Egalité, fraternité, liberté was the cry of the bloody carnage of the French Revolution in 1780 and tragically is, although more subtly, the A.B.C. cry today:
A. The word “equality” does not appear in either the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution.
The word “equal” appears only twice in the Declaration: 1) “…that all men are created equal, that they are endowed…” and 2) the United States declared they were assuming “equal” and separate station among the powers of the earth.
“Equal” or “equally” show up six times in the original and amended Constitution, and in each instance is impersonal, referring to the States, and never has to do with “equality” of individual humans.
Many “liberals” piously pontificate out of one corner of their mouths that, consistently, all individuals are equal (i.e., of equal worth) by virtue of their personhood, each being a biologic human being (although some of them go further and even include animals in the equality pitch because they embrace the ludicrous fable of biologic lineage. Some propose the lunacy of including plants, and even inanimate rocks).
They then turn around and inconsistently maintain, out of the other corner of their mouths, that:
1. each should be treated UNequally in certain respects, gauged by his title (“over 65,” “below the poverty level,” “minority,” “disabled,” etc.) and given the perquisites (perks) due his royal highness (entitlements)(1) or
2. that persons should be UNequally ranked by the monetary worth ($ dollar income) of each. They thus defend the 1913 Constitutional Amendment Sixteen that authorized Karl Marx’ communist graduated (unequal) personal income tax and contradicted Article I, Section 9, paragraph 4 of the Constitution of these American States in confederated Union that forbade same — “No Capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid,…” This incongruity is covered in a previous column.(2)
Our Founding Fathers in their wisdom referred to equality, not of title or monetary worth or status, but equality of opportunity and equal standing before the law, as set down in the founding documents — i.e., the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Federalist Papers.
By the census ordered in the original U.S. Constitution in Article I, Section 2, paragraph 3 and in Article 1, Section 9, paragraph 4, each individual was regarded consistently as of equal worth to every other person — each a personhood unit of one — with no title (Article I, Section 9, paragraph 8 and Article I, Section 10, paragraph 1) regardless of his financial status. Taxing was laid down to be on the basis of personhood — equal per head — true equality, not unequal pecuniary worth.3
B. The rallying cry then of the blood bath terror of the French Revolution next proclaimed “brotherhood” (i.e., fraternity), in whose name countless were slaughtered. But now, there is no freedom to associate with whom we please. Instead, there is affirmative action (racial and sexual quotas) which exacerbate, rather than ameliorate, “racism,” “bigotry,” “discrimination,” “prejudice,” hatred, envy, resentment, intolerance, unhappiness, friction, violence, pillage, plunder, etc.
C. And, alas alack, irony of ironies, the third of the troika, “liberty.” Then it was unbridled license to impose personal, permanent liberation from life by the guillotine. Now, instead of liberty being freedom from the tyranny of all-powerful government (which tyranny the Declaration of Independence halted, and the Constitution was written to preclude recurring), liberty has been and is wrested from us by the ruthless imposition of aberrations of the first two — forced equality and forced fraternity.
All three are contrary to the Preamble of the Constitution which says, “We the people of the(se) United States…do ordain and establish this Constitution for the(se) United States of America…(to) establish Justice…(to) insure domestic Tranquility…and (to) secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity,…” Where is justice? Where is domestic tranquility? Where is liberty? They are shot down through violation of the Constitution by those who have sworn to obey it.
The Constitution delegates to the central government certain specified functions in the eighteen paragraphs of Article I, Section 8. Otherwise, we and the States are to be left alone.
November elections are coming up. Constitutional, already built in, term limits have caught up with every member of the House, one third of the Senate, and the Executive. No incumbent office seeker who has violated the Constitution he took an oath to uphold, is worthy of, or should receive, even one vote.
References
1. Caine CW. Perquisites. Medical Sentinel 1996;1(3):23-24.
2. Caine CW. Census. Medical Sentinel 1999;4(1);36-37.
3. Caine CW. Taxation. Medical Sentinel 1998;3(3):102-103.
Dr. Caine is an anesthesiologist in Jackson, Mississippi, and a member of the Editorial Board of the Medical Sentinel.
Originally published in the Medical Sentinel 2000;5(5):178. Copyright©2000 Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS)
(This column on the Constitution appears in the Medical Sentinel to remind us that it is the unConstitutional (and thus illegal) activities in medicine and all other facets of our lives that have trampled on and outlawed our God-endowed freedom and liberty.)
