The Founding Principles
Founders’ Vision of Liberty
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The Founding Principles
Our Country
Opportunity and Absence of Coercion
Building a Great Nation, Part 4 Freedom: Opportunity and Absence of Coercion Freedom is the opportunity to apply free will in personal goals and religious worship. Freedom allows the ability to try, but it no way offers a guarantee of success. And for those who do not succeed or try in a free society, the government is not authorized to redistribute the wealth which comes from the labors of others. The Founders left that individual charity, families and churches be at the local levels. From the earliest colonial days, local governments took responsibility for their poor. However, able-bodied men and women generally were not supported by the taxpayers unless they worked. Opportunity and Help for Those […]
The Founding Principles
Natural Law: Our Founders were Trouble Makers
Our Founders Really Were Trouble-Makers Natural Law: If causing trouble was the goal of the Founding Fathers in 1776, attacking the notion that rulers derived their authority to govern from the Divine Right of Kings was certainly the way to go. The ruling establishments of the most powerful nations on Earth pushed the idea that their kings were chosen directly by God and that their authority, therefore, could not be questioned, nor could the people hold their kings accountable for their actions. Kings, as alleged representatives of God, therefore, were not subject to any earthly authority, certainly not to the people or even the aristocracy of their kingdoms. They were, in a very real sense, […]
History
The Declaration of Independence, Exact Transcript
Declaration of Independence: A Transcription Editor’s Note: This is a transcription of the Engraving of the parchment of The Declaration of Independence, a document on display in the National Archives Museum Rotunda. The spelling, punctuations and wording is exact to the original document. The signers of this Declaration are included at the bottom, along with the state they represented. In Congress, July 4, 1776 The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the […]
Civics
Only In America, Part 2: Keeping The Promise
Only in American, Part Two: Keeping the Promise Dr. Jerome Huyler’s work, Only in America: The Goodness Greatness Begot, has been featured by The Founding Project with this article being the third in the series and the second chapter of his work, entitled “Keeping the Promise”. Huyler’s work is an observation of America and also on civics education in America and is presented by The Founding Project in a series of articles. Dr. Huyler’s essay is a response to one author’s book, which has come to influence a version of civics education in America. But, Dr. Huyler found that book’s content did not coincide with the full civics education programs once prevalent in American schools […]
History
Lemuel Haynes’ Liberty Further Extended
Lemuel Haynes’ Most Important Work Liberty Further Extended… Lemuel Haynes, a Founder, Minuteman, Pastor and Author, penned in an influential essay called “Liberty Further Extended” in response to the Declaration of Independence. His work was a treatise against slavery and an influential stance during the Founding years of the United States. Haynes argued that liberty for one group of people justly meant freedom for all. The story of Lemuel Haynes is featured on The Founding Project website. (See link below.) His most important work, “Liberty Further Extended”, is published here for the benefit of TFP readers and to honor the story of our Founders. The Founding Project publishes his work with no changes, except to add […]
Our Government
The Free Market: Trading Pudding for Pickles
Part of the TFP Founding Principle Series, Tony Wyman continues with an explanation of Free Markets. Trading Pudding for Pickles ~ How the Free Market Made School Lunches Great No matter how many times I told my mother that I absolutely despised Snak Pak Butterscotch Pudding, every day I opened my lunch box in middle school, there it was. That vile, brown-grey paste, sitting in its little plastic tub, took up space in my lunch that should have been occupied by the food I craved most: Vlasic dill pickles. But, my mother, who religiously packed my lunch every day, insisted that I didn’t actually like pickles and that every boy of a certain age absolutely […]
Our Constitution
Our Constitution: America’s Legal Conservator of Natural Law
Conserving Natural Law In Law III of his Laws of Conservation and Energy, Sir Isaac Newton concluded “To every action there is always opposed an equal reaction: or the mutual actions of two bodies upon each other are always equal, and directed to contrary parts.” This best defines a political term of the same root word, conservatism, as the adherence according to Russell Kirk “to custom, convention, and continuity” through the spices permeating “the principle of variety.” As Edmund Burke too noted in a letter to Sir Hercule Langrishe in 1792, “We must all obey the great law of change. It is the most powerful law of nature, and the means perhaps of its conservation,” though “Conservatives,” opined […]
The Founding Principles
Justice: The Absence of Injustice
Building a Great Nation, Part 5 Justice: The Absence of Injustice Having suffered the many injustices of the British government, the Founders were intent on establishing a system of justice, order and defense within the legitimate function of the political realm a limited and delegated authority. Because they believed a person’s unalienable rights such as life, liberty, property, personal pursuit of goals and happiness are gifts from God’s natural law, the role of government they believed would be to secure those unalienable rights. They saw laws as protecting the citizen from criminals and the Constitution protecting the citizen from the government. The Founders saw justice as the absence of injustice achieved by securing individual rights. Justice […]
The Founding Principles
Introducing The Founding Principles
The Founding Principles: An Introduction While The Founding Project does not typically publish editorial pieces, this one seems to be a fitting introduction to a meme series The Founding Project will be rolling out over the coming weeks, which is all about The Founding Principles. The Founding Principles are the ideals or concepts our Founders believed were the base of freedom and a guide for citizens to maintain the freedom for which they fought to hard to attain. As an introduction to this meme series, The Founding Project introduces a guest writer, who has served our nation and whose son now currently also serves. Further, our guest writer also works to benefit the Gary Sinise […]