LETTERS: QUOTES GIVE HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES

To the editor:

In my studies of the various things that have put us in the predicament that we are in today, I have run across a few quotes that should be interesting to all concerned citizens.

An all-but-forgotten principle of constitutional law is that power granted to a particular branch of government cannot be delegated to another branch or to some other entity. A quote from Alexander Hamilton in The Federalist No. 78: "There is no position which depends on clearer principles than that every act of a delegated authority is void. No legislative act, therefore, contrary to the Constitution can be valid. To deny this would be to affirm that the deputy is greater than the principal, or the servant is above the master."

My comment: This confirms my declaration that executive orders by the president are illegal, because Congress cannot legally delegate its authority to anyone else.

A quote by Professor James Jarret of Phoenix: "Make yourselves sheep and the wolves will eat you."

My comment: This is self-explanatory.

A quote from Donald Alexander, who was director of the IRS 25 years ago: "We now have so many regulations that everyone is guilty of some violation."

My comment: Congress should be repealing more laws than it is passing, because it is apparent that we have too many when everyone in the country can be thrown in jail at the whim of some bureaucrat.

A quote from Winston Churchill: "If you will not fight for your rights when you can easily win without bloodshed, if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not so costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance for survival. There may be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no chance for victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves."

My comment: Churchill was making the point that people should wake up and act before it is too late, as is their usual habit.

A quote from Thomas Jefferson: "To compel a man to furnish funds for the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical."

My comment: Jefferson should have added "or furnish funds for the destruction of our country."

A quote from Karl Marx: "The meaning of peace is the absence of opposition to socialism."

My comment: Marx, who was the architect of socialism, had such contempt for the common man that he believed they should be enslaved and dictated to by the elite, and that there should be no peace for them till socialism was installed worldwide.

RAY UMBDENSTOCK

Cape Girardeau