Comment on Sovereignty

[Peter1469]

It is a global economy. Depending on your skills there are plenty of options.

I only get down on the US for failing to be what it is supposed to be. The American federalism that I talk about non stop is a gift to the world. I just wished we practiced it again. But even considering that we don't, the US isn't bad.

I only wish it were great.

Im certainly not the brightest guy around and I have to avoid threads because I totally have no knowledge of the subject.

Theres alot of hating on america lately, maybe hating is the wrong word and disdain or disillusionment.

I think about all our problems and what alot of people rail about. Then I ask myself, then why are people from all over the world still wanting to come here. Then I think even more and try to think of a country thats actually better and I cant.

Can you folks think of a country thats better to live in than here. Maybe Ill move

[Common]

I dont know Im a patriotic guy, I did for my country I didnt just take and I dont know how to feel about all the crazyness and the railing on everything america does. Being on this forum helps because I see other views and especially the view of younger americans and that helps me to understand. Doesnt mean im sold on their right but I understand.

From this older perspective it seems like alot of people just want it to be the way they want it and they dont consider that theres others that want it another way and neither is willing to take a half a loaf. So were all raging in all different directions. Some go bonkers over the cia spying. I dont know a single person that that bothers. Young guy and old in the VFW my kids that doesnt seem to bother any of them. Here and other forums its a huge issue. Point is everyone views things different and all of us cant it our way. We have to share.
I do love my country that sounds corny in this new world I guess but I really feel that way.

[Redrose]

When I'm not on drugs I'll answer this. @Alyosha : note to self, serious response required.

Note to others: I had surgery today. Drugs are required.

I hope you feel better soon. The only good thing about surgery is the drugs.

[Chris]

The experience of the British Commonwealth has disproved the Hobbesian doctrine that if political power is not concentrated, society returns to the law of the jungle. It has shown that it is possible to divide sovereignty and yet preserve the bond of peace and the order of civilized community.

-Chris Dawson....

In order to understand this, it might be useful to compare Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau.

Hobbes saw the nature of man as immoral and evil, selfish and warlike, left alone we'd all be at each others throats. Thus power alone could restrain this nature, power in the form of absolute monarchy, the Leviathan, with subjects as body and king as head who was divine and represented God.

Locke saw the nature of man as free to be moral with natural rights, to be left alone to be moral in interaction with others. In order to protect these rights some were given up in social contracts to form limited government.

Rousseau saw the nature of man as free and equal and basically good and civilization as corrupting. In order to avoid this corruption, governments are formed to represent the general collective will.


From the British Commonwealth that at one time the sun never set on has emerged many smaller states, US, Canada, India, etc etc. Political power is not concentrated, we're not all fighting each other.


BTW, Hobbes is generally consider conservative and Rousseau liberal. Much of Locke is found in the opening sections of the Declaration.

[CaveDog]

That's why I made the change point at the passage of the Seventeenth Amendment (1913). When Senators ceased to be the representatives of the states and became the representatives of the people, federalism effectively died, and with it died sovereignty.

Agree on that. Senators should still be elected by state legislatures. When they're elected by the same people as the house they are just a second house.

[Chris]

Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau had their views and so did Edmund Burke. From A Vindication of Natural Society

...In the State of Nature, without question, Mankind was subjected to many and great Inconveniencies. Want of Union, Want of mutual Assistance, Want of a common Arbitrator to resort to in their Differences. These were Evils which they could not but have felt pretty severely on many Occasions. The original Children of the Earth lived with their Brethren of the other Kinds in much Equality. Their Diet must have been confined almost wholly to the vegetable Kind; and the same Tree, which in its flourishing State produced them Berries, in its Decay gave them an Habitation. The mutual Desires of the Sexes uniting their Bodies and Affections, and the Children, which were the Results of these Intercourses, introduced first the Notion of Society, and taught its Conveniences. This Society, founded in natural Appetites and Instincts, and not in any positive Institution, I shall call Natural Society. Thus far Nature went, and succeeded; but Man would go farther. The great Error of our Nature is, not to know where to stop, not to be satisfied with any reasonable Acquirement; not to compound with our Condition; but to lose all we have gained by an insatiable Pursuit after more. Man found a considerable Advantage by this Union of many Persons to form one Family; he therefore judged that he would find his Account proportionably in an Union of many Families into one Body politick. And as Nature has formed no Bond of Union to hold them together, he supplied this Defect by Laws.

This is Political Society. And hence the Sources of what are usually called States, civil Societies, or Governments; into some Form of which, more extended or restrained, all Mankind have gradually fallen....

...On the whole, my Lord, if Political Society, in whatever Form, has still made the Many the Property of the Few; if it has introduced Labours unnecessary, Vices and Diseases unknown, and Pleasures incompatible with Nature; if in all Countries it abridges the Lives of Millions, and renders those of Millions more utterly abject and miserable, shall we still worship so destructive an Idol, and daily sacrifice to it our Health, our Liberty, and our Peace? Or shall we pass by this monstrous Heap of absurd Notions, and abominable Practices, thinking we have sufficiently discharged our Duty in exposing the trifling Cheats, and ridiculous Juggles of a few mad, designing, or ambitious Priests? Alas! my Lord, we labour under a mortal Consumption, whilst we are so anxious about the Cure of a sore Finger. For has not this Leviathan of Civil Power overflowed the Earth with a Deluge of Blood, as if he were made to disport and play therein?We have shewn, that Political Society, on a moderate Calculation, has been the Means of murdering several times the Number of Inhabitants now upon the Earth, during its short Existence, not upwards of four thousand Years in any Accounts to be depended on. But we have said nothing of the other, and perhaps as bad Consequence of these Wars, which have spilled such Seas of Blood, and reduced so many Millions to a merciless Slavery. But these are only the Ceremonies performed in the Porch of the political Temple. Much more horrid ones are seen as you enter it. The several Species of Government vie with each other in the Absurdity of their Constitutions, and the Oppression which they make their Subjects endure. Take them under what Form you please, they are in effect but a Despotism, and they fall, both in Effect and Appearance too, after a very short Period, into that cruel and detestable Species of Tyranny; which I rather call it, because we have been educated under another Form, than that this is of worse Consequences to Mankind. For the free Governments, for the Point of their Space, and the Moment of their Duration, have felt more Confusion, and committed more flagrant Acts of Tyranny, than the most perfect despotic Governments which we have ever known. Turn your Eye next to the Labyrinth of the Law, and the Iniquity conceived in its intricate Recesses. Consider the Ravages committed in the Bowels of all Commonwealths by Ambition, by Avarice, Envy, Fraud, open Injustice, and pretended Friendship; Vices which could draw little Support from a State of Nature, but which blossom and flourish in the Rankness of political Society. Revolve our whole Discourse; add to it all those Reflections which your own good Understanding shall suggest, and make a strenuous Effort beyond the Reach of vulgar Philosophy, to confess that the Cause of Artificial Society is more defenceless even than that of Artificial Religion; that it is as derogatory from the Honour of the Creator, as subversive of human Reason, and productive of infinitely more Mischief to the human Race.

If pretended Revelations have caused Wars where they were opposed, and Slavery where they were received, the pretended wise Inventions of Politicians have done the same. But the Slavery has been much heavier, the Wars far more bloody, and both more universal by many Degrees. Shew me any Mischief produced by the Madness or Wickedness of Theologians, and I will shew you an hundred, resulting from the Ambition and Villainy of Conquerors and Statesmen. Shew me an Absurdity in Religion, I will undertake to shew you an hundred for one in political Laws and Institutions. If you say, that Natural Religion is a sufficient Guide without the foreign Aid of Revelation, on what Principle should Political Laws become necessary? Is not the same Reason available in Theology and in Politics? If the Laws of Nature are the Laws of God, is it consistent with the Divine Wisdom to prescribe Rules to us, and leave the Enforcement of them to the Folly of human Institutions? Will you follow Truth but to a certain Point?

Sorry so long but that's the way they wrote back then.

I particularly like the line "This Society, founded in natural Appetites and Instincts, and not in any positive Institution, I shall call Natural Society." Positive there meaning positive laws, man-made laws, and institutions, as opposed to natural.

[Adelaide]

In order to understand this, it might be useful to compare Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau.

Hobbes saw the nature of man as immoral and evil, selfish and warlike, left alone we'd all be at each others throats. Thus power alone could restrain this nature, power in the form of absolute monarchy, the Leviathan, with subjects as body and king as head who was divine and represented God.

Locke saw the nature of man as free to be moral with natural rights, to be left alone to be moral in interaction with others. In order to protect these rights some were given up in social contracts to form limited government.

Rousseau saw the nature of man as free and equal and basically good and civilization as corrupting. In order to avoid this corruption, governments are formed to represent the general collective will.


From the British Commonwealth that at one time the sun never set on has emerged many smaller states, US, Canada, India, etc etc. Political power is not concentrated, we're not all fighting each other.


BTW, Hobbes is generally consider conservative and Rousseau liberal. Much of Locke is found in the opening sections of the Declaration.

I wouldn't include the US in the British Commonwealth. You guys fought them off early on. True Commonwealth nations gradually earned sovereignty and we remain mostly close allies, often with a shared Queen and royal family. Most of us have retained the constitutional monarchy model, as well as/or the parliamentary system we inherited from Britain. Our legal systems are modeled after them. We still have representatives for the Queen in many of our governments. The US has none of these qualities, except perhaps a constitution that sort of resembles that of Britain's in a few ways.

The US is a former colony (or group of colonies), not a Commonwealth nation. We are the UK, Canada, Australia/NZ, India, the various former British colonies in Africa, same for Asia, and a group of island nations in the Pacific and Atlantic. But we are not all peaceful. Some of us are much closer and have sort of a brother/sisterhood where we fight each other's battles and enjoy membership with one another. I wouldn't include Pakistan in that group, to use one example. They're corrupt and don't share the same relationship that Canada, the UK and Australia has, to use another example.

[Chris]

I wouldn't include the US in the British Commonwealth. You guys fought them off early on. True Commonwealth nations gradually earned sovereignty and we remain mostly close allies, often with a shared Queen and royal family. Most of us have retained the constitutional monarchy model, as well as/or the parliamentary system we inherited from Britain. Our legal systems are modeled after them. We still have representatives for the Queen in many of our governments. The US has none of these qualities, except perhaps a constitution that sort of resembles that of Britain's in a few ways.

The US is a former colony (or group of colonies), not a Commonwealth nation. We are the UK, Canada, Australia/NZ, India, the various former British colonies in Africa, same for Asia, and a group of island nations in the Pacific and Atlantic. But we are not all peaceful. Some of us are much closer and have sort of a brother/sisterhood where we fight each other's battles and enjoy membership with one another. I wouldn't include Pakistan in that group, to use one example. They're corrupt and don't share the same relationship that Canada, the UK and Australia has, to use another example.

I see the distinction you're making, and it is true as colonies we rebelled early on while Canada and others emerged independent gradually.

Still, it is true, history shows power has not concentrated but decentralized.