powerless over the demands of the federal government.
Well maybe you should start another war. You’ve got all the guns, you might actually win this one, and then you could flip it all back.
This concept is completely contrary to the original principles of our Confederated Republic, which was overwhelmingly acknowledged from 1787 to 1860.
Just like it says in the founding document of our Confederated Republic, the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union. Anyway, Timothy gasses on about states rights and state sovereignty through three or four stentorian paragraphs that make me think we interrupted him in the middle of his John C. Calhoun cosplay session. Then he cites Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens’ history of the Civil War — sorry — “the Late War Between the States,” because if there’s anyone with an unbiased view of civil and human rights, it’s the author of the Cornerstone speech (“Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition”).
While few are advocating secession (at least not yet), the battle for State Sovereignty against Federal usurpation and expansionism has clearly begun. Americans should not fear the movement for State Sovereignty. Rather, we should embrace it; because it is the only saving grace and vehicle for freedom left in this Confederate Republic we call the United States of America. Unless we stand for State Sovereignty, freedom will most certainly fall.
I’m sure Timothy’s convictions are sincere, and it was only his busy schedule that kept him from bringing all this up while the White Guy was still in charge.