Brownsville Tea Party Association

Brownsville Voice is a local blog published by self-professed socialist Bobby Wightman Cervantes. On the Fourth, his post about the rights of the people to overthrow their government piqued my interest. He claimed the Fourth was a myth essentially because the judiciary essentially took away the state’s right to secede from or overthrow the Union. He took a quote from our Declaration of Independence that does not mince words and proclaims our right to institute a new government if we so choose.

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

I dare not disagree or quibble with Brownsville Voice. Nevertheless, the very next section of our Declaration deserves mention as it clarifies that revolution over trivial or whimsical reasons is not enough justification.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

If you have read David McCullough’s John Adams or watched the companion HBO miniseries, it should be familiar to you that Jefferson believed in constant revolution for every generation. Further, he believed the people should not hamstrung by the laws of past governments or generations.

On the other hand, Adams argued government should be respected and so should the rule of law. Working with the government they built is, in his mind, the only choice. It appears the quote in Brownsville Voice was Jefferson’s belief while the subsequent section was a significant clarification by Adams.

On a completely different note our Declaration points to many successive injustices by mad King George III. This particular one strikes me as odd considering Adams infamously defending British soldiers after the Boston Massacre.

The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world….

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States

Any history buffs out there want to discuss if this included the Boston Massacre trial and if it was a slight against Adams?