A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State by John W. Whitehead Page B
Authors: John W. Whitehead
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the Constitution—our liberties and rights.
Too many Americans appear unconcerned about the loss of fundamental individual liberties—such as due process, the right to confront their government accusers in a courtroom, and the presumption of innocence–that are vital to being an American. Yet the reason we are vulnerable to being manipulated by the government out of fear is that most of us do not know and understand our liberties and how difficult it was to obtain them and how hard it is to keep them.
We are Americans because, under our Constitution, we are guaranteed freedom–which makes us the oldest living constitutional democracy. I think the greatest decision by the United States Supreme Court was rendered by Justice Robert Jackson in West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette in the middle of the Second World War. When the children of Jehovah's Witnesses would not salute the flag, they were expelled and their parents threatened with jail for contributing to the delinquency of minors. Their religion forbade them to salute the flag, which was a graven image. Jackson said, and I am paraphrasing here, that in this country there is no orthodoxy of belief or of conscience whether political, religious or anything else. You can't say that about any other country in the world.
So that's why we are Americans: we are free to be ourselves; to believe in what we believe; to not interfere with other people's beliefs or conscience. Ronald Reagan was known for this phrase, but the first time I heard it was from William O. Douglas, who was a great Supreme Court justice in terms of liberty. Douglas used to say that the government has to be off our backs when it comes to our individual liberties: the freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom to be who we are.
For more than sixty-five years as a reporter and an author (the latter beginning with The First Freedom: The Tumultuous History of Free Speech in America) , my primary mission has been provided by James Madison: "Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors, must arm themselves with the power that knowledge gives." I have spent a lot of time studying our Founders and people like Samuel Adams. What Adams and the Sons of Liberty did in Boston was spread the word about the abuses of the British. They had Committees of Correspondence that got the word out to the colonies. We need Committees of Correspondence now.
Barring that, a good place to start is with John W Whitehead, whose writing exemplifies George Orwell's freedom-saving advice: "If Liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear." If Orwell were still alive, he would be an avid reader of Whitehead's work.
As you'll find in this book, John is unequalled in revealing the removal of the Constitution's separation of powers by an executive branch that turns the Declaration of Independence upside down. At this stage of our history, with ever advancing government digital technology causing our Fourth Amendment right to privacy to hang by the thread, I can say without exaggeration that no American guardian of the Constitution has done more continually–indeed, almost daily–than John W. Whitehead, through his writing and his legal work. Unlike any other Madisonian investigative reporter and analyst, he deploys his Rutherford Institute allied attorneys to defend–at no charge–Americans of all backgrounds whose personal constitutional liberties are being invaded by government.
The danger we now face is admittedly greater than any we have had before. If I were to judge what I do and write on the basis of optimism, I would probably go back to writing novels, but I figure you have to do what you feel you have to do and just keep hoping and trying to get people to understand why we are Americans and what we are fighting to preserve. That is why I keep writing. That is why John Whitehead continues to write and advocate for
Too many Americans appear unconcerned about the loss of fundamental individual liberties—such as due process, the right to confront their government accusers in a courtroom, and the presumption of innocence–that are vital to being an American. Yet the reason we are vulnerable to being manipulated by the government out of fear is that most of us do not know and understand our liberties and how difficult it was to obtain them and how hard it is to keep them.
We are Americans because, under our Constitution, we are guaranteed freedom–which makes us the oldest living constitutional democracy. I think the greatest decision by the United States Supreme Court was rendered by Justice Robert Jackson in West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette in the middle of the Second World War. When the children of Jehovah's Witnesses would not salute the flag, they were expelled and their parents threatened with jail for contributing to the delinquency of minors. Their religion forbade them to salute the flag, which was a graven image. Jackson said, and I am paraphrasing here, that in this country there is no orthodoxy of belief or of conscience whether political, religious or anything else. You can't say that about any other country in the world.
So that's why we are Americans: we are free to be ourselves; to believe in what we believe; to not interfere with other people's beliefs or conscience. Ronald Reagan was known for this phrase, but the first time I heard it was from William O. Douglas, who was a great Supreme Court justice in terms of liberty. Douglas used to say that the government has to be off our backs when it comes to our individual liberties: the freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom to be who we are.
For more than sixty-five years as a reporter and an author (the latter beginning with The First Freedom: The Tumultuous History of Free Speech in America) , my primary mission has been provided by James Madison: "Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors, must arm themselves with the power that knowledge gives." I have spent a lot of time studying our Founders and people like Samuel Adams. What Adams and the Sons of Liberty did in Boston was spread the word about the abuses of the British. They had Committees of Correspondence that got the word out to the colonies. We need Committees of Correspondence now.
Barring that, a good place to start is with John W Whitehead, whose writing exemplifies George Orwell's freedom-saving advice: "If Liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear." If Orwell were still alive, he would be an avid reader of Whitehead's work.
As you'll find in this book, John is unequalled in revealing the removal of the Constitution's separation of powers by an executive branch that turns the Declaration of Independence upside down. At this stage of our history, with ever advancing government digital technology causing our Fourth Amendment right to privacy to hang by the thread, I can say without exaggeration that no American guardian of the Constitution has done more continually–indeed, almost daily–than John W. Whitehead, through his writing and his legal work. Unlike any other Madisonian investigative reporter and analyst, he deploys his Rutherford Institute allied attorneys to defend–at no charge–Americans of all backgrounds whose personal constitutional liberties are being invaded by government.
The danger we now face is admittedly greater than any we have had before. If I were to judge what I do and write on the basis of optimism, I would probably go back to writing novels, but I figure you have to do what you feel you have to do and just keep hoping and trying to get people to understand why we are Americans and what we are fighting to preserve. That is why I keep writing. That is why John Whitehead continues to write and advocate for
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