Is It Time For a Second Declaration of Independence?

On November 6, 2009, the House Committee of Ways and Means issued a press release warning Americans of the draconic measures contained within H.R. 3962 (as amended). The Pelosi bill mandates that citizens purchase health care or face fines and/or imprisonment. H.R. 3962 was passed at 11pm on Saturday night, November 7, 2009. (Hat tip Rushlight)

On Thursday, October 22, 2009, Pelosi was asked by a reporter from CNSNews.com if the Constitution authorizes Congress to order Americans to purchase health insurance. Her response was:

“Are you serious? Are you serious?”

Pelosi's press secretary later responded to written follow-up questions from CNSNews.com by emailing CNSNews.com a press release on the “Constitutionality of Health Insurance Reform,” that argues that Congress derives the authority to mandate that people purchase health insurance from its constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce.

Article I, section 8 of the United States Constitution describes Congressional authority. No single statement was found to even imply that officials elected by United States citizens have the right to demand the purchase of any form of health care.

The United States Bill of Rights lays out what the Founders felt was imperative for freedom. Amendment 10 states:

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.

This proclaims that if not stated within the Constitution, the federal government has no right to make new laws nor to obtain more power.

A famous saying is that history repeats itself. However it does not repeat itself exactly. Instead, historical events bearing frightening similarity to the past do indeed repeat when those in the present do not learn from such. Americans of today are experiencing events similar to what the colonies faced prior to the Revolutionary War. Upon viewing the Declaration of Independence, one will find comments such as these:

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

One example of such is:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

It continues:

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

The United States of the 20th century and beyond has come to resemble the condition of the 13 colonies prior to their revolt from England. Government corruption has become widespread. Multiple government agencies, unauthorized by the Constitution, have sprung into being. (The A-Z Index of U.S. Government Departments and Agencies lists the hundred of unconstitutional entities now in existence)

As well, the fundamental forms of our government are being subtly altered with unelected czars being placed into positions of power. States’ rights have been overshadowed and replaced by the federal government, freedom of speech has been neutered, private corporations have been seized, federal control of currency is maintained by a non government agency (the Federal Reserve), and the American populace is being taxed into poverty.

As the colonists before us, we have attempted to address these issues with those in power. We have done so through Town Hall gatherings, Tea Party protests, and protests before the actual House of Congress in Washington, D.C. Yet has anyone in power truly listened? Unfortunately, the answer is no. The most recent example of this was the passage of H.R. 3962 in the depth of a Saturday night – much like thieves in the darkness moving in when their victims are unaware.

Corruption and injustice now infest our highest political offices, yet none with power whatsoever feel inclined to fight it. Perhaps it truly is time to declare a second Declaration of Independence and throw off, once again, these chains of tyranny.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”