Now that the voting is complete and the battle for honesty, integrity, and legitimacy is being pursued there are some who insist that all non-Leftists should hang their harps on the willow branches and sit around the campfire singing Kumbaya.  I do not believe that is a legitimate option because there is still much work to be done.  I guess it depends on which side of the political aisle you sit and how you view the election as to what your choice of pathway is.  In my view, we must realize that the voting is complete but in many respects, the battle for our Constitutional Rights has just begun.

I want to say something at the outset before I engage in the designed and desired topic of Constitutional Rights in 2020 America and beyond.  “I am fed up with Hate!”  I have had people who profess to be Christians with such animosity and animus toward Donald John Trump that they insist that it was imperative that he be defeated because he is the embodiment of evil and everything anti-biblical.  I hear “hate” that is so overflowing and vile it is alarming. 

I refer to the Bible and 1 John 2.  The apostle John, speaking through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, declared the impact of ‘hate’.  If you call yourself a Christian and you hate, the Bible says you are, at best, deceived, and at worst, a liar.  In fact, in verse 9 we read, “The one who says he is in the light and yet hates his brother is in darkness until now.”  Do not argue that means you only have to love other Christians, it does not.  It means if you cannot love people and reject hate, you are exhibiting the qualities and character of the enemy of love and the enemy of God, the devil. 

Hate is incredibly powerful and hate like love and almost everything else in life is a choice.  If you allow hate to drive your actions and reactions, you are in a spiritual prison that can only lead to destruction.  There is no life in hate only death. 

Our nation cannot survive a continuation of the vitriolic hate that has been manifested since the elections of 2016.  Former President Barack Hussein Obama charged that Trump was elected in 2016 because America was ‘spooked’ by a Black Man in the White House.  Racism did play a part, but it was not Trump’s racism or his supporters but the racism advanced, embraced, espoused, and engendered by Barack Obama and his cohorts in government, the media, Hollywood, etc.  Hate because a cornerstone of his administration and he and Joe Biden sought to ‘fundamentally transform’ America and strip Americans of many of our Constitutional Rights. 

I have contended for a long time something that is rapidly becoming a foundation block in my appeal.  My cry is that All Americans turn their focus upon God and then upon Congress, the Courts, State Governments, Local City Governments, and auxiliary offices such as School Boards, etc.  We have, for too long, attempted to change the culture of politics by focusing on the National Elections failing to realize that if the foundation is solid the structure will be as well. 

If the grassroots are strongly rooted in constitutional principles and we manage to win a majority, from the local to the national level we can influence Washington positively and effectively.  Our historic problem has been we have elected politicians to represent us in Washington and they have the propensity to make campaign promises which they ignore once in the hallowed halls of Congress.  Unfortunately, we have allowed them to escape the consequences of failing us and returned them to DC time and again.  But if we had the foundation right those individuals would ignore our wishes with great trepidation knowing there would be swift consequences for failure.

One issue that cannot be ignored is the 2^nd Amendment and our individual right to ‘keep and bear arms.’  When the American Constitution was hammered out there were two significant opposing forces seeking compromise and common ground on many things.  However, one thing that the Federalists and Anti-Federalists agreed upon was the right of citizens to be armed. 

The Anti-Federalists did not want a standing army and the Federalists did.  However, neither wanted to disarm the citizens.  Both sides believed that armed citizens could and would take responsibility, in a large measure, for their own security, and exhibit and cultivate the self-reliance and vigorous spirit that are indispensable for true self-government.  Of course, that view is anathema to the liberal progressive view of most Democrats.

The Constitution was designed to suppress the tendencies of human nature to become overly ambitious politically which ultimately leads to soft or hard tyranny.  Of course, we have a much different society and the world than they did in the late 1700s.  Much has changed both for the better and worse but one thing that is constant is the depravity of man and the propensity of man to seek power. 

The Elitist Left has been seeking to infringe on our 2^nd Amendment rights for decades and sadly, some on the right are falling into agreement with their views.  It is all being done under the guise of making everyone safer, but the empirical evidence suggests the exact opposite.  Unfortunately, many if not most lawyers have been heavily involved in this war against the individual right to ‘keep and bear arms’ as guaranteed by our Constitution. 

Alexis de Tocqueville believed and warned that lawyers would eventually become somewhat of a democratic aristocracy to our hurt.  Until 2008 not one federal judge had sustained a challenge to the Second Amendment but that is shifting with each new Congress, set of judicial appointments, and the advancement of the liberal progressive agenda.

I have been appalled at some, so-called constitutionalists and conservatives including the late Dr. Charles Krauthammer on the issue of ‘gun rights’ and ‘gun control.’  He was found to often lament this issue.  He said, “unless you are prepared to confiscate all existing firearms, disarm the citizenry and repeal the Second Amendment, it’s almost impossible to draft or craft a law that will be effective.”  He did not stop there but said, “Ultimately, a civilized society must disarm its citizenry if it is to have a modicum of domestic tranquility of the kind enjoyed in sister democracies like Canada and Britain.”

When he said it, I thought “Seriously, Dr. Krauthammer?”  Do you honestly think there is no violence in those nations?  How about the cities in the United States with incredibly stringent gun control laws and virtual gun bans citywide?  How is that working out?  Have you considered the states and cities where people are allowed, to ‘keep and bear arms?’  In those areas, violent crime has been reduced.  You and the liberal progressives are completely missing the point.

The 2^nd Amendment was not designed to protect State Militias’ right to ‘keep and bear arms’ and to suggest that is what it intends is ludicrous.  That would not be necessary and would not have been included in the Bill of Rights were that the case.  No, the founders sought to ensure that citizens would maintain their inalienable right of ‘self-defense’ and to effect that their right to ‘keep and bear arms’ had to be protected.  Thus, the 2^nd Amendment!  In the Constitution and Bill of Rights, the founders expressed the recognition of certain inalienable rights which included ‘self-preservation’ which by implication includes the ability and right of ‘self-defense’ and to facilitate that is the ‘right to keep and bear arms.’  

Roger Sherman reemphasized the sentiments of John Locke regarding the strong connection between individual and collective self-defense.  His position was: [Sherman] conceived it to be the privilege of every citizen, and one of his most essential rights, to bear arms, and to resist every attack upon his liberty or property, by whomsoever made. The particular states, like private citizens, have a right to be armed, and to defend, by force of arms, their rights, when invaded.

Gun control has been implemented by tyrants throughout history.  Before a tyrant can gain complete control, he must effectively disarm the citizens.  However, it is more than just protecting ourselves against tyrannical governments it is a basic inalienable right to protect and defend our person and property.  No legitimate government has the right to infringe upon that right.  So, my fight is to ensure that my elected representatives are staunch supporters of the 2^nd Amendment when push comes to shove not just giving flowery assent to the idea. 

There are many more issues on the table including our 1^st Amendment Rights of Freedom of Speech, Religion, and Peaceable Assembly.  There is the issue of Private Property Rights, Taxation, Abortion on Demand, Illegal Immigration, Open Borders, Obamacare, and Churches.  There is the issue of Freedom of Travel and the infringement of the declared hope of the Declaration of Independence that all Americans would enjoy the Right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.

America, we can fold our tents, hang our harps on the willow branches, and sing Kumbaya around the campfire like docile sheep or we can stand for our God-given Rights.  I will stand, as long as I have breath, for Faith, Family, and Freedom.

God, bless you and God bless America!