Don't wait for government to solve problems

Ask people what words best describe our Congressmen and other political officials and many would say, "corrupt", "crook", "thief", for just a few examples. Yet many of these people when faced with a challenge of any kind turn first to the same corrupt, thieving crooks for solutions to problems large and small. Meanwhile, history demonstrates that we don't need government to come up with solutions to our problems.

Consider how the Civil Rights Act of 1964 came to pass. High school history textbooks present the federal government as the hero that righted the wrongs of Civil War reconstruction. But did the federal government really lead the charge? How did the Supreme Court act in defense of American minorities? Famously, the Supreme Court formally legalized prejudice and discrimination with its "separate but equal" ruling. The only reason there's a Civil Rights Act of 1964 is because the American people decided to take action and right the wrongs that government officials had allowed to go on for a century.

Ordinary Americans devoted their time and energy to solve the problem on their own. Once the groundswell of energy was in motion, government finally reacted to the will of the people - though not before violently fighting against this rightful change. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 only put into law what the American people had already demanded.

How about drunk driving laws? How did they come to pass? Government officials paid very little attention to drunk driving. In fact, there was an unwritten, unspoken acceptance among government, the beverage industry and the automotive industry - until a mom named Candace Lightner founded Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) when her 13-year old daughter was killed by a drunk driver. Ms. Lightner first presented the idea that drunk driving was a problem, then created a groundswell of public support to put an end to drunk driving. Once government officials recognized it as a popular issue, they scrambled to get on board and pass a variety of laws against drunk driving. This one, ordinary American began to solve the problem. Government only reacted to what the American people had already demanded.

President Woodrow Wilson was among the many government officials who fought against allowing women to vote.

And how did women get the right to vote? Women's suffrage wasn't in the Constitution and government officials did nothing to help women get the right to vote. In New Jersey, in fact, women actually had the right to vote and in 1807, government officials took it away. It wasn't until the 1830's when women began entering the workforce in greater numbers and recognized they deserved the right to vote and started agitating and becoming vocal about voting that any real progress occurred. In 1848, Elizabeth Cady Stanton organized a conference on womens' rights. It was Stanton who persuaded Susan B. Anthony to get on board. They created the groundswell of support. Then state government officials reacted by passing laws. Yet the 19th Amendment granting women the right to vote didn't pass until 1920 and only overcame the resistance of government because World War I necessitated the support of the many women who joined the workforce during the war.

Clearly, it makes little sense to look to or wait for government to solve our problems. Unfortunately, many people in government prefer to exploit our problems for their own benefit and their involvement often worsens a situation. As people like Martin Luther King, Jr., Rosa Parks, Candace Lightner and Elizabeth Cady Stanton have proven, the most effective solutions come from us, from we, the people.

Today, many doctors across the country, for example, have decided to offer their services on a retainer basis to survive post-Obamacare. In Missouri and Michigan, the government responded to the will of the people by passing laws stating these medical retainer agreements, which have proven to cut costs and promote patient health, may continue unfettered by insurance regulations. Disgusted by the public school system? Scores of ordinary Americans have started charter schools and thousands upon thousands of others now homeschool their children. While the public education system works hard to discredit and control this traditional method of education, many government bodies and boards of education have reacted to this movement by passing laws offering educational flexibility that aim to keep these students - and the funding they bring - in the system. Ready to push back against the rise of the police state? Former U.S. Army paratrooper Stewart Rhodes founded Oathkeepers to defend the Constitution and prevent government officials from destroying the freedoms that allowed America to grow and prosper.

Now, if the thieving, corrupt crooks in government would please just get out of our way, then we, the people are ready to prosper.
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Secession: Screw You Guys! I'm Going Home

My Letter to the Editor, Wall Street Journal

In Michael Trinklein's "Altered States" in the Weekend Journal of April 17-18, he states, "Seceding from the nation is illegal...". The Supreme Court ruled in 1869 in Texas v. White that "The Constitution, in all its provisions, looks to an indestructible Union, composed of indestructible States". It's curious why he didn't state in the article that seceding from a state is also illegal. Or is it that the Court was simply wrong to declare secession illegal? At the time of the 1787 Constitutional Convention, it was widely understood that any state would retain the right to leave the union after ratification if its people determined it was no longer a beneficial agreement. The writings of Thomas Jefferson, Alexis de Tocqueville, George Mason and many others document the thinking of the time was that it would be downright ridiculous for states to be compelled to remain part of a country when the costs and sacrifices outweighed the benefits. New Englanders spent years trying to secede from the union long before the South tried to secede. To the founders, secession was a very real and obvious course of action to check an overbearing central government. Today, talk of secession draws a condescending chuckle mostly because we've been told it's illegal, impossible and a dead issue settled by Lincoln's use of force. The tone of the article reinforces that perspective. As a long-time   reader of the WSJ, I expect more than breezy excerpts - even in the Weekend Journal. Given the facts about the intent of the founders, the issue of secession seems worthy of a more weighty piece written by a journalist. Leave the excerpts and promotional book reviews to the online retailers.

Paul Entin
Bloomsbury, NJ
www.twitter.com/paulentin

Addendum: Rhode Island, New York and Virginia only agreed to ratify the Constitution based on the clear and obvious understanding that the states would leave the union if it no longer benefited its people. Here's a fine explanation from History Vortex.

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Wanted: Historians for Washington Crossing State Park

While looking at some of the Revolutionary War artifacts at the museum in Washington Crossing State Park (New Jersey side), the very nice man working there alerted me that the film was about to start. “OK, thanks.” He mentioned it again a few minutes later. I was looking at some of the maps and thought it very interesting how the European colonists perceived the coastline at that time vs. how the area has actually grown to this day. Raritan Bay was written in very large, bold letters. It was viewed as a hugely important port by this cartographer. New York was secondary and maybe even tertiary behind Delaware Bay for its access to Philly despite New York’s proximity to the Hudson River, if I remember correctly. Anyway, when we asked the nice man a question, he said, “I don’t know, I’m not a historian. I’m just stationed here today.”

!!!!**@!?#*!!?#!??!

Well, why can’t we hire historians to work at these museums? Why not history students studying nearby at Rutgers, Rider, Princeton, the College of New Jersey or any of the other area colleges? Why not their professors? How about retirees with an interest in the period? With all the challenges of managing a park system, with security, facilities maintenance and funding, staffing these historic sites with people who care about history should be the easy part.

UDPATE
Went to the Saratoga National Battlefield last week and the ranger at the desk (Eric Schnitzer) was not only helpful and informative but he was one of the reenactors who participates in the annual reenactment of the battle at Saratoga. He knew what he was talking about and I knew he could answer our questions credibly. Surely, even one participant in the annual reenactment of Washington leading his troops across the Delaware to Trenton would be interested in serving at the park that commemorates that event?
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My Tour of Historic Trenton

I went into Trenton last week to walk the path our soldiers took at the Battle of Trenton. From a stop at Washington Crossing State Park on the New Jersey side, a second stop at one of the bridges where our troops hauled artillery down and up a ravine, we walked from the monument to the Assunpink Creek, to the barracks and elsewhere. How sad that Trenton, Mercer County and New Jersey have squandered their rightful places in our history as the site of many of the key Revolutionary War battles.

Most of us know about Washington crossing the Delaware but Pennsylvania - mostly through its marketing efforts and New Jersey’s absence of any marketing at all – has somehow captured the attention, recognition and tourist dollars. It’s the heroic struggle wintering at Valley Forge that’s become lore, not the heroic struggle wintering at Morristown. Sure, Washington had to start from Pennsylvania to cross the Delaware but he landed in New Jersey and the actual fighting was in New Jersey yet it seems as though New Jersey’s political leaders are bent on denying any role in the events or are at least indifferent to the fact such events occurred. Even the event is commonly referred to as Washington Crossing the Delaware, not the Battle of Trenton. I won't even mention there were two battles of Trenton.

We stopped at a cemetery with Revolutionary War period grave stones, including one of Col. Rall, the Hessian commander who died in the battle. Nearby, was a mass grave of Hessian soldiers hidden under a recently paved parking lot. Just baffling. Someone had to decide to pave over it and no one thought this was even remotely noteworthy. Maybe if there were Union soldiers from the Civil War, runaway slaves or veterans of Manzanar under the pavement the site would have earned some media coverage and a sign as a historic marker. Nope. It’s just the American Revolution. Is it ironic that the original bridge over Assunpink Creek, which was the site of intense fighting during the battle, was razed years ago to make room for the Dept. of Human Services building? Odd that the decline in Trenton’s manufacturing base seems to coincide with the rise of the socialist state. It’s almost inconceivable how Trenton could be dotted throughout the city with historic buildings and attractions, and do next to nothing to capitalize on it yet raise taxes year after year while crying about a lack of funds – and certainly a lack of funds for promoting history and tourism.

I’ve attended Trenton Thunder baseball games and Trenton Titans hockey games but the city offers little else as an enticement to stay longer. No cohesion of events and activities. We go to the game. We go home. New Jersey politicians find it so easy to raise taxes with virtually no consequences. Why should they work to strengthen its tourist economy when they can continually tax us and tax us and still get reelected?
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