What two functions do each of us have that always says we are an individual? It is our mind and our mouth, what we think and what we say. No one can take that away from us. No one can punish us for the thoughts we entertain and how we express them. However, they can try and always have. What are the two most dangerous threats to any dictator? What we think and what we tell others about what we think.

The mind and mouth of the slave are two things that a dictator can never be sure of from anyone they rule. Fear is their only weapon of choice. Fear of retribution, once thought is discovered, is the only way to keep the mind and mouth in check.

In America, following its war of independence and its three constitutions, several of our “Founders” believed it necessary to chain the third constitution down with words that were simple and more forceful to preserve individual freedom. Thomas Jefferson and James Madison demanded a Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the newly ratified Federal Constitution.

The first of those ten amendments dealt specifically with the mind and the mouth, with our thoughts and how we express those thoughts. They felt it was not sufficiently nailed down for posterity to prevent political interference with thought and speech. Here it is, just as it was agreed early in the life of our Constitution, which established a small, limited, well defined central government. It was the first of ten to prevent tampering with liberty for the benefit of a few over the many, as is done today.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

To the freedom of the mind and the mouth they added the right to share with others and express to government, what they were thinking and saying, without fear of reprisal by government. In doing that, it expresses what was in the founder’s minds as to their distrust of the new government, as borne out today. The boisterous 2009 Town Hall meetings, on the issue of national health care, demonstrated the view of the people running the government as critical of the citizens speaking out against their legislative proposals. Their terms to describe those objecting, make their minds and mouths appear criminal.

Why, after the convention delegates spent four hot months shaping a new constitution, would these men go a step further in limiting the constitution as they did? They knew, without these plain, simple, forceful words, the politician would have found a backdoor and route to tyranny, as they are doing today while ignoring the constitution. It happened before the ink on the constitution was dry, with the passing and enforcement of the Alien and Sedition Acts.

It took a new rebellion in 1800, when the Federalists were tossed out of office and Thomas Jefferson was elected President. What glorious foresight he and Madison demonstrated fighting for a Bill of Rights. The First Amendment declared religion and its participation the first right, which is the right of thought. The following rights involved how we expressed our thoughts. All the rights in this amendment define the individual as the principle, not the community.

America prospered because of minds and mouths that were free. Men and women were free to think, to conceive, to believe and to achieve what they believed, and they prospered. As they prospered, their families prospered. As their families prospered, so did their communities.

Reflecting individual freedom and the supremacy of legitimate individual self-interests, when compared to the interests of the community, this amendment protects for each individual the right to think thoughts from his own mind, practice his or her own religion, to go to church, speak openly on the concepts of his beliefs and thoughts, print notices in the paper, or print his own paper, to gather with a group of like minded people and to tell elected and appointed officials in government what he thinks.

The present American government is just one step behind arresting and prosecuting people who complain about the wrongs committed by arrogant bureaucrats.

Clay Barham [send him email] has been a candidate for the California legislature and a stand-in talk show host for ABC.  He was educated in physical and behavioral sciences, with a Ph.D. in sociology.  He is the author of five books, including Foundations of Modern American Conservatism and Liberalism: The Roots of Freedom and Tyranny.  His latest is The Changing Face of Democrats: Libertarian Roots Lost.  Visit his website at http://www.claysamerica.com/.

There is an on-going debate about the extent to the First Amendment bars congressional campaign finance limits. That debate is important, but it doesn’t address a more fundamental question: What empowers Congress to regulate congressional campaign finance at all?

Remember that the Constitution gives Congress only the powers the Constitution lists. All other powers are reserved to the states and people by the Ninth and Tenth amendments.

Regulation of campaign finance is said to be part of Congress’s power to govern the “Manner” of congressional elections under the Time, Manner, and Place Clause (Article I, Section 4, Clause 1).  That provision says the states shall prescribe “the Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives,” but that Congress may (with one restriction) “make or alter such Regulations.”

This past summer, I investigated to find out what the Founders meant by the “Manner of holding Elections.” I found a lot of evidence, most of it unexamined by prior researchers. Interestingly, almost all the evidence suggests Congress was not given power to regulate campaign finance. That was a power reserved to the states and the people.

State regulations of the “Manner of holding Elections” were already quite common when the Constitution was adopted. Although the precise scope of the phrase “Manner of holding Elections” varied somewhat, its widest meaning was not broad enough to include campaign finance laws. And the Constitution’s use of the phrase was narrower than the widest meaning.

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As the Constitution used the phrase, it meant to regulate the voting: that is, to specify what officer was to oversee elections, who was to do the counting, how results were to be recorded, whether open or secret ballots were used, whether the winner needed a majority or only a plurality, and the like.

That’s not all.

During the ratification fight, advocates of the Constitution were insistent in assuring the public that this power of Congress was quite narrow. They explained that the power would be exercised rarely, and only to correct serious state abuses, and that its principal purpose was to enable the federal government to preserve itself if one or more states refused to hold federal elections.

To my knowledge, the Supreme Court has never reached a direct conclusion about this evidence one way or another.

In private life, Rob Natelson is a long-time conservative/free market activist, but professionally he is a constitutional scholar whose meticulous studies of the Constitution’s original meaning have been published or cited by many top law journals. (See www.umt.edu/law/faculty/natelson.htm.) Most recently, he co-authored The Origins of the Necessary and Proper Clause (Cambridge University Press) and The Original Constitution (Tenth Amendment Center). After a quarter of a century as Professor of Law at the University of Montana, he recently retired to work full time at Colorado’s Independence Institute.

At the time, the two major political parties were the Federalists (led by John Adams and Alexander Hamilton) and the Democratic-Republicans (led by Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr – who actually killed Hamilton in a duel!).

The Sedition act was an effort, in practice, to silence opposition press and stifle Democratic-Republican criticism of the Federalists.  Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?

It outlawed conspiracies “to oppose any measure or measures of the government” and made “false, scandalous and malicious writing” against Congress or the president punishable by fine or imprisonment.

First Amendment and free speech be damned!

Democratic-Republican Vice President Thomas Jefferson argued that the act granted too much power to an already authoritative government. He asserted that the 10th Amendment rendered the Sedition Act unconstitutional.  This was on the basis that the 10th reserves to the states and people all powers not specifically granted to the federal government by the Constitution.

But, as to be expected in political battles, Federalists contended that the Sedition Act was “necessary” to ensure that Adams could fulfill his obligations as President without interference – and maintain peace against a threat of war with France.

So, right from the beginning, politicians in the United States have used fear and security as a pretext for passing legislation that violates the Constitution – and severely limits liberty.

The act remained in place until 1801, when it expired upon Jefferson’s inauguration as president. Jefferson pardoned all 24 citizens who had been prosecuted under the statute.

The important thing to note here, though, is the correctness of Jefferson’s position – powers not granted to the US Federal Government are prohibited.  The 10th Amendment makes this quite clear:

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

“Sedition” is part of the American tradition – the Founding Fathers were traitors to England and patriots to a not-yet-formed new country.  This is why free speech and limitations on the powers of government much be enforced.

Frank I. Cobb had something to say on this too:

“The Bill of Rights is a born rebel. It reeks with sedition. In every clause it shakes its fist in the face of constituted authority… it is the one guaranty of human freedom to the American people.”