Constitution Day

How will you be celebrating Constitution Day, September 17? Had our Founders thought appropriate, they could have set aside the ratification date of the US Constitution to commemorate our country's beginning. Why did men who signed both the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence chose July 4th as our nation's birthday?

The Declaration of Independence set forth the idea that all men are created equal and are endowed by their creator with the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It declares that government's only legitimate purpose is to secure these rights. Revolutionary was the notion that these rights supersede all others and that government is subservient to man. The Declaration of Independence is a document of universal inspiration.

The US Constitution, by contrast, is a document of necessity. John Adams pointed out that if men were angels then government would not be necessary. The Constitution was written so as to limit government -- to limit man's power over other men. To that end, the Constitution and Bill of Rights contain a total of twenty-three usages of 'not' and 'nor' applied to the Congress in an attempt to secure the freedoms and dignity of man.

Today, however, we find Congress and the Courts viewing the Constitution as a document that empowers, not restrains government. The Feds want to pick our pockets (income tax), allow our property seized (Kelo decision), and dictate our lifestyle and healthcare choices (prohibit gay marriage and medicinal marijuana). It feigns to provide for our retirement and later-life health care, while running huge deficits, inflating our money supply, and devaluing our savings. It supports the contradiction that young adults 18-20 are too immature to consume alcohol yet mature enough to defend this government in foreign wars. Ironically, those who seek to tell others how to behave and how to dispose of their property, in essence -- those who wish to rule over others, may find more reason to celebrate Constitution Day than freedom lovers.

Every Fourth of July should be celebrated with a rereading of the Declaration. As time goes by, will the Constitution be read as a document that further grants more power to government or will it fulfill the Founders intent and return to being the document that protects our God-given right of freedom as individuals?

With Congressional confirmation of Supreme Court nominee John Roberts hinging on whether he subscribes to an "expansive view of the Constitution able to embrace evolving notions of social progress", the outlook hangs in the balance. I doubt our Founders would consider today's welfare state, advancing socialism, political correctness, gun control laws, excessive government regulation, and an interventionist militarism to be "social progress".

David Adams
Vice Chair
Libertarian Party of Kentucky

Profiteering and Price Gouging

Profiteering and Price Gouging

Kentucky Attorney General Greg Stumbo announced he intends to investigate and prosecute those who are "profiteering" from hurricane Katrina.

Before he begins wasting taxpayer money and harassing gas station owners, I wish he could tell us what separates "profiteering" from profits.

He might suggest that profiteers make "excess" profits; exploiting natural disasters for their own selfish gain by gouging consumers.

Stumbo, like many politicians, illustrates his lack of understanding about economics by attacking business for raising prices and seeking high profits.

In a market economy, prices serve to tell us, instantly, what we must give up to get something else. Price is information -- it is neither good nor bad.

Prices are determined by both supply and demand. How we distribute the scare resources of our planet, including our precious time, is factored into the price of all goods and services.

Remember that no one forces us to buy gas at high prices; we can choose to walk or ride a bike, take the bus or carpool, and indeed some do so. This decreases demand, and tends to lower prices.

Profits are the signals the market uses to help businessmen decide where to invest time and resources. By seeking to maximize profits, business creates more supply. More supply tends to lower prices.

Over time, the price of gas stabilizes, and may start to decline. When prices and profits fall, will Stumbo decry the "gas war" and resulting bankruptcies?

There is an alternative to having the free market set prices: the government can do this.

Centralized command and control of the economy proved spectacularly unsuccessful in the Soviet Union and everywhere it's been tried throughout all of mankind's history.

Government price setting has always resulted in mass shortages (evidenced by rationing and queues), huge waste (think price supports and government cheese), and dissatisfied consumers with little choice (did you ever hear of an East German fashion show?)

Just witness the violent stampede that took place in Richmond, Virginia when the school system sold off valuable laptops for $50 each. Not only did the taxpayers lose out, so did the unfortunates who were trampled.

The truth is that government officials like Stumbo can no more control the cost of gas than they can the fury of nature.

Nixon tried to limit profiteering by Big Oil during the 1973 oil embargo, when he passed the Emergency Petroleum Allocation Act, which set price controls on oil producers, and attempted to coordinate the allocation and distribution of gasoline on a national level.

The result? Gas rationing, with long lines of cars waiting hours to fill up at the pump. Fistfights were common, as tempers flared. The economy went into recession. Our dependence on imported oil actually increased, as domestic producers, forced to sell at pre-embargo prices, cut back production.

To be sure, the cost of gasoline doesn't go down when the government artificially lowers the price. Because now you have to add in the value of the time you've spent waiting in line to get the gas. The cost of waiting varies by individual. Still I don't know anybody who enjoys waiting in line.

Stumbo suffers the fatal conceit of thinking that government knows better than the market what the price of gas should be and how much profit gas stations should make.

I don't know why he's so timid; why doesn't he just mandate gas stations sell gas at $1 per gallon? Or better yet, since we live in a democracy, we could vote on how much profit gas stations should make.

The absurdity of these proposals reveals the truth: government interference in the marketplace causes problems, not solves them.

Hurricane Katrina is a tragedy that given time, individuals and free markets will overcome. Short-term economic disruption and price hikes cannot be avoided.

Let us not compound our problems by asking government to do something it has no right or power to do. Otherwise, nature's freak calamity will evolve into permanent man-made catastrophe.

George Conrad Dick
Chairman
Libertarian Party of Kentucky