Assigning respect to a person by virtue of any arbitrary factors is completely unfair. Yes, a special kind of respect must be given to the elderly merely because various generations respond differently, but they deserve no particular level of respect. I would show appropriate respect to the Queen of England merely because of my desire not to make waves. Allowing others power over us merely because of birthright or societal expectations is, as you said, completely ridiculous.

Your point on generalization doesn’t really make sense to me. A large majority of Mormons demonstrably do not wear strange clothes and live on compounds. It is simply not demonstrable that a large majority of America’s Founders shared any kind of detailed political beliefs, other than the simple belief that King George III had gone off the rails.

Good luck with your move.

Elder Cook recently stated that members of the LDS church don’t live in compounds, dress in old-fashioned clothing, or wear unusual hairstyles.”

Doesn’t this just illustrate the point, Connor? Many reasonable people would point to the MTC as evidence that LDS people do live in compounds, do dress in old-fashioned clothes, and do wear unusual hairstyles.

I see this as no different than when a church leader, for example, makes a reference to the congregation as a whole, effectively summarizing what the most common characteristic is. In reference to the FLDS issue, Elder Cook recently stated that members of the LDS church don’t live in compounds, dress in old-fashioned clothing, or wear unusual hairstyles.”

Was he wrong? I’m sure that each of us know a few Saints that have unusual hairstyles or dress funny. What I see in his remark, though, is the attempt to find a common thread, perhaps from the majority. Just as the majority of LDS don’t live in compounds, so too did the majority of the Founders agree on fundamental principles. I’ve never claimed that they generally agreed on specific application and implementation of those principles, but that’s beside the point, I think, since two people who largely agree on an issue will probably disagree on some of the minutiae.

I’m not sure exactly what Connor proposes as the united belief of the Founders, other than that it includes the Constitution. Unfortunately, the Constitution doesn’t interpret itself — and once we acknowledge the plurality of Founders’ opinions regarding Constitutional issues, it becomes clear that we can’t interpret the document simply by reference to original intent.

Then what of Jefferson’s advice on the matter?

On every question of construction [of the Constitution] let us carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed. (Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Johnson, June 12, 1823)

Surely the interpretation of a written document (scriptures being another good example) is subject to various outcomes based upon the individual’s world view, political ideals, and other factors. But I believe that there are many common threads from the Founders’ debates and writings that harmonize quite nicely with one another, regardless of attempts by some modern scholars to divide, presumably in order to conquer and discredit.

I’ll have to end this conversation here for a while, I’m going to be moving into a new house this weekend. While blogging is certainly more entertaining than hefting furniture, unfortunately it’s not quite as productive. :)

Connor’s response to Brad’s point about the nonexistence of such a thing as a perspective of the Founders is a useful example of the intellectual method that troubles me. Connor agrees that the Founders as a group shared little if anything regarding a perspective on how the U.S. ought to be governed. Yet, it would seem, the Founders as a group nonetheless have a position — even though that position is evidently not that of any of the individual Founders. While I have some nostalgia for the Rousseauvian nature of this kind of collective will, it nonetheless remains the case that power in such an account lies in the hands of the person who gets to specify which mixture, out of the several individual perspectives, in fact represents the collective as a whole.

I’m not sure exactly what Connor proposes as the united belief of the Founders, other than that it includes the Constitution. Unfortunately, the Constitution doesn’t interpret itself — and once we acknowledge the plurality of Founders’ opinions regarding Constitutional issues, it becomes clear that we can’t interpret the document simply by reference to original intent. After all, there were only original intents in the plural. So Connor’s appeal to the original unity and beliefs of the Founders seems to be intellectually somewhat hollow. This doesn’t diminish the value of the institutional work that was done, but it does suggest that Connor’s urgent belief that the Founders as a group were believers in some kind of individual liberty (for white, male property owners, obviously) has shaky foundations. It’s unclear that a majority of Founders could be found who would endorse any specific theory of freedom — let alone mid- to late-20th-century libertarianism.

Appeals to scriptural statements about the divine purpose of the Constitution also accomplish much less than Connor might hope. These statements simply warrant that the Founders were God’s tools to create enough freedom of religion and enough international power to spread the church through the world. That’s really it; most other institutional details seem a bit accidental in relation to our canon.

On the evils of monarchy–the Book of Mormon is actually pretty nuanced about this. There are king-heroes with not a whiff of election anywhere to be found. And the switch to ‘democracy,’ such as it is, is not because having kings is per se unjust and tyrannical. Its because a bad king will push people to embrace more immorality and injustice than they would otherwise.

Now, Queen Elizabeth II has not always been fortunate in her children. But I think its hard to argue that she has been pushing much immorality or getting the British people to do injustice. She’s a figurehead.

You choose quotes, talks, and documents selectively, with no justification for why you rely on those texts and not others.

Feel free to provide quotes, talks, and documents that contradict my opinions, and I’ll be happy to comment on the matter, change my opinion as is necessary, or explain why I think they do or do not harmonize. I have my opinions for a reason, and like to think that they’re a result of dedicated study and thought. This in no way means that I’m always right, nor that I’m right the majority of the time. I’ve been wrong many times before. But to change my opinion, I’d need to be presented with material that contradicts what I’ve already studied that makes a strong case for debunking what I’ve come to believe. Even then, I can’t guarantee that I’ll change my mind, but who knows. Stranger things have been known to happen. :)

You also show little if any intellectual openness to other readings or to the possibility that you are wrong. These are the hallmarks of fanaticism, I’m afraid. You’re clearly very smart, but if you live in a closed loop of reason I won’t bother trying to invade it any further.

Since this accusation has been made on other occasions, I’m beginning to wonder how I can better clarify or make known that I’m not intellectually stubborn. I believe that I’m quite open to new and different facts and opinions that differ from my own. I enjoy reading, at times, books, articles, and posts from authors with whom I disagree (in whole or in part) in order to be exposed to various perspectives and beliefs. In that vein, I like this quote: “Only by being made to question our own beliefs can we prevent them from becoming dogma…”

So what apparently appears to some to be a “closed loop of reason” is anything but, I believe. Yes, I strongly believe what I have come to learn and study. A few years ago, I would have argued a different point in many of these cases. But I don’t back down easily from what I believe to be truth, unless I am presented with something that has the potential to refute what I believe or add additional clarity to a gray area. Call it stubbornness if you wish, but rest assured that I am open to insights, perspectives, and information that contradicts my own. (So long as it’s not presented in belligerence. And yes, I myself have been guilty of this before.)

Brad,

Connor, to invoke some imagined past of unfettered individual liberty at this nations founding as an argument against monarchy of any kind in favor of a quasi-Jeffersonian democratic-republicanism/libertarianism betrays the lack of depth to your liberty-based education.

I disagree. Reading over the writings of various of the Founders, it’s clear that liberty and self-government were the main driving forces behind the Revolution. You mention “unfettered individual liberty”, but that notion is absurd. Unfettered individual liberty is essentially libertinism or anarchy, which imply that the individual can do anything he pleases. Few, if any, of the Founders advocated this extreme, nor have I.

Yet it seems to presuppose something like uniformity of opinion among important and influential founding figures.

This is a typical argument made by people who wish to discredit the work of the Founders. Of course they weren’t perfectly united; they were individuals, after all. They had disagreements, they quarreled, they fought for differing restraints on power, and they had different ideas of what the Constitution should ultimately be.

So?

Does this discredit their ultimate work, or negate the importance of God’s statement that He raised them up for this purpose? Does honoring their fruit imply that the tree was perfect? Are they not entitled to the same humanity we enjoy?

In referring to the Founders, by no means am I implying that there was a 100% unity in thought between the group. But the unity they enjoyed—that allowed their work to result in “The Great Compromise”—demonstrates their overall common purpose and goal. Regardless of disagreements, the fight for freedom (as you note, from specific abuses of a specific king) was a fairly universal sentiment among those who framed the Constitution. When it came time to frame a government that would secure that liberty, the group ultimately created not a monarchy, but the Constitutional Republic we currently enjoy (well, sort of..). Regardless of a few individual desires to perpetuate monarchy and install a king in America, the Founders (as a whole) didn’t let it happen. I believe that there is wisdom in the result.

But in a day where we have a “Decider”, I’m not sure that we’re too far away from some fashion of monarchy…

Connor, to invoke some imagined past of unfettered individual liberty at this nations founding as an argument against monarchy of any kind in favor of a quasi-Jeffersonian democratic-republicanism/libertarianism betrays the lack of depth to your liberty-based education. It certainly reflects Jefferson’s animus toward central, hierarchical state power (though none of his animus toward traditional religion). Yet it seems to presuppose something like uniformity of opinion among important and influential founding figures. The founding was not just 1776 (populist revolution against monarchy and the trappings of traditional power). It was also 1787 (the creation of a much stronger centralized government with consolidated power to keep the unwashed masses in check and maintain order and stability). The creation of a national bank was not a scam foisted upon the country by pernicious men trying to undermine the constitution. It was a project vigorously opposed by some (like Jefferson) and vigorously supported by others (including Hamilton, who, unlike Jefferson,actually participated in the drafting of the constitution but was arguably, with the possible exception of Madison, the individual most responsible for the shape the document took and for its ratification). The bank was Hamilton’s brain-child. Adams (arguably America’s most important political theorist) supported it as well. It’s entirely likely that Washington was supportive of the idea, at least in theory, as well. You know what else Hamilton and Adams liked??? Kings! (At least in theory, though they certainly hated George) Hamilton wanted the American executive to be MORE powerful than the king in Britain. Appointed, not elected (even indirectly). Veto with no override. Ability to introduce legistlation. Lifetime tenure. Hamilton wanted a meritocratic king, and Adams constantly argued for treating the President with a reverence reserved for royalty, advocating calling him “your excellency,” etc.

The people who rebelled against English rule in 1776-87 were rebelling against the specific abuses of a specific king and his government. They considered themselves to be better Englishmen than their countrymen across the pond, in the tradition of English constitutionalism. Jefferson was strongly anti-british and anti-monarchy, but Hamilton practically wanted to recreate (in what he considered to be better form) English government here, and Adams was responsible for restoring good relations with the king, a man whom (and whose office) he had deep respect for. Jefferson hated all things English, evincing a strong preference for the direction in which France was moving, including all the excesses of the French anti-Monarchical revolution. He might be disgusted with the direction the country has gone in much the same way that you and Oliver DeMille are. But Hamilton would have been quite pleased.

The Petersen quote you offer is actually pretty strange. Note that Petersen must have believed that God raised up ancient Israel as a nation; the Bible’s pretty specific about that, and Petersen was a literalist. So, Petersen’s statement has to be limited to just countries with written constitutions. Hey presto, Britain’s a different category… Anyway, as I mentioned earlier, various other church leaders haven’t agreed with this sentiment; we’ve got a selective interpretation problem here.

Connor, we obviously disagree somewhat on substance. But the reason I’m checking out of this conversation is concerns about your intellectual method. You choose quotes, talks, and documents selectively, with no justification for why you rely on those texts and not others. You also show little if any intellectual openness to other readings or to the possibility that you are wrong. These are the hallmarks of fanaticism, I’m afraid. You’re clearly very smart, but if you live in a closed loop of reason I won’t bother trying to invade it any further.

Quick! Call the office of the First Presidency! They are about to meet with George W. Bush, of whom God surely disapproves. If only they had your insight.

Re. diplomacy and the U.N.: You have gratuitously and needlessly insulted the U.K., Canada, and Australia, three of America’s most reliable allies. Tell me again why your ideas about diplomacy have any merit at all?

This is the section I was referring to:

This is the one nation in all the world which He acknowledges was set up by His own hand. I don’t know of any other country in all the world, in any period of the world’s history which God set up as a nation and for which He actually raised up men to write its constitution.

Since God set this nation up by His own hand, I believe it then follows that He approves of the method in which it was implemented. Moreover, He went so far as to say that freedom-supporting constitutional law belongs not just to Americans, but to all mankind. I interpret that to say that God approves of the Constitution and the method of government implemented by the men He raised up for the purpose.

On the idea that the U.S. has departed from the Founders’ original design, I think this is self-evident. After all, we’ve abolished slavery, eliminated property and literacy qualifications for citizenship, and enfranchised women.

And set up a national bank, created numerous federal-level offices for which the Constitution gives no authorization, abolished habeas corpus, gone to war without Congressional declaration, to name a few.

You referred to amendments, whereas I didn’t. The Founders knew that they couldn’t achieve certain things, therefore they created a method whereby those things could be added to the Constitution. I’m not referring to legitimate Constitutional amendments (since those are within the scope of Constitutional law), but instead am referring to the frequent and repeated deviance from the written Constitution and the refusal to comply by the provisions contained therein.

That said, is England really a monarchy anymore?

And that said, was Connor speaking against England and the English, or was he speaking against monarchy much as Paine was?

Or perhaps he was speaking against those that revere or idolize the monarchy without understanding its origins?

And in that vein, I think it was pointed out here that the US has its own monarchical (your spell check said this is how it’s spelled) idols as well. Our celebrity idolizing culture is perhaps no better than what Connor was speaking against, and I would submit that many or most of the idolizers don’t understand its origins either.

I’m not sure about this. I can’t find anything in the Petersen talk that claims that God has only specifically approved of one form of government. Could you cite the specific statement you have in mind? I just can’t find anything along these lines.

On the idea that the U.S. has departed from the Founders’ original design, I think this is self-evident. After all, we’ve abolished slavery, eliminated property and literacy qualifications for citizenship, and enfranchised women.