7/28/10

When the government fears the people there is liberty; when the people fear the government there is tyranny.

~ Thomas Jefferson

In May 2009, a little over a year ago I wrote a cathartic article expressing my profound disappointment in the Republican Party titled: “I Can No Longer Remain in the GOP.” (http://www.wnd.com/index.php/index.php?fa=PAGE.printable&pageId=98936) Although I had been a Republican for 21 years since my grad school days at Harvard (ironically during the same time Barack Obama was there) what became the straw that broke the camel’s back for me was when I heard McCain aggressively state that the man he was running against (Barack Obama) would make an outstanding president and that conservatives out there who thought otherwise was just plain wrong.

At that moment I knew that the fix was in; that the GOP set up Senator John McCain as the fall guy in the face of the Democrats history-making nomination of the first Black president. Republicans were too afraid to put forth a candidate that could defeat this historical, messianic figure and cynically used Huckabee to thwart Mitt Romney’s much stronger candidacy.

Shortly after writing that article I received an offer from one of my long-time readers of my WorldNetDaily columns, Matt Charles, Chairman of the Marketing Committee of the American Conservative Party [ACP] to consider joining this organization. Recently Matt put me in touch with the Chairman of ACP, Butch Porter, who ironically told me of a similar ‘last straw’ situation we had regarding John McCain who during his second debate with Obama said America had to spend $300 billion on helping people refinance their mortgages.

To Porter’s credit instead of throwing a lamp through his TV screen he did something constructive to build the conservative movement and used his skills to help further a fledgling political party—the American Conservative Party—by starting its first State chapter in Virginia in February 2009, and becoming the national party's second elected Chairman. His purpose was “to bring people out from behind the computer” into the marketplace of ideas into the marketplace of ideas where the rubber meets the road. ACP’s modus operandi would be: Action over talk, practice over theory, trenchant conservative ideas over moribund GOP partisan politics. …The result?

18 months later the American Conservative Party is active in 28 states with 4 affiliates and approximately 1,300 members. ACP has had a very impressive beginning indeed. Their informative website can be found at: http://theamericanconservatives.org/

Butch Porter suggested that I visit the ACP website again and study its background, leadership and various platforms on the major issues which include:

• The ACP Creed

• The Principles of the ACP

• Authority of Government

• Limitations on Government

• Citizenship

• Citizen Responsibilities

• Global War on Terror and Iraq and Afghanistan

• Education

• Eminent Domain

• Immigration

• Taxes

What I found most striking to me were these words from the American Conservative Party’s platform:

Principles: Federalism and Social Issues

We reject the practice of using Government powers for any purpose of social engineering, and we uphold the principle that the individual is sovereign; where social conduct involves personal choices, the People are best served when those choices are embraced and defended at the family and community level.

If ACP can move the dialogue away from accepting liberal premises like the welfare state, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, public sector unionism, a $14 trillion dollar deficit among many other tyrannies as all being patently unconstitutional and immoral, and keep the emphasis of ACP’s mandate on the limited role of government, then I predict ACP will be a very relevant political organization for many years to come.

The critical importance and relevance of American government is to maintain not a “democracy” which the Framers considered a “mobocracy” and tyrannical, but in the words of Benjamin Franklin, “We have given you a Republic if you can keep it,” where inalienable rights held by each citizen are viewed as derivative from God, not the Constitution, which can only defend our rights. The American Conservative Party is an eloquent voice crying out in the wilderness in modern times to proclaim this mandate throughout America. Issues and principles that both major parties have forgotten long ago.

Recall what JFK famously said at his Inaugural Address in January 1960: “The rights of man come not from the generosity of the state but from the hand of God.” Liberals have willfully contravened these self-evident truths codified in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, particularly the Ninth and Tenth Amendments, the latter which says: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.

What ACP has demonstrated throughout their platform in plain black letter text during its two short years of existence is that if America’s Republic is to last another 200 years, or last another 200 days we had better return to the original mandate of the Constitutional Framers—God, Natural Law, liberty, truth and constitutionalism.

Why is the American Conservative Party relevant? Because unlike many other independent political parties including: the Green Party, the Socialist Party USA, the Progressive Party, the Constitution Party, the Libertarian Party and even some elements of the Tea Party, ACP’s major goals begins at the local grass roots level to elect and keep conservatives in political office. And it is in their Creed that their ideas of how American government should interact with its citizens can be rediscovered—not as tyrannical overlords, but within a social contract (=Constitution) of limited, enumerated and narrowly defined rights.

ACP therefore is dedicated to promoting those politicians on both sides of the aisle as well as independents who solemnly vow to zealously uphold the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Concurrently, ACP is wholly committed to throwing out of office the overwhelming majority of members of Congress who rather than following Jefferson’s admonition that “Government governs best that governs least” follows Machiavellian aphorism, “The end justifies the means.”

Thomas Jefferson also once stated that, “When the government fears the people there is liberty; when the people fear the government there is tyranny.” Be assured that ACP is committed to fighting against tyranny, beginning at the local level and progressing through the county, state and national level; returning the fear and respect politicians should have towards We the People so that dystopia, despair, government oppression and alienation will be vanquished and Natural Law, liberty, limited government and free market capitalism may flourish throughout America once again.

… And that’s why the American Conservative Party is relevant …today, tomorrow and God willing for many, many years to come!

Biography: Ellis Washington is former editor of the Michigan Law Review and law clerk at The Rutherford Institute. He hosts a radio program Thursdays at 11 a.m. Eastern on 1620 AM in Atlanta. It can be heard online at the Radio Sandy Springs website. His weekly podcasts are available Mondays at The Conservative Beacon. Washington is a graduate of John Marshall Law School and a lecturer and freelance writer on constitutional law, legal history and critical race theory. He has written over a dozen law review articles and several books, including "The Inseparability of Law and Morality: The Constitution, Natural Law and the Rule of Law" (2002). Washington's latest book is "The Nuremberg Trials: Last Tragedy of the Holocaust."