Sowing Liberty
by Dr. Ron Paul
Orginally published in Homeschooling Today® magazine, March/April 2008
We live in one of the most difficult times in history for guarding against an expanding central government. We are seeing a steady erosion of our freedoms. We have arrived here because our ideas, our words—and the actions that follow—have consequences. Homeschoolers, by-andlarge, understand that bad ideas have bad consequences, and even the best of intentions can have unintended consequences. We need to understand exactly what ideas brought us to this point. We can then, I hope, reject the bad ideas and reform our thinking toward a better set of intellectual parameters. Our goal should be to identify what ideas are now shaping our culture and work to sow the seeds of liberty for the generations who will come after us.
God hath not given us a spirit of fear…
Currently, the mood of our country is dominated by a powerful word: fear. Fear is not always the product of irrational thinking. However, once experienced, fear can lead us away from reason, especially if it is extreme in duration or intensity. This kind of fear is a threat to rational liberty. When people are fearful, they are more willing to irrationally surrender their rights. The psychology of fear is an essential tool of those who want us to increasingly rely on "the powers that be" to manage the apparatus of the central government.
Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. —attributed to Benjamin Franklin
Clearly, people seek out safety and security when they are in a state of fear, and the result is often the surrender of liberty. We must remember that liberty is the ultimate security.
Our love for liberty has been so diminished by fear—of everything but God—that we tolerate intrusions into our privacy that most Americans would have abhorred just a few years ago. American history, at least in part, is a history of people who refuse to submit to the will of those who have no rightful authority over them. Yet we have increasingly empowered the federal government and its agents to run our lives, far beyond their jurisdiction to do so. The seeds of future tyranny are being sown and many of our basic protections from government oppression are being undermined. We tolerate new laws that allow the government to snoop on us, listen to our phone calls, track our financial dealings, make us strip down at airports, and even limit the rights of habeas corpus and trial by jury...
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As a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, Congressman Ron Paul tirelessly works for limited constitutional government, low taxes, free markets, and a return to sound monetary policies. Known among his congressional colleagues and his constituents for his consistent voting record, Dr. Paul never votes for legislation unless the proposed measure is expressly authorized by the Constitution. His consistent voting record prompted one of his congressional colleagues to say, "Ron Paul personifies the founding fathers' ideal of the citizen-statesman. He makes it clear that his principles will never be compromised, and they never are." Reach him at: www.ronpaul2008.com.
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