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The Constitution Reader Challenge: Day 7

February 23, 2013 by Daniel

With special thanks to Constituting America and Heritage College, we will be taking part in their project:The U.S. Constitution: A Reader. It is a 90 day challenge to learn and dive deeper into understanding the Constitution.

In case you missed it, catch up with day 6 HERE.

Off to day 7, which brings us to a more current reading from someone who is regarded as one of the fathers of Conservatism. His name is John Locke, and if you haven’t heard of him, you could be hiding under a rock. His thoughts and political theory have been influencing people for years and years, and will continue to help shape minds to come.

Well, for today’s reading we look at a portion of John Locke’s Second Treatise of Government. You can click HERE to read it.

To summarize today’s reading would be to say that this is the definitive precursor for our Constitution. Very few modern day thinkers have laid it out so plainly. The Founding Fathers relied heavily on the thoughts of John Locke.

Locke begins by talking about the principles of natural rights and continues into how people shall appoint their law makers. This makes the case that government comes from the consent of those that are governed.

Groundwork for our Constitution is laid when Locke discussed that laws are made by one body of government but enforced by another. This is a system of checks and balances that was embraced by the Founders. Something almost unheard of at a time when Kings and Queens and Rulers made and enforced all the laws.

Please, take the time to read what John Locke presented for today’s reading and you will be enlightened.

For day 8 we will be looking at Discourses Concerning Government by Algernon Sidney.

If you liked what you read, please share it on Facebook, Twitter or Email. Also, comment below and share your thoughts.

The Constitution Reader Challenge: Day 6

February 22, 2013 by Daniel

Well, day 6 is upon us and today we look at a work by one of histories great masters of oratory and rhetoric. Commonly referred to as just Cicero, his full name is Marcus Tullius Cicero and many regard him as having an important influence of the framers of the Constitution. Although today’s reading is a snippet of ‘On the Commonwealth,’ it is on of the first looks on Natural law.

Cicero starts by saying:

“True law is right reason, consonant with nature”

Never before had anyone pointed to the thought that law was consistent with the laws of nature. Cicero was a beacon of light for the Founding Fathers. When they sought insight on ‘certain unalienable Rights’ that are ‘endowed by our Creator,’ they had to look no further than Cicero. The 15 lines for today’s reading carries that same tone.

“. . . at all times will be bound by this one eternal and unchangeable law, and the god will be the one common master and general (so to speak) of all people. He is the author, expounder, and mover of this law . . .”

To recognize that a Higher being is in direction for people to choose right from wrong, and that their conscience is their guide, could very well be the re-direction that is so much needed in today’s moral decay. Also, that law is inherently guided by one’s Faith, Morals and Virtues was a definitive answer to the writers of the Constitution.

Click HERE to read the snippet of On the Commonwealth by Marcus Tullius Cicero

Did you like what you read? Please share with your friends and family via Facebook, Twitter and Email.Your comments are always appreciated.

The Constitution Reader Challenge: Day 5

February 21, 2013 by Daniel

With special thanks to Constituting America and Heritage College, we will be taking part in their project:The U.S. Constitution: A Reader. It is a 90 day challenge to learn and dive deeper into understanding the Constitution.

Today is day 5 of the challenge and we get to take a look at another work by Aristotle, The Politics.

Click HERE for a copy of today’s reading assignment.

In The Politics, Aristotle looks at how the lowest level of political institution starts within the household and how that system shapes cities and regimes. Here are some themes and notes:

Chapter 1:

He has set the stage for political regimes and the division of compounds into its uncompounded elements.

Chapter 2:

It is Natural for man and woman, i.e. reproduction. Nature makes nothing in an economizing spirit. (pg 24 line 16) There is a natural order to the design of households to towns to cities and so on. Self-sufficiency is an end and what is best. (pg 25 line 8) The last half of this chapter seems to have an undertone of the setting for a free market system.

Chapter 3:

He continues on from the previous chapter on ‘business expertise.’ Management of the household is the model for the city.

Chapter 4:

Continuing on about household structure, he theories that we are all slave to someone or something.

Chapter 5:

He opens this chapter with the idea that ‘all slavery is against nature.’ (pg 27 line 22) He then compares the animal kingdom to humans and how it relates to political hierarchy.

Summary:

It is easy to see how this work has helped shape the minds of the framers of the Constitution. It not only sets forth a Natural order to things, but continues to drive the theme that we are all created equal. And, while we do not all have equal outcomes to what is before us, it is our Natural pursuit to happiness that drives us personally and politically.

This a difficult read, but very rewarding when you ponder on what Aristotle has presented. Please, if you haven’t done so, click HERE to download and read it.

The Constitution Reader Challenge: Day 4

February 20, 2013 by Daniel

With special thanks to Constituting America and Heritage College, we will be taking part in their project: The U.S. Constitution: A Reader. It is a 90 day challenge to learn and dive deeper into understanding the Constitution.

Today is Day 4 (Yes, we got started a few days late.) and the read is about defining the pursuit of happiness and the difficulties that go along with defining happiness as well as its search.

Written by Aristotle, who can at times be difficult to understand, wished to answer the question: “What is the best life for man?” While he had a difficult task of doing just that, it is the theme of the pursuit of happiness at which his dialogue comes from. And so many years later, it had been addressed by President George Washington during his first inaugural address when he stated, “that there exists in the economy and course of nature, an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness.”

Please take the time to read it HERE and come back to share what you took away from it.

Here are just a few highlights:

page 15 – lines 10-19

Since the young are apt to follow their impulses, they would hear such discourses without purpose or benefit, since their end is not knowing but action. And it makes no difference whether one is young in age or immature in character, for the deficiency doesn’t come from the time, but from living in accord with feeling and following every impulse. For knowledge comes to such people without profit, as it does to those who lack self-restraint; but to those who keep their desires in proportion and act in that way, knowing about these things would be of great benefit.
About the one who is to hear this discourse, and how it ought to be received, and what task we have set before ourselves, let these things serve as a prelude.

page 16 – lines 15-31

For our part, let us speak from the point where we digressed. Most people and the crudest people seem, not without reason, to assume from people’s lives that pleasure is the good and is happiness. For this reason they are content with a life devoted to enjoyment. For there are three ways of life especially that hold prominence: the one just now mentioned, and the political life, and third, the contemplative life. Now most people show themselves to be completely slavish by choosing a life that belongs to fatted cattle, but they happen to get listened to because most people who have power share the feeling of Sardanapalus. But refined and active people choose honor, for this is pretty much the goal of political life. Now this appears to be too superficial to be what is sought, for it seems to be in the ones who give honor rather than in the one who is honored, but we divine that the good is something of one’s own and hard to take away. Also, people seem to pursue honor in order to be convinced that they themselves are good. At any rate they seek to be honored by the wise and by those who know them, and for virtue; it is clear, then, that at least according to these people, virtue is something greater, and one might perhaps assume that this, rather than honor, is the end of the political life.

page 20 – lines 19-21

So happiness appears to be something complete and self-sufficient, and is, therefore, the end of actions.

Now it’s your turn! Please, share your thoughts. Also feel free to share on Facebook, Twitter and Email.