The following principles are taken directly from the book “The 5,000 Year Leap.” This book is a very easy read, but one that should be pondered greatly. If you begin a new chapter of The S.T.A.R. Forum in your area, we will ship you 10 books for the cost of the books only. Please contact us with any questions.
- The only reliable basis for sound government and just human relations is Natural Law.
- A free people cannot survive under a republican constitution unless they remain virtuous and morally strong.
- The most promising method of securing a virtuous and morally stable people is to elect virtuous leaders.
- Without religion the government of a free people cannot be maintained.
- All things were created by God, therefore upon Him all mankind are equally dependent, and to Him they are equally responsible.
- All men are created equal.
- The proper role of government is to protect equal rights, not provide equal things.
- Men are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.
- To protect man’s rights, God has revealed certain principles of divine law.
- The God-given right to govern is vested in the sovereign authority of the whole people.
- The majority of the people may alter or abolish a government which has become tyrannical.
- The United States of America shall be a republic.
- A constitution should be structured to permanently protect the people from the human frailties of their rulers.
- Life and liberty are secure only so long as the right to property is secure.
- The highest level of prosperity occurs when there is a free-market economy and minimum of government regulations.
- The government should be separated into three branches – legislative, executive, and judicial.
- A system of checks and balances should be adopted to prevent the abuse of power.
- The unalienable rights of the people are most likely to be preserved if the principles of government are set forth in a written constitution.
- Only limited and carefully defined powers should be delegated to government, all others being retained in the people.
- Efficiency and dispatch require government to operate according to the will of the majority, but constitutional provisions must be made to protect the rights of the minority.
- Strong local self-government is the keystone to preserving human freedom.
- A free people should be governed by law and not by the whims of men.
- A free society cannot survive as a republic without a broad program of general education.
- A free people will not survive unless they stay strong.
- “Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations – entangling alliances with none.”
- The core unit which determines the strength of any society is the family; therefore, the government should foster and protect its integrity.
- The burden of debt is as destructive to freedom as subjugation by conquest.
- The United States has a manifest destiny to be an example and a blessing to the entire human race.
See the stirring video based on these principles HERE.
The S.T.A.R. Forum 
As usual, the typical denial of the Founding Fathers criticism of democracy and support for a strong central government. While Thomas Jefferson is known for his Compact Theory, George Washington chose to follow Alexander Hamilton’s economic policies that included a central bank, promotion of public works, and tariffs to build up domestic enterprises. John Adams also supported the general population paying for public schooling to advance the common good, and Thomas Paine’s Agrarian Justice promoted the introduction of guaranteed minimum income funded by estate taxes and land owners. Even Skousen’s beloved Thomas Jefferson supported free education. Small government? Hardly.
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It seems you do not fully understand the entire context. It was the tariffs that were used, not our personal income tax. The founders did not agree on everything, for sure. Alexander Hamilton did advocate for a central bank owned and run by the government. He did not advocate for a private bank, which is what we have now with the Federal Reserve. Did you actually read the 28 principles of liberty? I suggest going through them. They aren’t anti-government. They are a people’s government that will create the best people to guide the country, the best laws to create happiness and prosperity.
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Do you know of anyone who has produced a poster of the 28 principles? We study 5000 Year Leap in our Statesmanship Club & thought it would be handy to have, but I don’t see one on the market. Thanks for all you do!
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I only know of the book mark that has all of the principles listed. You can get these from NCCS at http://www.nccs.net/
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Agree with most of the Vanilla principles, but here are some weirdo ones that no good American should tolerate:
“All things were created by God, therefore upon Him all mankind are equally dependent, and to Him they are equally responsible.” – tends to base government on divine law – not natural law.
“The proper role of government is to protect equal rights, not provide equal things.” – providing things (education, opportunities, and safety net is essential to allow people to take risks and be entrepreneurial. People in countries without safety nets are highly risk averse, and that keeps them from venturing capital, and developing.
“To protect man’s rights, God has revealed certain principles of divine law.” – Mans rights are protected by man descerning natural law and its consequences, not divine law.
“Life and liberty are secure only so long as the right to property is secure.” – wrong. Life and liberty can easily be lost with right to property well maintained – as is happening now in America. The rich have all the rights, poor have few real rights.
“The highest level of prosperity occurs when there is a free-market economy and minimum of government regulations.” – We’ve just seen the mess deregulation can do to the economy.
“Strong local self-government is the keystone to preserving human freedom.” – not when it came to abolishing slavery or the civil rights movement in the south where the US government had to force the south to do its bidding.
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I highly recommend you read the book to better understand the basis of these principles. Some of your arguments are answered in the book itself. These principles are not “vanilla” but apply to all of mankind. They are very deep and hold truths that cannot be explained by just reading the principles themselves. Natural law is God’s divine law. It is law that cannot be changed. You can try and bend it to fit your needs, but you won’t be able to bend it forever. The consequence will follow.
Also, your argument on slavery is interesting. If you understand the Declaration of Independence, you would know that the framers changed the wording from “life liberty and property” to “life liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” This wording was changed specifically because of slavery. They did not want this document to give permission of slavery because at the time they were seen as property. They hoped it would change at some future date, but knew changes could only come about once a country was established. Also, you failed to mention principle #6 “All men are created equal.” This principle by itself tells us how wrong slavery was. I did not live when slavery was around. I’ve never owned slaves, my grand-parents and even great-grand parents never owned slaves. I doubt you have slavery in your background that close either. This was a sad time in our history, and it was one that was happening all over the world at the time. Africans were selling their own people into the slave trade. Thankfully, we had a President who saw fit to cleanse our country with it’s own blood in freeing the slaves. It’s time to move forward and stop looking back to things that occurred multiple generations ago as our excuse for the current situations.
It is not the Federal governments responsibility to provide education, or any kind of safety net for our society. I have never been to a classroom where my tax money has gone to the federal system and been given back to the school and done more than my tax money going directly to my state and getting back to my schools. It is just a bureaucracy that eats away at the funds with waste, misuse, and unnecessary red tape. The states can provide adequate and even excellent education when handled at a local level. The state of New York spends more money per student than any other state. The state of Utah spends less per student than any other. The test scores are the same. Money isn’t the answer. Good local control of schools, parental involvement, and high standards in the community are the answer.
The deregulation mess you quote is inaccurate information. The mess that was created was an over-regulation on government forcing banks and lending institutions to give loans without documentation to people who should never have received loans in the first place. Too many people began speculating, and greed took over where common sense should have ruled. Fannie and Freddie were in trouble during the Bush days, and Bush requested multiple times for Barney Frank to look into it, and which time Mr. Frank told the administration that all was well in the federally owned companies. This fiasco could have been avoided by our Federal government being responsible with their “quotas” instead of trying to create housing for the poor that was truly unaffordable to them.
Finally, I hope you will take time to read the book. You may find that after reading the words of our founders and the words of those they looked to these principles will make more sense.
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Dittos! You clearly need to study and think again yourself.
The free market always provides services and goods more efficiently and with better quality than the government. Education brought to you by the unions is appallingly bad in numerous ways. When the government gets out of the way, entrepreneurs (including the poor) can create positive change.
Private property rights are trampled in the US today and that reduces investment, creativity, and risk taking. For example, the government causes inflation by it’s ill conceived monetary policy, then turns around and taxes you on that “long term” capital gain. Gain my bum, much/most of that “gain” is inflation, not real value increase. This 35 year business investor/owner will owe taxes on 75+% of our gain that was inflationary. That is theft. Period!
Current economic problems are not entirely due to deregulation in spite of your assertion. For example, Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, and slick obama all PREVENTED needed regulation sought by GWB that might have alerted or prevented FNMA GNMA problems. The legislators did more harm than good, as they almost always do.
Get over slavery. That was then. This is NOW. BTW, liberals werre mostly at the heart of the votes against civil rights. Those nasty GOP were at the forefront of pushing and voting for civil rights.
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