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Showing posts from September, 2012

The Moral Basis of a Free Society

The intent of my blog is to organize my own thoughts but I have discovered one thing.  Study leads to further knowledge expressed by more diligent students and thinkers.  Here is one those excerpts with a link to the page. This is the introduction to the book which can be read at the link below. H. Verlan. Anderson The Moral Basis of a Free Society http://www.inspiredconstitution.org/index.php?content=mbfs/introduction.html Why Men Establish Governments One fundamental political truth which will be considered is that men establish governments for the purpose of compelling the citizens to obey a code of private morality. This code is contained in a set of laws which govern human conduct. Such laws may be classified into these two types: (1) Those which condemn and punish certain conduct as evil and harmful; (2) Those which compel the performance of other conduct considered good and beneficial.        When men make laws, and thus determine which conduct is so evil it sh

Abortion

The newspaper reports this week that abortions are up 25% in Arizona this year. The Arizona Health Services department statistics show that total is 13,606 or 16 out of 100 live births. The number of abortions annually in the world consistently reach 40 million.  What do these statistics indicate. Do they indicate an environment of affection and respect in the relationships that brought the pregnancy about? What are the unintended consequences of tampering with the processes of life with such impunity as abortion does?   In my post on Two Moral Codes and Social Challenges I point out as others have in the past, that certain events, topics, and situations that we talk about on a regular basis as issues are not usually the actual problem, but a symptom of an underlying moral condition at its core or root. Politicians like to treat symptoms because they can justify their misguided notions of solving something by ongoing rhetoric that sounds good to uninformed minds and simplis

James Madison, Essay on Property

Property James Madison, National Gazette March 29, 1792 This term in its particular application means "that dominion which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in exclusion of every other individual. In its larger and juster meaning, it embraces every thing to which a man may attach a value and have a right; and  which leaves to every one else the like advantage.   In the former sense, a man's land, or  merchandise , or money is called his property. In the latter sense, a man has property in his opinions and the free communication of them. He has a property of peculiar value in his religious opinions, and in the profession and practice dictated by them.  He has a property very dear to him in the safety and liberty of his person. He has an equal property in the free use of his faculties and free choice of the objects on which to employ them. In a word, as a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equ