Bfgrn
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Rules for Changing a Limited Republican Government into an Unlimited Hereditary One
Volume (?)
1784-1796
Organizing the New Nation
THE ANNALS OF AMERICA
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Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc.
100
Philip Freneau
Rules for Changing
a Republic [into a Democracy, then] into a Monarchy
Those who had opposed the constitution thought their fears justified by the conduct of the government that began to function in 1789. Under the aggressive leadership of Alexander Hamilton, the secretary of the treasury, economic measures were taken that favored the few, while a effective party machine was organized and the army strengthened in such a way as to suggest an intent to control rather than to represent the many. The whole tone of Washington's administration was aristocratic, favoring as it did the educated, the wealthy, the clergy, and the press, who were fearful of "mob rule" and preferred to see what Hamilton called "gentlemen of principle and property" in command. As Hamilton had at his service a newspaper - John Fenno's Gazette of the United States - to support his policies, his opponents, led by Jefferson and Madison, decided to establish a rival newspaper, the National Gazette. Philip Freneau, an experienced journalist of known democratic leanings, was chosen to edit the paper. The editorial, reprinted here, is typical of those in which Freneau criticized the Hamiltonian program from 1791 to 1793.
Source: American Museum, July 1792: "Rules for Changing a Limited Republican Government into an Unlimited Hereditary One."
Rules for changing a limited republican government into an unlimited hereditary one.
1. It being necessary in order to effect the change, to get rid of constitutional shackles and popular prejudices, all possible means and occasions are to be used for both these purposes.
2. Nothing being more likely to prepare the vulgar mind for aristocratical ranks and hereditary powers than titles, endeavor in the offset of the government to confer these on its most dignified officers. If the principal magistrate should happen to be particularly venerable in the eyes of the people, take advantage of that fortunate circumstance in setting the example.
3. Should the attempt fail through his republican aversion to it, or from the danger of alarming the people, do not abandon the enterprise altogether, but lay up the proposition in the record. Time may gain it respect, and it will be there always ready, cut and dried, for any favorable conjuncture that may offer.
4. In drawing all bills, resolutions, and reports, keep constantly in view that the limitations in the Constitution are ultimately to be explained away. Precedents and phrases may thus be shuffled in, without being adverted to by candid or weak people, of which good use may afterward be made.
5. As the novelty and bustle of inaugurating the government will for some time keep the public mind in a heedless and unsettled state, let the press during this period be busy in propagating the doctrines of monarchy and aristocracy. For this purpose it will be particular useful to confound a mobbish democracy with a representative republic, that by exhibiting all the turbulent examples and enormities of the former, an odium may be thrown on the character of the latter. Review all the civil contests, convulsions, factions, broils, squabbles, bickering, black eyes, and bloody noses of ancient, middle, and modern ages; caricature them into the most frightful forms and colors that can be imagined, and unfold one scene of horrible tragedy after another till the people be made, if possible, to tremble at their own shadows. Let the discourses on Davila then contrast with these pictures of terror the quiet hereditary succession, the reverence claimed by birth and nobility, and the fascinating influence of stars, and ribands, and garters, cautiously suppressing all the bloody tragedies and unceasing oppressions which form the history of this species of government. No pains should be spared in this part of the undertaking, for the greatest will be wanted, it being extremely difficult, especially when a people have been taught to reason and feel their rights, to convince them that a king, who is always an enemy to the people, and a nobility, who are perhaps still more so, will take better care of the people than the people will take of themselves.
6. But the grand nostrum will be a public debt, provided enough of it can be got and it be medicated with the proper ingredients. If by good fortune a debt be ready at hand, the most is to be made of it. Stretch it and swell it to the utmost the items will bear. Allow as many extra claims as decency will permit. Assume all the debts of your neighbors - in a word, get as much debt as can be raked and scraped together, and when you have got all you can, "advertise" for more, and have the debt made as big as possible. This object being accomplished, the next will be to make it as perpetual as possible; and the next to that, to get it into as few hands as possible. The more effectually to bring this about, modify the debt, complicate it, divide it, subdivide it, subtract it, postpone it, let there be one-third of two-thirds, and two-thirds of one-third, and two-thirds of two-thirds; let there be 3 percents, and 4 percents, and 6 percents, and present 6 percents, and future 6 percents. To be brief, let the whole be such a mystery that a few only can understand it; and let all possible opportunities and informations fall in the way of these few to cinch their advantages over the many.
7. It must not be forgotten that the members of the legislative body are to have a deep stake in the game. This is an essential point, and happily is attended with no difficulty. A sufficient number, properly disposed, can alternately legislate and speculate, and speculate and legislate, and buy and sell, and sell and buy, until a due portion of the property of their constituents has passed into their hands to give them an interest against their constituents, and to ensure the part they are to act. All this, however, must be carried on under the cover of the closest secrecy; and it is particularly lucky that dealings in paper admit of more secrecy that any other. Should a discovery take place, the whole plan may be blown up.
Cont.......
Freneau: Changing a Republic into a Monarchy (1792)
Fascinating...this game plan was followed to the T by Ronald Reagan.
Think bigger.![]()
The enemy of We the People is not JUST big government. Thomas Jefferson was aware of the forces that create an aristocracy.
Thomas Jefferson to Edward Carrington
16 Jan. 1787Papers 11:48--49
The tumults in America I expected would have produced in Europe an unfavorable opinion of our political state. But it has not. On the contrary, the small effect of those tumults seems to have given more confidence in the firmness of our governments.
The interposition of the people themselves on the side of government has had a great effect on the opinion here. I am persuaded myself that the good sense of the people will always be found to be the best army. They may be led astray for a moment, but will soon correct themselves. The people are the only censors of their governors: and even their errors will tend to keep these to the true principles of their institution. To punish these errors too severely would be to suppress the only safeguard of the public liberty.
The way to prevent these irregular interpositions of the people is to give them full information of their affairs through the channel of the public papers, and to contrive that those papers should penetrate the whole mass of the people. The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them.
I am convinced that those societies (as the Indians) which live without government enjoy in their general mass an infinitely greater degree of happiness than those who live under European governments. Among the former, public opinion is in the place of law, and restrains morals as powerfully as laws ever did any where. Among the latter, under pretense of governing they have divided their nations into two classes, wolves and sheep. I do not exaggerate. This is a true picture of Europe. Cherish therefore the spirit of our people, and keep alive their attention. Do not be too severe upon their errors, but reclaim them by enlightening them. If once they become inattentive to the public affairs, you and I, and Congress, and Assemblies, judges and governors shall all become wolves. It seems to be the law of our general nature, in spite of individual exceptions; and experience declares that man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term to the governments of Europe, and to the general prey of the rich on the poor.
I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered at the White House - with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.
President John F. Kennedy (Speaking at a White House dinner for Nobel Prize winners, 1962)