Ramon Arias | February 3, 2014
Perhaps Americans will understand now what others in past generations have experienced throughout the world, that is, how it is to live under the grip of a centralized power, also known as tyranny. History shows that tyrants may go by different names. Nonetheless, the form of government is always the same. Currently, the most common form of government has become an Imperial Presidency and America’s presidency is no exception.
In this nation, the overwhelming majority has elevated the presidency to that of divine. It really does not make any difference who is in that presidential chair whether a Republican or a Democrat because the Emperor in the White House has increased in power thinking he is infallible and that no one can control him. There have been a handful of U.S. presidents who have resisted the temptation of power and adulation. It is considered by reputable historians that Grover Cleveland was the last conservative president. He was a conservative Democrat elected twice to the presidency in 1884 and 1892. He was known for his honesty, courage, and leadership, was business oriented, and a fierce opponent of the leftist forces that were taking control of the Democratic Party. He was also known to be a strong supporter of the gold standard, lower tariffs, and strongly fought against imperialism, corruption, and high taxes. Was he perfect in his conservatism? No, but he was the last conservative president America was to have. In his second term (1893-97) he faced economic crisis and political disorder. He was rejected by his Democratic Party for not bending to the wishes of the left and the capitalist cronies.
We are constantly hearing that Obama’s administration is out of control, that it is destroying the Constitution and that it needs to stop. I’m no fan of Obama, and it has nothing to do with his mulatto skin color. I am friends with people of all skin colors in the States and abroad. My dislike of Obama is that I have an issue with his worldview, which is against the principles of the biblical worldview. My position is the same with any theologian, pastor, Bible teacher and professing Christian that does not uphold biblical concepts. I’m all about knowing and understanding how to apply God’s Revealed Truth in all areas of life, including politics.
Obama is the product of an elite system that he may not even understand the full extent of his makers’ intentions. He is the product of an ongoing malady, not the cause. For any of you who may think that the imperial presidency assisted by the servile elected to Congress and the U.S. Supreme Court and states followers is a modern problem, well think again and do a serious study of our political history starting from 1620 with the arrival of the Pilgrims.
To wet your curiosity or serious interest on the subject you should know that the Constitutional Convention of 1787 in Philadelphia was a struggle because it was self-evident to those involved that, without careful adherence, it was going to create a monstrosity of imperial powers. To some, that is what they wanted. George Washington was elected to be president of the Convention and he established the rules of engagement. The “Virginia Plan” was introduced which called for a strong national government.
Why did they feel the need for such a convention? Because of the insufficiency of The Articles of Confederation which at that time was the founding document for the newly formed nation of the United States; adopted in 1777, but from their perspective the Articles had to be modified in order to give Congress the authority to regulate domestic affairs, to tax and to regulate commerce. In 1786 the newborn nation was bankrupt and European nations despised her. This hurt the pride of some people. Compromises gave us the Constitution, signed September 17, 1787 with a divided vote. Since then we inherited a sick form of government based upon compromises, divided votes and an already divided unhappy nation.
All elected officials have a choice of doing what is right and either pay the consequences for their compromise or receive the benefits of their integrity. They may even enjoy ill gains while they can but sooner or later the backlash will catch up to them. History does not lie. Making concessions with what is wrong has never worked for the good of all. Elected officials will self-serve in spite of all the havoc they bring to their present and future society. They become drunk with power and find it easy to fail their constituents by becoming liars and hypocrites.
Voters elevate elected officials to such prominence of divinity like a presidency. Those who get the prize and believe the lies of adulation of their fictitious greatness become the most dangerous and destructive. This is the reason Roger Sherman wrote to John Adams the following in 1789:
“If the president alone was vested with the power of appointing all officers, and was left to select a council for himself, he would be liable to be deceived by flatterers and pretenders to patriotism.”
Let us look briefly at some of the presidential inclinations to become imperial:
President John Adams misused his position to enforce the Sedition Act in 1798 against journalists who wrote favorably in support of Thomas Jefferson’s candidacy for the 1800 election.
In 1832 President Andrew Jackson openly defied a Supreme Court ruling.
President Abraham Lincoln before and during the War Between the States significantly violated the Constitution in many ways and had a different vision for the nation than the Founding Fathers. Of course, this may come as a shock to many but facts are facts in spite of the efforts of those who have twisted them.
In the 20th century, in the aftermath of the First World War, Democrat President Woodrow Wilson suppressed free speech, immigrants who differed from him politically were deported, and he had an aberration to blacks’ civil liberties. Even though he was a Presbyterian and son of a Presbyterian minister he did not live according to God’s principles like most of the Christians of his time and governed with ideas contrary to God’s principles. Many believe that because of his great quotes from God’s principles that he embraced them, not so. An example of this is that no Christian would argue against him when he said: “When you have read the Bible, you will know it is the word of God, because you will have found it the key to your own heart, your own happiness and your own duty.”
Democrat President Franklin D. Roosevelt, an Episcopalian Protestant Christian, through the power of executive orders imprisoned over 120,000 Japanese Americans, did mandatory surveillance, implemented the use of ID cards, and relocated immigrants from other “hostile” nations.
Not forgetting Republican President Richard Nixon, a Quaker Christian who hosted religious services in the East Room of the White House and used his executive office and law agencies to persecute his political opponents, and through the Watergate cover up, his criminal activities.
Even the conservatives’ beloved Republican President Ronald Reagan, a Presbyterian, expanded presidential powers.
His successor Republican President George H. W. Bush, an Episcopalian, pursued expanded presidential powers.
Democrat President Bill Clinton, a Southern Baptist, also pursued expanded presidential powers. He went as far as to openly affirm what other presidents quietly executed, that siting presidents are immune from lawsuits. In 1997, the Supreme Court denied such a claim.
Republican President George W. Bush, a Methodist, same as the others, abused presidential powers that even Obama called him unpatriotic for increasing the national debt.
Then comes Barack Hussein Obama, who by his own admission professes the Christian faith, and why not! I will let you figure him out with his professing Christian faith and political ideology. The fact is, in practice he is no different than most professing Christians. And when it comes to untruthfulness the experts in psychology and psychiatry affirm he is a pathological liar. Most experts agree he has a lying problem, but I differ from them, to me it’s clear his ideological agenda calls for deception in order to accomplish the goals of the elite who are behind him. The old phrase, “The end justifies the means” exemplifies the goal of social engineering of the new America and for now it can only be accomplished by means of deception. This is the reason the Press Secretary is paid to constantly lie and the mainstream media must sustain that propaganda to cover all the trickery coming from most of the other two branches of government. They are, after all, part of the machinery that caused an incompetent man to hold such an office in comparison to the forefathers and most Founding Fathers. Knowing them by their fruit still holds as the unmovable test for all individuals and institutions. Back to the experts, after examining his speeches and campaign pledges from 2007 and 2013 they found a mountain of lies, broken promises, hypocrisy and endless rhetoric. One thing is for sure, he has surpassed all his predecessors when it comes to using or abusing executive orders, ignoring Congress, and we have not seen the end of the consequences.
Noah Webster, called “Father of American Scholarship and Education,” was the author of the first American dictionary, renowned lexicographer, textbook author, spelling reformer, political writer, and editor. He summarized America’s problem with the divinization of the presidency, and all public offices at county and state level, not just the federal when he said:
“When you become entitled to exercise the right of voting for public officers, let it be impressed on your mind that God commands you to choose for rulers, ‘just men who will rule in the fear of God.’ The preservation of government depends on the faithful discharge of this duty; if the citizens neglect their duty and place unprincipled men in office, the government will soon be corrupted; laws will be made, not for the public good so much as for selfish or local purposes; corrupt or incompetent men will be appointed to execute the laws; the public revenues will be squandered on unworthy men; and the rights of the citizens will be violated or disregarded. If a republican government fails to secure public prosperity and happiness, it must be because the citizens neglect the Divine commands, and elect bad men to make and administer the laws.”
Elected officials are the reflection of the people who elect them. This is the moral law and it’s universal. People who vote are voting for those who will represent their values. Those who abstain from voting in reality do vote for the ones chosen by others; technically accepting the election results in violation of God’s commands.
What are God’s commands when it comes to electing public servants? “Elect just men to office who will rule in the fear of God.”
How do we do that? By following God’s instructions in Deuteronomy 17:14-15 and 18-20:
“When you come to the land that the Lord your God is giving you, and you possess it and dwell in it and then say, ‘I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me,’ you may indeed set a king over you whom the Lord your God will choose. One from among your brothers you shall set as king over you. You may not put a foreigner over you, who is not your brother…. “And when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself in a book a copy of this law, approved by the Levitical priests. And it shall be with him, and he shall read in it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the Lord his God by keeping all the words of this law and these statutes, and doing them, that his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers, and that he may not turn aside from the commandment, either to the right hand or to the left…”
Jesus reminded the Jews of His time there is a marked difference between rulers who follow God’s moral law and those who do not and that God’s principles to elect government officials do not change with time, God’s moral laws do not evolve:
“But Jesus called them to him and said, ‘You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.’” Matthew 20:25-28
Next time you hear that government is a necessary evil, that’s a lie! God is the one who establishes civil government to be under and not independent from His moral law. When government is done by Biblical Standards it can never be evil. The imperial presidency and corrupt government at all levels exists because God’s people neglect to stand upon His principles and that is what Noah Webster was conveying.
The condition of the Union is more the responsibility of God’s people than those who do not know that God Almighty Rules Supreme in the affairs of men and nations.
It is not acceptable to complain about the leadership we now have in civil government, we must be accountable to God and future generations, and change the downward course. It is time Biblical Christians accept the historical facts that America will be destroyed from within due to corruption. Also, we must understand and accept the challenge to restore the nation to be under God by electing individuals to public office that align with God’s principles above political party.
“When the righteous increase, the people rejoice, but when the wicked rule, the people groan.” Proverbs 29:2