ClayBarham
08-17-2007, 09:19 PM
Throughout the history of man on earth, the many always ruled the few. It was always Government ON the people, not OF the people, BY the people and FOR the people, to use Abraham Lincoln’s words. The few strongest and wealthiest ruled and subjugated the people. Government has always been a top-down sort of organization, much like any corporation. It was tradition, habit, expected and assumed always to be the case. It began with the family structure. Father always knew best. It expanded for reasons of survival, where people would huddle in extended families called tribes, each with their chief to manage and coordinate the needs of the tribe. No one argued about it.
As the tribe expanded, they grew into nationhood. Rule by kings and royal families became accepted. The kings were treated as gods to whom ordinary people kneeled and bowed, out of respect and recognition of their lower position. Enlightenment movements looked forward to society ruled by a more moderate, temperate, just and understanding monarch. It was the intellectual wish for a good king. It was the extension of a fairy tale. The prince relates with the king’s subjects and marries a girl from the ranks, later becoming a good king with a more compassionate queen. Anything other than that was anarchy, something that struck fear into the hearts of all. How could a society operate with no leader any more than a ship could navigate troubled waters without a captain? How could any corporation today exist without a CEO? It was unthinkable, and still is in most of this world.
What happens if you convince a group of people that God is not mortal? Then, convince each that God has given all men and women the ability to manage their own lives. He gave them many different talents, skills, interests and aspirations. He has given them moral rules, regulations as boundaries of behavior. Then, He sets them loose on an island to test their gifts and powers. What would happen? Would they survive, multiply, grow and sustain themselves without reverting to subjugation by a mortal God? Would the strongest among them rise up, beat back anyone who resists, and take command of the community, setting himself up as the new God on earth? Or, would the community band together and reject anyone’s attempt to impose a dictatorship on them all?
This actually happened. In 1620, a small band of Christians landed on the shores of New England and took up residence, establishing a community ruled by God in Heaven, of the Bible, rather than one on earth. They threw off the communal organizational yoke they had agreed upon initially, and began acting on their own. Their first order of business was survival in a hostile land.
Following that was using their respective God-given talents in agriculture, building and inventing the tools needed to produce sufficient goods for use and trade. The quality of their own decision-making provided successful economic growth in their communities and between other settlements. They governed themselves by incorporating their towns, cities and beyond to counties and electing officers and magistrates to handle disputes between them, their neighbors and indigenous peoples. The officers were limited to certain functions and served the community, rather than leading it. They began local and democratic government, of the people, by the people and for the people, with no room for a dictator or ruler of any kind. Their enormous economic growth, freedom to try, to succeed or fail, to learn and apply each man and woman’s abilities, was a great testament to the gifts God gave each person, and the power to rule themselves.
I described America, the New World. It was the New World because men and women were free of all mortal rulers, and answered only to a God in Heaven instead. They grew and produced a nation founded on individual freedom, the liberty to pursue their own interests and aspirations, using their own skills and talents. Americans, living this way, proved that man was not created to be ruled or coerced by other men, at an age of maturity.
Unfortunately, the tradition of rule of the many by the few is immigrating into America. It threatens to replace God in Heaven with a powerful few in Washington, D.C. No longer are men and women viewed as responsible and capable, without expert leadership. The titles are yet to appear, of kings, queens, emperors and dictators, but that will follow. The compassionate and understanding liberals are ready to replace God and the Bible with their own rules and regulations on how Americans will live and work. Americans are poised to vote for it in 2008. What a sad day for the world, when government of the people, by the people and for the people is replaced again with on the people.
As the tribe expanded, they grew into nationhood. Rule by kings and royal families became accepted. The kings were treated as gods to whom ordinary people kneeled and bowed, out of respect and recognition of their lower position. Enlightenment movements looked forward to society ruled by a more moderate, temperate, just and understanding monarch. It was the intellectual wish for a good king. It was the extension of a fairy tale. The prince relates with the king’s subjects and marries a girl from the ranks, later becoming a good king with a more compassionate queen. Anything other than that was anarchy, something that struck fear into the hearts of all. How could a society operate with no leader any more than a ship could navigate troubled waters without a captain? How could any corporation today exist without a CEO? It was unthinkable, and still is in most of this world.
What happens if you convince a group of people that God is not mortal? Then, convince each that God has given all men and women the ability to manage their own lives. He gave them many different talents, skills, interests and aspirations. He has given them moral rules, regulations as boundaries of behavior. Then, He sets them loose on an island to test their gifts and powers. What would happen? Would they survive, multiply, grow and sustain themselves without reverting to subjugation by a mortal God? Would the strongest among them rise up, beat back anyone who resists, and take command of the community, setting himself up as the new God on earth? Or, would the community band together and reject anyone’s attempt to impose a dictatorship on them all?
This actually happened. In 1620, a small band of Christians landed on the shores of New England and took up residence, establishing a community ruled by God in Heaven, of the Bible, rather than one on earth. They threw off the communal organizational yoke they had agreed upon initially, and began acting on their own. Their first order of business was survival in a hostile land.
Following that was using their respective God-given talents in agriculture, building and inventing the tools needed to produce sufficient goods for use and trade. The quality of their own decision-making provided successful economic growth in their communities and between other settlements. They governed themselves by incorporating their towns, cities and beyond to counties and electing officers and magistrates to handle disputes between them, their neighbors and indigenous peoples. The officers were limited to certain functions and served the community, rather than leading it. They began local and democratic government, of the people, by the people and for the people, with no room for a dictator or ruler of any kind. Their enormous economic growth, freedom to try, to succeed or fail, to learn and apply each man and woman’s abilities, was a great testament to the gifts God gave each person, and the power to rule themselves.
I described America, the New World. It was the New World because men and women were free of all mortal rulers, and answered only to a God in Heaven instead. They grew and produced a nation founded on individual freedom, the liberty to pursue their own interests and aspirations, using their own skills and talents. Americans, living this way, proved that man was not created to be ruled or coerced by other men, at an age of maturity.
Unfortunately, the tradition of rule of the many by the few is immigrating into America. It threatens to replace God in Heaven with a powerful few in Washington, D.C. No longer are men and women viewed as responsible and capable, without expert leadership. The titles are yet to appear, of kings, queens, emperors and dictators, but that will follow. The compassionate and understanding liberals are ready to replace God and the Bible with their own rules and regulations on how Americans will live and work. Americans are poised to vote for it in 2008. What a sad day for the world, when government of the people, by the people and for the people is replaced again with on the people.