Sunday, December 16, 2012

Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, the Democratic Party, and Unions

George Will has submitted his latest column as a tribute to Republicans governors, right to work, and workers' rights to keep their money from the prying hands of Democratic political machines.

Despite their growing trend toward more government, the Democratic Party still celebrates their party's "founders"  Thomas Jefferson and later Andrew Jackson. Undoubtedly, these two scions of the former "Democracy" would be ill-suited to the current platform of spending money and expanding the state at the expense of the Constitution.

Thomas Jefferson cut spending drastically after the Federalists fell out of power in1800. He deliberately impounded appropriations back into the state treasury. Andrew Jackson defended the Union against the insurrection of dissident statehouses (including the Nullification Crisis of 1836), yet he loathed the National Bank of the United States because it was "unconstitutional," a term with no bearing on today's Democratic Party, where the former House Speaker first comforted the country with "we have to pass it so that you can see what's in it", then in response to challenges to Obamacare's legitimacy, she scoffed: "Is it constitutional? Really?"

Ironically enough, Jefferson and Jackson would find themselves more at home in the Republican Party. Perhaps they would sympathize with the "Tea Party extremists" who expect Congress and the White House to honor the Constitution as a charter limiting the federal government.

Will also quoted Jefferson's thoughts on the source of revenue for collective bargaining units in this country:

“To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.”

This goes for union dues as well as compulsory tithes. If the Democratic Party of today truly honors their forefathers, then they should forgo their support of the public sector union lobby in their midst.

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