Conservatives…
and Ideologies
Conservatives are often referred to in the media as being “ideological conservatives”. That is a misnomer, a contradiction in terms. Ideologues are the antithesis of conservatives because they exalt time over place. For the ideologue, time is unfolding a better and better society. What has gone before has no import to the ideologue. Ideology is about what is “not” instead of reality; about what could be instead of what exists. Ideologues fit nicely with scientific materialists who believe that we live in a closed system of random origin without outside influence or ideals and we alone are responsible for “getting it right” and that requires time.
On the other hand we have the conservative. Russell Kirk said being a conservative is a:
…cast of intellect or a type of character, and inclination to cherish the permanent things in human existence…to join in resistance to the destruction or the old patterns of life [and] damage to the footings of civil social order…
Note two things in particular that sets the conservative apart from the ideologue. The first is “permanent things”. That is non-negotiable virtues without which a society cannot exist and operate. Ideologues are about changing social order because nothing is permanent. Why? Because, for the ideologue, there is the unfolding enlightenment of man that allows him to move to higher and higher plains of goodness. There is not a good, an ideal, to be cherished because we are making things better and better.
Second, the conservative is “against destruction” of the old social order. This is why conservatives resist ideologues and their ideologies. Conservatives know that ideologues leave in their wake of change dismantled foundations and non-functioning institutions that had served the society before the “change for the better”. On striking example, but by no means the only, is the “better way” of sexual liberation leaving in its wake the broken and destroyed family as it had functioned for thousands of years in the world.
At their core, ideologues are about the rejection of reality and destruction of what is. In place of reality ideologues what to build a “possibility” that has never existed and is not possible. The ideologue represents a smug, self-righteous attitude that by subverting and dismantling the “way it is” there can be a “better way”. This attitude is rejected by the conservative. This is not a rejection of change, for change is inevitable. It is a rejection of the radical change that dismantles what we know for what is imagined. Conservatives desire to maintain the permanent virtues and patterns of life that have been the basis of society since there have been societies and promote change within.
The hubris of ideology ignores the fallibility of man. The ideologue wants to dismiss the accrued wisdom of men through the ages for the enlightened view of modern man. The traditional virtues, tested through time and experience, are found wanting by the 21st century ideologue. They are viewed as oppressive and not in step with what is now happening. For improving the world, wholesale change is needed. Bringing the world in line with the desires of modern man is the way to a better world. This is why there are no “permanent things” or “footings of society” for the ideologue. The desires of man are always changing, so change is inevitable. Tying society to the desire of man means a constantly moving target unmoored to anything permanent.
Virtuous terms do not disappear; just the meaning of them. Take for instance the modified definition of honor. At one time honor meant standing on principles believed regardless of the consequences or impact on the person of honor. But, today we do not see honor as a permanent virtue that is manifested in an individual as part of his character. Honor in a “changed” society is now defined as status, or respect for personal accomplishment. It is an “I did it my way” view of things. Honor is no longer attached to virtue or a part of a person’s character. We honor those judged to be successful at fulfilling his or her personal desires. Honor is now recognition of the individual rather than the individual representing service, sacrifice, or even death for a cause that is virtuous.
A brief examination of the world we now live inn exposes the foolishness of ideologies. Do we really see in the unfolding of time a continuing revelation of a higher and better humanity? Do we see in our world societies finally “getting it right” after centuries of misplace emphases on permanent things? Globalism, multi-culturalism and neo-conservatism are ideologies that are moving us away from the “old ways” to “new ways” that promise an elevated humanity. Is that what we see? One a grand scale we see a movement to a one world economic order doing away with nation-states and on a micro scale it is personal autonomy shedding the shackles of oppressive communities. I am sure you can come up with many other examples.
The dream of ideologues is progress driven by the engine of technology. Ideologues love progress for it is indicative of the better. Surely the new is always better than the old? Progress is defined by the ideologue as moving ahead. We are the most advanced folks because technology has made our lives easy, comfortable and pleasurable. So, we surely must also be the most advanced in ideas and consequent behavior. We march into the future armed with technology and believing that we can ignore the past and create a new social order. To T.S. Eliot’s famous statement:
We are what we are because they were what they were,
the ideologue answers yes…but we must be different because we now know better.
The late Gerhart Niemeyer asserted that ideologies fail because of two reasons. One, they are frauds. They substitute the philosophical questions about what is given for a set of assertions about what is not given. As a willful assertion of unreality or willful denial of reality, ideology is an intellectual perversion. Second, because and ideologue does not embrace reality and act within it to achieve real possibilities they are destroyers of societies not builders.
Two examples of 20th century history…National Socialism and Communism…prove Niemeyer’s point. Going forward in the 21st century we must be vigilant in identifying the unreality and destruction of ideologies. They can come from anywhere. No group or party has a monopoly on ideology. This is where the conservative must play an assertive role in society. Ideologies must be called ideologies. And, the conservative must continue to stand for permanent things and keep the foundations of society from being destroyed. Conservatives look to the past to seek the accumulated wisdom of those who have gone before and the time worn verities that maintain a society. This is not a romantic return to “Ozzie and Harriet. He does not live in the past but is guided by the old order built on permanent virtues that have stood the test of time. Change will come but as a modification of the old not the substitution of a new order built on human progress driven by technology and human desires of modern man.
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Not Forgetting 9/11
This was a day that ranks with Pearl Harbor and the assassination of JFK in the memories of Americans living today. A bright, sunny day in the east turned dark and foreboding as airliners were turned into missiles and thousands of non-combatants died in a war we did not even know we were fighting. Some call it a War on Terror, others call it a resumption of the war between Islam and Christianity. Whatever the case, we can never forget that day. Say a prayer for the families of the victims of that day who can never scrub this day from their minds. Say a pray for the leaders of our country as they attempt to keep the citizens safe in an increasingly hostile world where the technology for those who want to harm us is increasingly available.
This was a day that ranks with Pearl Harbor and the assassination of JFK in the memories of Americans living today. A bright, sunny day in the east turned dark and foreboding as airliners were turned into missiles and thousands of non-combatants died in a war we did not even know we were fighting. Some call it a War on Terror, others call it a resumption of the war between Islam and Christianity. Whatever the case, we can never forget that day. Say a prayer for the families of the victims of that day who can never scrub this day from their minds. Say a pray for the leaders of our country as they attempt to keep the citizens safe in an increasingly hostile world where the technology for those who want to harm us is increasingly available.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Living in the World
The Providence of God
Nothing happens by happenstance, serendipity, if you will. There is a purpose and plan for all that happens in the universe. What the purpose and plan is we sometimes cannot know at the time an event happens. There are times when we just rejoice. This is one such time. When I think of the lifetime memory for the Ledford girls I just smile and chuckle for a cherished moment in their lives. A moment unplanned by man; designed by God!
http://danledford.blogspot.com/
The Providence of God
Nothing happens by happenstance, serendipity, if you will. There is a purpose and plan for all that happens in the universe. What the purpose and plan is we sometimes cannot know at the time an event happens. There are times when we just rejoice. This is one such time. When I think of the lifetime memory for the Ledford girls I just smile and chuckle for a cherished moment in their lives. A moment unplanned by man; designed by God!
http://danledford.blogspot.com/
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
Escape From Reason
The Crisis of the Middle Class
This middle class group is, in many ways, a product of the Reformation; it is something to be thankful for as a source of stability. By now, people in this group often do not understand the basis of its stability. They do not understand why they think in the old way; they are continuing to act out of habit and memory after they have forgotten why the old form was valid. Often they still think in the right way—to them truth is truth, right is right—but they no longer know why. So how can they understand their 20th century children who think in the new way, who no longer think that truth is truth nor that right is right?
Francis A. Schaeffer, Escape From Reason
The Crisis of the Middle Class
This middle class group is, in many ways, a product of the Reformation; it is something to be thankful for as a source of stability. By now, people in this group often do not understand the basis of its stability. They do not understand why they think in the old way; they are continuing to act out of habit and memory after they have forgotten why the old form was valid. Often they still think in the right way—to them truth is truth, right is right—but they no longer know why. So how can they understand their 20th century children who think in the new way, who no longer think that truth is truth nor that right is right?
Francis A. Schaeffer, Escape From Reason
Monday, September 8, 2008
Conservatives…
and Education
It is appalling how little attention is paid to reading and history today. They go had in hand. Television, the internet and cellular phones tell us little about our history. They are technological “now” instruments. You have to put them down to read. And, we do not want to do that. We might miss something!
Education has generally moved from the liberal arts [including history] to technical and specialized learning. And, what is left of the liberal arts is riddled with political correctness. In the academy of today, race, gender and class, with increasing doses of sexual preference, dictate the study of the social sciences. Western civics has become the story of the failure of rich white men, who were probably homophobic, to produce an egalitarian society where every idea has equal validity and importance. You are far more likely to gain admittance to a doctoral program in a US university wanting to study about homosexual black women on southern plantations than the study of any heretofore significant male figure from the 17th to 20th century.
Jude Daugherty, former Chairman of the Philosophy Department at Catholic University maintains that being an educated conservative requires a literary [reading] tradition that puts people in touch with the wisdom of the past. Of, course that flies in the face of those who debunk the past [history] as the story of the oppressive winners who suppressed every dissident voice and view. Even for those who have not bought into the PC view of education, the past and its wisdom still lacks importance. They look at the past as worthless and hopelessly outdated for modern man. The virtues of the past; the rule of law from the past; ideas of society and family from the past; concepts of science and religion believed in the past; none of it has relevance to now and the future. So, why read history?
For conservatives, the past is important and it is imperative that we understand the past. The conservative understands that Western Culture is the foundation of our society. The Greek and Roman classics; Holy Scripture; the early and medieval church fathers; European works on philosophy and science; these all play an important role in the structuring of what we now identify as the west. The conservative cannot understand why someone would espouse the construction of a new order of things ignoring the collective efforts of the past. Preservation of those collective memories of the past is necessary according to Edmund Burke:
…it is with infinite caution that any man ought to venture upon pulling down an edifice which has answered in any tolerable degree for ages the common purposes of society or on building it up again without having models of approved utility before his eyes.
We are 180 degrees from Burke. We reject notions of the past as out of step with the now. We are attempting to build a society without a known foundation. How long can such an edifice stand?
Specifically, this country, the USA, was built by men schooled in foundational works of the past. Conservatives know that, and real conservative educational concepts would propose returning to the classics. Walter Lippmann addressed this matter on the University of Pennsylvania campus in 1940. His topic was, interestingly enough, entitled “Education v. Western Civilization”. He said:
The men who wrote the American Constitution and the Bill of Rights were educated in schools and colleges in which the classic works of this culture were the substance of the curriculum. In these schools, the transmission of this culture was held to be the end and aim of education. Modern education, however, is based on a denial that it is necessary or useful or desirable for schools and colleges to continue to transmit from generation to generation the religious and classical culture of the western world.
Thus there is an enormous vacuum where until a few decades ago there was the substance of education. And that vacuum is filled with the elective, the specialized, the accidental and incidental improvisions and spontaneous curiosity of teachers and students. There is no common faith, no common body of principle ,no common body of knowledge, no common moral and intellectual discipline. Yet the graduates of modern schools are expected to form a civilized community.
Breathtaking! Spoken 68 years ago and unheeded. Where there is no common educational process there is no common anything. Just about sums up where we are today.
Conservatives are not against vocational education. But, for us to have a citizenry that has common principles, knowledge, morals and intellectual discipline, there must be a pursuit by all citizens of the foundation of our cultural formation. Our civilization is becoming increasingly uncivilized, as Lippmann predicted. The education promoted by the true conservative is based on understanding the basis of our western culture and transmitting those principles and virtues to all our citizens. Recapturing such a vision of education is needed yesterday and any other educational philosophy cannot be called conservative.
and Education
It is appalling how little attention is paid to reading and history today. They go had in hand. Television, the internet and cellular phones tell us little about our history. They are technological “now” instruments. You have to put them down to read. And, we do not want to do that. We might miss something!
Education has generally moved from the liberal arts [including history] to technical and specialized learning. And, what is left of the liberal arts is riddled with political correctness. In the academy of today, race, gender and class, with increasing doses of sexual preference, dictate the study of the social sciences. Western civics has become the story of the failure of rich white men, who were probably homophobic, to produce an egalitarian society where every idea has equal validity and importance. You are far more likely to gain admittance to a doctoral program in a US university wanting to study about homosexual black women on southern plantations than the study of any heretofore significant male figure from the 17th to 20th century.
Jude Daugherty, former Chairman of the Philosophy Department at Catholic University maintains that being an educated conservative requires a literary [reading] tradition that puts people in touch with the wisdom of the past. Of, course that flies in the face of those who debunk the past [history] as the story of the oppressive winners who suppressed every dissident voice and view. Even for those who have not bought into the PC view of education, the past and its wisdom still lacks importance. They look at the past as worthless and hopelessly outdated for modern man. The virtues of the past; the rule of law from the past; ideas of society and family from the past; concepts of science and religion believed in the past; none of it has relevance to now and the future. So, why read history?
For conservatives, the past is important and it is imperative that we understand the past. The conservative understands that Western Culture is the foundation of our society. The Greek and Roman classics; Holy Scripture; the early and medieval church fathers; European works on philosophy and science; these all play an important role in the structuring of what we now identify as the west. The conservative cannot understand why someone would espouse the construction of a new order of things ignoring the collective efforts of the past. Preservation of those collective memories of the past is necessary according to Edmund Burke:
…it is with infinite caution that any man ought to venture upon pulling down an edifice which has answered in any tolerable degree for ages the common purposes of society or on building it up again without having models of approved utility before his eyes.
We are 180 degrees from Burke. We reject notions of the past as out of step with the now. We are attempting to build a society without a known foundation. How long can such an edifice stand?
Specifically, this country, the USA, was built by men schooled in foundational works of the past. Conservatives know that, and real conservative educational concepts would propose returning to the classics. Walter Lippmann addressed this matter on the University of Pennsylvania campus in 1940. His topic was, interestingly enough, entitled “Education v. Western Civilization”. He said:
The men who wrote the American Constitution and the Bill of Rights were educated in schools and colleges in which the classic works of this culture were the substance of the curriculum. In these schools, the transmission of this culture was held to be the end and aim of education. Modern education, however, is based on a denial that it is necessary or useful or desirable for schools and colleges to continue to transmit from generation to generation the religious and classical culture of the western world.
Thus there is an enormous vacuum where until a few decades ago there was the substance of education. And that vacuum is filled with the elective, the specialized, the accidental and incidental improvisions and spontaneous curiosity of teachers and students. There is no common faith, no common body of principle ,no common body of knowledge, no common moral and intellectual discipline. Yet the graduates of modern schools are expected to form a civilized community.
Breathtaking! Spoken 68 years ago and unheeded. Where there is no common educational process there is no common anything. Just about sums up where we are today.
Conservatives are not against vocational education. But, for us to have a citizenry that has common principles, knowledge, morals and intellectual discipline, there must be a pursuit by all citizens of the foundation of our cultural formation. Our civilization is becoming increasingly uncivilized, as Lippmann predicted. The education promoted by the true conservative is based on understanding the basis of our western culture and transmitting those principles and virtues to all our citizens. Recapturing such a vision of education is needed yesterday and any other educational philosophy cannot be called conservative.
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Conservatives…
and the State
Back on 02 March 2008, I posted on “Who are the Conservatives?” in light of the criticism of John McCain as not being conservative. I opined that being a conservative is not about conserving what or where we are now, but rather about reclaiming permanent things with “redeemed imagination”. The principle is that modernism, and now post- modernism, has corrupted the western culture’s view of what is important and those permanent things need to recaptured. But, that in itself is pretty unsatisfactory. How is this applied in looking at the world? We will try to answer that over the next few weeks with reference to certain specific topics.
We start with the state, not Pennsylvania, Ohio, etc. but the governing authorities whomever they may be. Geo. W. Bush is portrayed by the media and his political adversaries as a conservative. But, is he really when it comes to the state? On his watch, the federal government underwent unbelievable growth. He liked all kinds of spending bills and that extended the power of the state. So, too did the expansion of bureaucracy. TSA alone added thousands of individuals to the government payroll, and the increased emphasis on security has spread the tentacles of the state further into the lives of the citizen.
Most government spending is to enhance the state’s position in the lives of those living in the state. And, state authority and power is not the goal of the truly conservative. Read what Robert Nisbit says about state power:
The contemporary state with all its apparatus of bureaucracy, has become more powerful, more cohesive and is ordained with more power than at any time in history…the whole tendency of modern political development has been to enhance the role of the political state as a direct relationship among individuals, and to bring both its powers and its services even more intimately into the lives of individuals.
That was written in 1953! How much more appropriate today. The massive leviathan state of today with all its intrusions and influence in individual lives would make Nisbit wince.
Conservatives oppose the growth of state power. Why? Because it shifts allegiances away from home and community, local influences, to regional, state and federal influences. The power over individual lives becomes vested in the state, and in the US, especially the federal government. The live of the individual is more and more affected by power centers removed from him when state power grows. And, the larger the state grows; citizens take on more of an impersonal, numerical identity. You are more likely to be on a first name basis with your mayor or township supervisor than your governor, state or federal representatives or anyone in the Executive Branch of the federal government. At least you local leaders have a better chance of knowing who you are…that you have a name! The state rarely knows you so there is no personal touch or compassion in you relationship to the state as there are with family, neighborhood and community of place.
If you have ever had to deal with the bureaucracy of the state or federal government, you understand. Your issue better be one that has stock solutions. Square pegs find no answers in a bureaucracy of round holes. The state is not in the business of addressing your particular problem and it cannot tailor a specific solution not allowed by the operations manual of the bureaucrat. The idea that “I am from the government and I am here to help you” is indeed a joke. The state is not about individual problems; it is about government solutions.
That is to be expected when the seat of power and authority is far removed from where you live your daily life. The bureaucrat in Harrisburg or Washington is not concerned with you as a person and how your problem affects you. His mission is to field your question, open his little box of pat answers approved by the state and see if you fit the profile for “help” he is permitted to dispense. If you do not fit the profile, then you are passed off to another bureaucrat. The mass of red tape and paper work needed to address the simplest question is often mind boggling.
For the conservative, the role of the state is to maintain order so its people can live in peace and safety and punish wrongdoers while promoting good. A friend of mine used to say: The role of government is to deliver the mail, protect the borders and keep the highways open…and they do a lousy job at all of them!” With that many can concur. At what are they good? Taxing and spending comes to mind. Redistributing income so that incumbent politicians can hand out our money to those who are best suited to see that they are re-elected. The expansion of the power of the state permits the state to control more of our lives and keeps those who exercise that power to remain the entrenched political elite. We do not have a King George, we have KINGS George!
The expansion of state power is not a tenant of conservatism. Conservatives place a premium on the individual, his family, his local community and local associations as being most important in forming life and character and permitting an individual to flourish. What Burke called “the little platoons.” For the conservative, the power of the state is to be limited for a healthy society. There is little doubt that the power of the state over the lives of the people dramatically increased under Geo W. Bush’s stewardship of the USA.
As we approach the November election, it is pretty clear that neither major candidate is a “limiting state power” kind of guy. Neither is likely to capture the vision of my friend as to the role of government. The real question may be: Can the present political climate ever produce a conservative candidate who wants to recapture the idea of limited state power for the good of the country? That is, one who values family, community and place as the power centers of life over and above the influence of the state.
and the State
Back on 02 March 2008, I posted on “Who are the Conservatives?” in light of the criticism of John McCain as not being conservative. I opined that being a conservative is not about conserving what or where we are now, but rather about reclaiming permanent things with “redeemed imagination”. The principle is that modernism, and now post- modernism, has corrupted the western culture’s view of what is important and those permanent things need to recaptured. But, that in itself is pretty unsatisfactory. How is this applied in looking at the world? We will try to answer that over the next few weeks with reference to certain specific topics.
We start with the state, not Pennsylvania, Ohio, etc. but the governing authorities whomever they may be. Geo. W. Bush is portrayed by the media and his political adversaries as a conservative. But, is he really when it comes to the state? On his watch, the federal government underwent unbelievable growth. He liked all kinds of spending bills and that extended the power of the state. So, too did the expansion of bureaucracy. TSA alone added thousands of individuals to the government payroll, and the increased emphasis on security has spread the tentacles of the state further into the lives of the citizen.
Most government spending is to enhance the state’s position in the lives of those living in the state. And, state authority and power is not the goal of the truly conservative. Read what Robert Nisbit says about state power:
The contemporary state with all its apparatus of bureaucracy, has become more powerful, more cohesive and is ordained with more power than at any time in history…the whole tendency of modern political development has been to enhance the role of the political state as a direct relationship among individuals, and to bring both its powers and its services even more intimately into the lives of individuals.
That was written in 1953! How much more appropriate today. The massive leviathan state of today with all its intrusions and influence in individual lives would make Nisbit wince.
Conservatives oppose the growth of state power. Why? Because it shifts allegiances away from home and community, local influences, to regional, state and federal influences. The power over individual lives becomes vested in the state, and in the US, especially the federal government. The live of the individual is more and more affected by power centers removed from him when state power grows. And, the larger the state grows; citizens take on more of an impersonal, numerical identity. You are more likely to be on a first name basis with your mayor or township supervisor than your governor, state or federal representatives or anyone in the Executive Branch of the federal government. At least you local leaders have a better chance of knowing who you are…that you have a name! The state rarely knows you so there is no personal touch or compassion in you relationship to the state as there are with family, neighborhood and community of place.
If you have ever had to deal with the bureaucracy of the state or federal government, you understand. Your issue better be one that has stock solutions. Square pegs find no answers in a bureaucracy of round holes. The state is not in the business of addressing your particular problem and it cannot tailor a specific solution not allowed by the operations manual of the bureaucrat. The idea that “I am from the government and I am here to help you” is indeed a joke. The state is not about individual problems; it is about government solutions.
That is to be expected when the seat of power and authority is far removed from where you live your daily life. The bureaucrat in Harrisburg or Washington is not concerned with you as a person and how your problem affects you. His mission is to field your question, open his little box of pat answers approved by the state and see if you fit the profile for “help” he is permitted to dispense. If you do not fit the profile, then you are passed off to another bureaucrat. The mass of red tape and paper work needed to address the simplest question is often mind boggling.
For the conservative, the role of the state is to maintain order so its people can live in peace and safety and punish wrongdoers while promoting good. A friend of mine used to say: The role of government is to deliver the mail, protect the borders and keep the highways open…and they do a lousy job at all of them!” With that many can concur. At what are they good? Taxing and spending comes to mind. Redistributing income so that incumbent politicians can hand out our money to those who are best suited to see that they are re-elected. The expansion of the power of the state permits the state to control more of our lives and keeps those who exercise that power to remain the entrenched political elite. We do not have a King George, we have KINGS George!
The expansion of state power is not a tenant of conservatism. Conservatives place a premium on the individual, his family, his local community and local associations as being most important in forming life and character and permitting an individual to flourish. What Burke called “the little platoons.” For the conservative, the power of the state is to be limited for a healthy society. There is little doubt that the power of the state over the lives of the people dramatically increased under Geo W. Bush’s stewardship of the USA.
As we approach the November election, it is pretty clear that neither major candidate is a “limiting state power” kind of guy. Neither is likely to capture the vision of my friend as to the role of government. The real question may be: Can the present political climate ever produce a conservative candidate who wants to recapture the idea of limited state power for the good of the country? That is, one who values family, community and place as the power centers of life over and above the influence of the state.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Living in the World/Tales from the ECD
China, Clearfield County and Rights
[As the Summer Olympics wind through the second week in China, I wanted to share an article I wrote that first appeared in SGM Magazine. It has a reference point when Chinese were in Clearfield County to examine how open pit mining was conducted in the US. It also involves a discussion of the changing attitude toward “economic rights” in China and the US. That is not to say one should prefer the PRC over the USA. It is obvious to all who have watched the run up to the Games that there is much wanting and a distance unmeasureable to go in the matter of “human rights” in China. Yet, we see the “times are a changing”’ with respect to “economic rights” both in China and the US.]
In November and December of 1978, Deng Xiaoping eased Communist party and State controls into his hands. Quite a feat for one who was twice exiled by Mao.Deng was an economic reformer. He believed that communism did not mean poverty. One of his greatest reforms was the Special Economic Zone [SEZ]. Much of the growth of China today is based on the SEZ and the partnership forged between free enterprise and the Communist Party. In 1984, Deng described the SEZ as:
a medium for introducing technology, management and knowledge…a window for our foreign policy…and to import foreign technology, obtain knowledge and learn management.
The success of Chinese economic reform can be seen by all in the big box stores in the USA. Many of the goods sold are marked “Made in China” which was unheard of ten year ago.
But, before the onslaught of Chinese consumer goods into the USA, Clearfield County came face to face with the economic reforms of the People’s Republic of China [PRC]. In the early 1980s, the PRC sent a delegation of mining engineers to the US to investigate mining technology.
Their first stop was Clearfield County, Pennsylvania, for good reason. According to Geologist C.H. Chance, as reported in The History of Clearfield County by Lewis Cass Aldrich published in 1887,Clearfield County is divided into three great coal basins separated by two anticlinal axes. The county sits on one of the largest deposits of bituminous coal in the Commonwealth. And, in the 1980s large amounts of coal were being mined by the surface mining method. The Chinese delegation wanted to investigate the types of machinery used in removing coal by the surface mining method.
During the one and one-half days they were in central Pennsylvania they crawled all over the bull dozers, rock trucks and loaders typical of surface mining. They took plenty of notes and pictures. The group consisted of 30 men…18 engineers, 4 interpreters and 8 “pilots”. The later were actually agents of the PRC accompanying the others to ensure the others returned to China at the completion of the three week visit.
At a banquet honoring the Chinese visit to Clearfield County, I sat with six of the visitors. When the conversation turned to what I did, I responded that I was a lawyer. The six looked at each other and after a long silence, one of the “pilots” responded. He spoke directly to me and said: “We do not need lawyers in our country. The government takes care of us.” Another period of silence ensued. I finally responded, “I see.” The conversation resumed without any reference to “rights talk”.
My how times have changed. Because of China’s burgeoning economy and international commerce, the PRC has developed a commercial legal system. This does not included a legal system protecting personal, property, civil or political rights of individuals. After all, it was the economic reformed Deng who turned the troops loose on the students in Tiananmen Square in 1989. But, even that is changing. A new brand of legal activists, trained in Chinese law schools, is pushing the envelope on public interest and human rights issues. In Chinese courts they have raised issues involving illegal land grabs, freedom of press and illegal taxation. Such actions, like Chinese goods in Walmart, were unheard of ten years ago.
The Communist Party is not yielding ground easily, however. Trudy Rubin reporting from Beijing, tells of Chen Guangcheng, a blind peasant lawyer, who tried to bring a class action suit challenging forced abortion and sterilization in Linyi. He was seized by the PRC and is being held in an undisclosed location. The Chinese media is forbidden to mention his case. Nevertheless, the New China with its presence on the world stage and the coming 2008 Summer Olympics, is clearly emboldening lawyers to push for peaceful internal political change through the courts.
Wang Xixin, associate dean of Peking University Law School has even created the China Center for Public Participation and Support. One of their key projects is to help farmers assert their legal rights to comment on draft legislation affecting them and challenge expropriation of their land by the government. All in all, strides are being made in a communist ruled country to free folks from the tyranny of the state involving the property rights of the people.
At the time of these encouraging changes, the USA seems to be moving in the other direction. While most conservatives were roiling about the two Ten Commandment cases in the last term of the US Supreme Court [USSC], Kelo v. City of New Haven, flew under their radar. In Kelo, the USSC approved an eminent domain taking by the City of New Haven, CN, not based on:
blight in the Fort Trumball area, but their determination that the area was sufficiently distressed to justify a program of economic rejuvenation..
The city used a state statute authorizing “eminent domain to promote economic development.”
Kelo argued that economic development does not qualify as a “public use” under the explicit language of the 5th Amendment of the US Constitution. The USSC agreed with taking statute:
There is, moreover, no principled way of distinguishing economic development from other public purposes that we have recognized…Clearly, there is no basis for exempting economic development from our traditionally broad understanding of public purpose.
It appears that the PRC and USA are moving in two different directions. While we are a nation of laws not men, the US Constitution is being molded like a wax nose. As Justice Thomas points out in his dissent, the Constitution is being stretched to the breaking point in justifying economic development as “public use”:
Public utility, public interest, common benefit, general advantage or convenience…we are afloat without any certain principle to guide us.
The USSC has opened the door to any government action based on “general public economic good” to condemn private property. Isn’t that what the public interest lawyers in China are trying to curtail? Practices by a totalitarian regime are being adopted by the USSC. We are witnessing quite a role reversal. If you live in an economically depressed area, watch your perfectly fine home or your neighbor’s home may be condemned so a Wal-Mart can be erected to sell Chinese goods. After all, it will bring commerce and jobs to the area. Economic development is a constitutional public use.
God bless those brave Chinese who want to obtain and keep personal, political, property and human rights. God help us here in the USA and the Eastern Continental Divide as our courts continue to limit our rights as a constitutional principle. If you live in a state where a Kelo result is possible, call you state legislator. And if you live in a state where it is not, keep it that way!
China, Clearfield County and Rights
[As the Summer Olympics wind through the second week in China, I wanted to share an article I wrote that first appeared in SGM Magazine. It has a reference point when Chinese were in Clearfield County to examine how open pit mining was conducted in the US. It also involves a discussion of the changing attitude toward “economic rights” in China and the US. That is not to say one should prefer the PRC over the USA. It is obvious to all who have watched the run up to the Games that there is much wanting and a distance unmeasureable to go in the matter of “human rights” in China. Yet, we see the “times are a changing”’ with respect to “economic rights” both in China and the US.]
In November and December of 1978, Deng Xiaoping eased Communist party and State controls into his hands. Quite a feat for one who was twice exiled by Mao.Deng was an economic reformer. He believed that communism did not mean poverty. One of his greatest reforms was the Special Economic Zone [SEZ]. Much of the growth of China today is based on the SEZ and the partnership forged between free enterprise and the Communist Party. In 1984, Deng described the SEZ as:
a medium for introducing technology, management and knowledge…a window for our foreign policy…and to import foreign technology, obtain knowledge and learn management.
The success of Chinese economic reform can be seen by all in the big box stores in the USA. Many of the goods sold are marked “Made in China” which was unheard of ten year ago.
But, before the onslaught of Chinese consumer goods into the USA, Clearfield County came face to face with the economic reforms of the People’s Republic of China [PRC]. In the early 1980s, the PRC sent a delegation of mining engineers to the US to investigate mining technology.
Their first stop was Clearfield County, Pennsylvania, for good reason. According to Geologist C.H. Chance, as reported in The History of Clearfield County by Lewis Cass Aldrich published in 1887,Clearfield County is divided into three great coal basins separated by two anticlinal axes. The county sits on one of the largest deposits of bituminous coal in the Commonwealth. And, in the 1980s large amounts of coal were being mined by the surface mining method. The Chinese delegation wanted to investigate the types of machinery used in removing coal by the surface mining method.
During the one and one-half days they were in central Pennsylvania they crawled all over the bull dozers, rock trucks and loaders typical of surface mining. They took plenty of notes and pictures. The group consisted of 30 men…18 engineers, 4 interpreters and 8 “pilots”. The later were actually agents of the PRC accompanying the others to ensure the others returned to China at the completion of the three week visit.
At a banquet honoring the Chinese visit to Clearfield County, I sat with six of the visitors. When the conversation turned to what I did, I responded that I was a lawyer. The six looked at each other and after a long silence, one of the “pilots” responded. He spoke directly to me and said: “We do not need lawyers in our country. The government takes care of us.” Another period of silence ensued. I finally responded, “I see.” The conversation resumed without any reference to “rights talk”.
My how times have changed. Because of China’s burgeoning economy and international commerce, the PRC has developed a commercial legal system. This does not included a legal system protecting personal, property, civil or political rights of individuals. After all, it was the economic reformed Deng who turned the troops loose on the students in Tiananmen Square in 1989. But, even that is changing. A new brand of legal activists, trained in Chinese law schools, is pushing the envelope on public interest and human rights issues. In Chinese courts they have raised issues involving illegal land grabs, freedom of press and illegal taxation. Such actions, like Chinese goods in Walmart, were unheard of ten years ago.
The Communist Party is not yielding ground easily, however. Trudy Rubin reporting from Beijing, tells of Chen Guangcheng, a blind peasant lawyer, who tried to bring a class action suit challenging forced abortion and sterilization in Linyi. He was seized by the PRC and is being held in an undisclosed location. The Chinese media is forbidden to mention his case. Nevertheless, the New China with its presence on the world stage and the coming 2008 Summer Olympics, is clearly emboldening lawyers to push for peaceful internal political change through the courts.
Wang Xixin, associate dean of Peking University Law School has even created the China Center for Public Participation and Support. One of their key projects is to help farmers assert their legal rights to comment on draft legislation affecting them and challenge expropriation of their land by the government. All in all, strides are being made in a communist ruled country to free folks from the tyranny of the state involving the property rights of the people.
At the time of these encouraging changes, the USA seems to be moving in the other direction. While most conservatives were roiling about the two Ten Commandment cases in the last term of the US Supreme Court [USSC], Kelo v. City of New Haven, flew under their radar. In Kelo, the USSC approved an eminent domain taking by the City of New Haven, CN, not based on:
blight in the Fort Trumball area, but their determination that the area was sufficiently distressed to justify a program of economic rejuvenation..
The city used a state statute authorizing “eminent domain to promote economic development.”
Kelo argued that economic development does not qualify as a “public use” under the explicit language of the 5th Amendment of the US Constitution. The USSC agreed with taking statute:
There is, moreover, no principled way of distinguishing economic development from other public purposes that we have recognized…Clearly, there is no basis for exempting economic development from our traditionally broad understanding of public purpose.
It appears that the PRC and USA are moving in two different directions. While we are a nation of laws not men, the US Constitution is being molded like a wax nose. As Justice Thomas points out in his dissent, the Constitution is being stretched to the breaking point in justifying economic development as “public use”:
Public utility, public interest, common benefit, general advantage or convenience…we are afloat without any certain principle to guide us.
The USSC has opened the door to any government action based on “general public economic good” to condemn private property. Isn’t that what the public interest lawyers in China are trying to curtail? Practices by a totalitarian regime are being adopted by the USSC. We are witnessing quite a role reversal. If you live in an economically depressed area, watch your perfectly fine home or your neighbor’s home may be condemned so a Wal-Mart can be erected to sell Chinese goods. After all, it will bring commerce and jobs to the area. Economic development is a constitutional public use.
God bless those brave Chinese who want to obtain and keep personal, political, property and human rights. God help us here in the USA and the Eastern Continental Divide as our courts continue to limit our rights as a constitutional principle. If you live in a state where a Kelo result is possible, call you state legislator. And if you live in a state where it is not, keep it that way!
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