Patrick McKnight

Patrick McKnight is a Libertarian Candidate for Assembly in the 16th District. See mcknight1776.com.

The United States Constitution is a formal agreement between a free People and their chosen form of government. As such it is the most important type of binding legal contract. The wisdom of the Constitution is in the establishment of a limited government with clearly-articulated individual freedoms. The adoption of this system and the accompanying Bill of Rights represented a singular historical triumph for civilization, as for the first time a government was established in liberty and reason rather than in plunder and force. Our Constitution, though not perfect nor a panacea, remains the bulwark of our freedom and the source of our national greatness.

This contrast is written in the blood of Patriots who made the ultimate sacrifice so that their children could live in a free, solvent United States of America. Only the Libertarian Party realizes that freedom requires constant struggle because the nature of government is to always revert backwards into illegal tyranny.

Not so long ago the American people suffered under the unlimited power of a feudal monarch. Today the monarch has been replaced by federal bureaucracy but still we are not free. Lest we forget that in an empire the individual is nothing more than government-property with legal rights essentially equivalent  to an animal or inanimate object. Likewise, in an empire there can be no justice because there is no rule of law, only the arbitrary whim of monarchs and despots. In an empire human beings exist only to be exploited, sacrificed in military adventures and oppressed politically. This is the essence of the imperial-feudalism our country was founded to oppose.  In America We the People are the Constitutional Sovereigns and first branch of government.

Unfortunately, our legal contract with government has been repeatedly and methodically breached. The NDAA, PATRIOT ACT and countless executive orders have in effect voided the Bill of Rights. This is the political crisis we confront as 2013 begins: we have truly lost our Constitution and with it the most basic rule of law.

I believe we have a duty to our families, our children and to ourselves to enforce the terms of our Constitutional contract. It is our duty as Citizens to resist with the firmest resolve any infraction on the terms of this most important of agreements. In a Republic the rule of law embodies the principle of freedom and limited government. This is not a bi-partisan issue, this is a non-partisan issue. The Natural Rights of human beings are inalienable and antecedent to the establishment of government. Government is a means to an end, and in America that end is supposed to be freedom.

The NDAA and PATRIOT ACT are anti-Constitutional tyranny. They have no place in a civilization of free human beings. When an individual is considered guilty until proven innocent then that person is not rightly called a 'Citizen', that person is called a 'serf'. In America secret police are not supposed to drag away political dissidents in the middle of the night. Yet this is the legal reality we face today.

Meanwhile, the ongoing global financial crisis continues to destroy jobs in the real economy. The private Federal Reserve continues to throw trillions at the too-big-to-function banks on Wall Street while devaluing the savings of hard-working Americans on Main Street. The Fed's manipulation of interest rates discourages savings and productive investment while encouraging speculation, inflation and asset bubbles.  We have a $17 trillion debt that is mathematically impossible to repay. The end of the global fiat-dollar monopoly looms near, inflation is unfortunately only just beginning.  We have sent our good jobs out of the country through NAFTA and other not-so-free trade deals. The prohibition of marijuana puts peaceful law-abiding Citizens in jail, costing taxpayers billions, while in a free society there is no such thing as a 'victimless crime'. Perhaps most disturbingly, the attempt to disarm peaceful law-abiding Citizens threatens to tear the very fabric of our domestic tranquility.

Though we live with the imminent collapse of the dollar and though we toil beneath the heavy yoke of tyranny, we also live on the cusp of a new era of freedom and enlightenment. Through the internet people can for the first time in history freely communicate with others and educate themselves. I believe we have already reached the irreversible tipping point in favor of liberty. The empowerment of the individual and the decentralization of federal power are the future of America.

The eventual restoration of liberty in America will be a triumphant day that many of us will live to witness. Ours is an intellectual revolution where individuals reevaluate the nature of their relationship with government.  We are fortunate to live in this place and at this time because it offers us a unique opportunity to participate in history. We require an upgrade and system-restore of the original operating system of Constitutional government. The viruses of tyranny and insolvency will be deleted by a combination of popular will and economic necessity.

This is the American Revolution 2.0 and it is inevitable. It is already happening. It is happening through conversations with friends and neighbors. It is happening online and in the alternative media. It is happening in the hearts and minds of a new generation of Americans who value their freedom more than their free material objects.

It is my sincere hope that Dr. Martin Luther King's legacy in this intellectual revolution is the realization that the refusal to initiate force is the definition of moral empowerment. Our singular goal should be to inspire the minds of coming generations with the message of freedom and non-violence. This is the essence of libertarianism.

Despite the ongoing political theatre in Washington DC, the economic forces behind the collapse of fiat money are larger than any government intervention. Sound money is the only solution. Our movement for freedom and solvency in America has truth on its side and the winds of history at its back.

The restoration of the United States Constitution is the duty of every American Citizen. The Constitution is a binding legal document that has been breached much to our disfavor. A common-sense strategy of restoration through nullification will be achieved at the State and local levels. As Jefferson and Madison understood, the Tenth Amendment is the cornerstone of limited government. The Constitution is not a blank check; it could not be more precise in its articulation of limited government power. Only a politician could be confused by the obviousness of its meaning and the clarity of its intent.

It is up to us to keep working at the grassroots level to reach our friends and neighbors. The growing tyranny and insolvency will continue to erode more of the hard-won foundations of our free society. We need to continue to liberate ourselves with the message of freedom denied us by the public miseducation system. An illegitimate and silent coup has been achieved at the highest levels of government because of our own political and economic illiteracy. Only through literacy can we empower our children to think critically and thus educate themselves. Self-directed education is the ultimate empowerment.

I believe a historical victory for reason and enlightenment lay beyond the hard times ahead. We do not require violence for a revolution of ideas. All we require is the will to turn off the television set and open our minds to our own limitless potential. None of us need be concerned with saving the world on our own. If we can only change the way we see ourselves as individuals then the world would save itself.

Freedom is the future, and though struggles await us the depth and duration of which cannot be predicted or overestimated, I believe liberty is destined to prevail. All the bullets and tanks and drones and missiles in the world cannot defeat a revolution of ideas. The day is coming when for the first time an entire generation of freedom-loving Americans of all colors and all creeds will rightly call themselves free at last. I cannot wait for that day.