Our American Heritage

The colonists did not only revolt against taxes; they revolted to stop the British from taking away the self-governance they already had been exercising since the earliest colonization. The crown appointed governors for the colonies, but over three thousand miles of ocean in the day of wind-powered ships gave ordinary Americans more freedom than a minor noble living in Bristol, England. (Connecticut and Rhode Island even elected their own governors.) Americans bristled over dictates from Parliament because colonial legislatures had been exercising substantial power for well over a century.

Plymouth Plantation Today

The Founders on the Economy

Many think the Founding Fathers were a bunch of old-fogies who lived way before iProducts, and have little to contribute in handling modern economic issues. Those people would be wrong. The post-war economy under the Articles of Confederation was in a tailspin. Alexander Hamilton under the leadership of George Washington saved this nation from economic collapse. (See The Man who saved America from financial ruin.)

What would the Founders think about our current economic problems? Here is what they said in their own words.

In framing a system which we wish to last for ages, we should not lose sight of the changes which ages will produce. An increase of population will of necessity increase the proportion of those who will labor under all the hardships of life, and secretly sigh for a more equal distribution of its blessings. These may in time outnumber those who are placed above the feelings of indigence. According to the equal laws of suffrage, the power will slide into the hands of the former. No agrarian attempts have yet been made in this country, but symptoms of a leveling spirit, as we have understood, have sufficiently appeared in a certain quarters to give notice of the future danger. — James Madison, Federal Convention, June 26, 1787

Constitutional Protection of Property

“Government is instituted to protect property of every sort … This being the end of government, that alone is a just government which impartially secures to every man whatever is his own.” James Madison

Does the Constitution protect private property? All rights, not just property rights, appear to have received scant attention during the Constitutional Convention. Most of the delegates believed it would be far more effective to limit government with enumerated powers than to compose a list of rights because they feared an overly powerful government would trample those rights, despite written restrictions to the contrary. If the national government’s powers were held in check, then it was believed that common law and state declarations of rights provided sufficient safeguards to protect all rights. That is, until ratification. Several states unofficially conditioned their ratification on a Bill of Rights being added to the Constitution. The First Congress thus proposed the first ten amendments to the Constitution.

There were only a couple provisos in the base document that protected property rights. States were prohibited from impairing the obligation of contracts, and intellectual property was protected, giving “authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.”

Surely the Bill of Rights rectified this absence of protection for private property. Not entirely. The takings clause in the Fifth Amendment is one of the few outright protections of property. It reads, “nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation.’’ It would appear that this clause protects property owners from government confiscation, but cities and states became increasingly brazen in taking property for public domain purposes.  In 2005, Kelo v. City of New London defined public domain so broadly that it effectively included any action forecasted to increase the tax base. The takings issue is an illuminating object lesson that proves the Framers were right on the issue of protecting rights—unchecked power trumps protections written on a piece of parchment.  The clause is clear, yet it has proven a weak shield against the abusive exercise of determined power.