The U.S. Government and Universal Human Rights
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…” The Declaration of Independence
“Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.” Amendment VIII
In this time of turmoil and chaos, when, as Yeats said, “The best lack all conviction, while the worst/Are full of passionate intensity,” I find it comforting to review the founders’ mission statement i.e. the Declaration of Independence, excerpted above and the 8th amendment to the U.S. Constitution, a document meant to implement the mission.
More than other nations, the United States of America was founded on the idea of individual freedom and the principles of justice. Those principles were enshrined in the U.S. Constitution and evolved over the years to a greater or lesser degree. As recently as the 70s, we citizens thought we were making practical progress. The end of the cold war and the peace and prosperity of the Clinton years turned our heads.
Now the greedheads i.e. the corporate oligarchs are taking back the gains made by average Americans. In light of recent revelations by the U.S. Senate Committee on Intelligence, it has become clear that American leaders and agents have subjected the innocent and the guilty alike to torture in “our name.” Behind the scenes the bankers are calling the tune for the war on terror, aka the dream come true for private contractors.
As political historian William Pfaff has reminded us, “The wartime Western allies, their judges sitting in judgment on war crimes in the city of Nuremberg, ordered hanged until dead eleven major World War II criminals at Spandau Prison in Germany on October 6, 1946. Those judged were not hanged because their crime was that they were themselves torturers; they were too highly placed for that. They were people who had ordered that the gloves be taken off. It was the people under their orders who took the gloves off and tortured and murdered.
“For many years preceding the Second World War torture of a human being was widely accepted as being a heinous crime. It was not formalized in international law as such, because it was taken as part of the General Law of Humanity, which is to say law that was taken to be obvious to humans in Western Civilization.”
Former Vice-President of torture, Dick Cheney, has indicated that he has no remorse for his participation in crimes against humanity, even while ignoring the evil done to innocents. He and his cohorts, the President, various government attorneys, CIA Agents, and private psychologists all participated in heinous crimes to little or no affect other than satisfying what must be considered a sadomasochistic urge to punish alleged wrongdoers.
The dangers of letting loose lawless operators, who claim they represent patriotic responses to external threats reinforces the righteousness of street side antinomian police officers, who claim concerns for “officer safety” permit shooting down black males nationwide or the homeless in New Mexico. (Antinomianism characterizes those who believe salvation comes solely from faith followed by grace: good works be damned.) Cheney and the cops in Ferguson, Staten Island, Cleveland, and Albuquerque apparently believe in their own godlike judgment.
This dark tale of recurring viciousness aimed at the African American was once enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, where these “non-citizens” were considered 3/5th of a person until the 13th Amendment was ratified on Dec. 6, 1865. The clause benefitted the slave holding class and financiers who promoted the American capitalist system and profited on the backs of slave labor as much as it did on the great natural resources and genocide of the Native Americans. The latter didn’t become citizens until 1924 and weren’t allowed to vote in all states until 1934. Custer, they say, died for the sins of Capital.
Despite the Civil Rights gains made in the 60s, retrograde police and financial policies i.e. the institutionalization of the inequality of wealth, which amounts to class warfare, degrades opportunity not only for African Americans but also for other members of the middle classes, who are slipping down the economic rungs into poverty and indentured servitude.
The violence aimed at alleged “terrorists abroad” by the national security state connects the aims of bankers at home to the police and politics. The rise of domestic spies, onerous living expenses, degradation of social welfare programs and declining educational opportunities, as well as the assault on the environment all speak to an attack on universal human rights.
The Declaration of Independence continues from the quotation above, saying, “That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends [life, liberty, happiness, justice], it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
It’s time for us citizens to withdraw our consent.