For many
conservatives in the United States and some
abroad, the reaction to Donald Trump’s conviction in NYC has been some
variant of the phrase, ‘This is unprecedented in US history.’ To which we must reply that this simply is
not the case.
But citizens
of the States are notoriously illiterate
of history. There is a reason for
this, which we will touch on later. But
for the moment it is necessary to recite some of the precedents in US history
for the weaponized court conviction of Donald Trump.
First up is
the Whiskey
Rebellion, which occurred in western Pennsylvania. It was more or less a replay of the
colonists’ rebellion against the British tax on tea, except this time it was
small farmers and producers rebelling against a federal tax on whiskey,
implemented in 1791.
Pres.
Jefferson helped repeal the hated taxes in 1802, but the hypocrisy of the whole
affair is palpable: The very people who
used a tea tax to agitate a war for independence from Great Britain were quick
to squelch a similar maneuver from being used by the poor working-class folk of
western Pennsylvania via the new federal government’s overwhelming military
force. That was an ominous beginning for
the plain folk of the States (i.e., the same type of people who are now ardent
Trump supporters, who are facing the same type of punitive measures by their
elite) under their new federal constitution, written and ratified just a few
years earlier in 1787-8. But more
disturbing actions were to come.
The Alien
and Sedition Acts were passed during the Adams administration in 1798, and bear
an incredibly strong resemblance to what Mr. Trump is undergoing in NYC. Under these Acts, criticism of the federal
government became a treasonous crime that could be punished by fines or a jail
sentence. Benjamin Franklin’s grandson
was charged under the act, dying before his trial, but the
case of Rep. Matthew Lyon is so similar to Mr. Trump’s that it deserves
special notice:
A
sitting member of Congress even found himself caught up in the web spun by the
Sedition Act. Matthew Lyon represented Vermont in Congress and also served as
the editor of the Republican paper The
Scourge of Aristocracy. During his re-election campaign, Lyon wrote
a reply to his Federalist opponents, accusing President Adams of engaging in a
“continual grasp for power” and of having “an unbounded thirst for ridiculous
pomp, foolish adulation, and selfish avarice.” He also blasted the president
for using religion to drum up war against France, writing he could not support
the executive, “when I shall see the sacred name of religion employed as a
state engine to make mankind hate.”
Lyon
was indicted on sedition charges on Oct. 5, 1798, and arrested the next day. A
federal judge fined Lyon $1,000 and sentenced him to four months in prison. (4)
He served time in a 16′ x 12′ cell used for felons, counterfeiters, thieves,
and runaway slaves. Judge William Paterson – an avid nationalist and supporter of the
Federalist Party – lamented
the fact he couldn’t impose a harsher sentence.
Lyon
won reelection while in jail by a landslide.
Will Trump
also win re-election ‘by a landslide?’
Leftists ought to pause to reflect on what their actions may bring
about.
Nevertheless,
the Alien and Sedition Acts also expired under Jefferson’s administration. One might think by these acts that
Jefferson’s years as president would be bright with the light of liberty, but
he also abused federal power. His
embargo measures during the Napoleonic wars in Europe were a cause of much
hardship in New England, bringing the commerce of her great shipping fleet to a
standstill. State governments rebelled,
refusing to cooperate with federal officials tasked with enforcing them, and smuggling
became widespread (full details are provided in J. J. Kilpatrick’s The Sovereign
States).
These
embargo acts would eventually be repealed, but other federal embargo laws would
continue to stir up strife in New England through the War of 1812, culminating
in the pro-secession Hartford Convention of 1814.
It is
telling that callous, repressive measures by the political elite were committed
even by Pres. Jefferson, one of the presidents most friendly towards the ideals
of the Enlightenment/classical liberalism.
This makes the actions of Pres. Lincoln, who was the opposite of Mr.
Jefferson – a
Cromwellian figure, in fact, per Prof. Mel Bradford – all the more
predictable. Pres. Lincoln launched a
war to prevent peaceful Southern secession (the falsely named ‘Civil War’ of
1861-5), and his
actions during that war are amongst some of the worst by a government of
the US against its citizens. Some of the
most egregious include the jailing of upwards of 30,000 citizens of the
Northern States, deporting Ohio’s Rep. Vallandigham for opposing an income tax,
silencing hundreds of newspapers, and intimidating voters.
Other
notable parts of this pattern of precedents include the violent, corrupt
federal Reconstruction
of the South, which followed the War; the assassination of Pres. Kennedy (1963),
likely at the behest of his Vice President Lyndon Johnson, among other
characters; and the Ruby
Ridge killings by the FBI (1992).
What
conservatives saw in a NYC courtroom on May 30th, 2024, shouldn’t
have startled them so badly. Things
equally bad, and things much worse, have been done by their governmental elite
in the past. But, as we noted above, the
historical amnesia of the peoples of the States precludes this. And the cause of this forgetfulness transcends
in importance the foolish and immoral acts of this or that administration or
official.
That cause
is the very thing upon which they pride themselves so highly: American exceptionalism. The freedom of the individual to chart his
own destiny (the main aspect of American exceptionalism) necessarily means the
severing of ties to the past and ties to community – for one to truly become
‘anything he wants to be,’ all restraints must be removed, however benevolent
they may seem, including the most basic duties to one’s religion, family and
neighborhood, history, class, culture, and even one’s own sex.
This hyper-individualism
of theirs also leaves them vulnerable to the thing they dread the most: a tyrannical, lawless government. . . .
The rest is
at https://identitydixie.com/2024/06/15/putting-trumps-conviction-in-historical-perspective/.
Thanks to
Michael Hoffman for pointing out the importance of the Whiskey Rebellion in
his writings.
--
Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us
sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!
Anathema to the Union!
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