Liberty Belle

Hey this is Mike Swick from if not for God podcast our show stories of hopelessness turned and I hope your chosen Truth Network podcast is starting in just seconds. Enjoy it, share it, but most of all, thank you for listening and for choosing The Truth Podcast Network. This is the Truth Network. I see you radio show host, maybe for the first Saturday of the month. Today I had the opportunity of filling in for Robbie while he's hosting a men's retreat and I had the great pleasure of being on the show with political science professor Dr. Kristin McMasters.

She's not only charming but conservative, which makes her extremely rare in her field. Dr. McMasters is a constitutionalist with a PhD in political science from the University of South Carolina. Dr. McMasters has been all across the state of North Carolina addressing sheriffs and other elected officials, candidates in groups like the Forsyth County conservative lunch.

She's been sharing with groups what it should mean when our elected officials swear their oath to uphold and defend the Constitution in the United States.

This morning I paid four dollars a gallon for gas. On my way in.

I wanted Dr. McMasters to discuss with us what we as citizens should expect constitutionally when it comes to our federal government getting us out of this inflation mess they created. But before we jump into that discussion I would like Dr. McMasters to share with us about her webpage and her blog, the Liberty Bell, thank you for being on the show. Kristin, please tell us about your blog and your webpage pain care.

Yeah, I'm really excited to be here now. It's called the Liberty Bell see I had to put the fee on there because unfortunately the Liberty Bell PEL LTE is actually about something ancestors he'll pay for that risk of death though. Anyway, I got a website I was a political science major in undergrad and then I went to grad school and entered an American political thought. American theory for my PhD and I really kind of realized that I didn't understand why I believed what I believed that when you go through so much academic research and studying have to really challenge yourself in ways that piece for me. I had never done before, so they challenge myself with. Why did I actually believe that I believed I started realizing that most Americans don't do that right. We all had these really strong got reactions to things like the government should follow the Constitution, the government should do this.

The government should do that. But if we were to really push ourselves to know why we believe this. Most people really don't have an answer and so I really started answering those "why" questions for myself from 1/3 of broad theoretical perspective, not one that was just based on my opinions or my feelings and it started really grounding me in ways I never had been grounded before and so wanted to share that with the rest of the world because I realize that if we can actually bring us back to a truly constitutional state in the United States we actually have to know why our Constitution matters and why our government should follow it and so that's at the Liberty Bell website is for its after I published three articles a week on their I basically just help inform people about the government not just the government but actual modern day issues from a constitutional perspective, it's a nonpartisan partisan website not a political pundit I'm trying to really help people be able to arm themselves with knowledge and I think what I've noticed is that a lot of constitutional classes. They can just go over people's heads right a people talk about the Constitution and I've given a lot of speeches I've seen people get the Constitution but every single one of them. When I asked them why does it matter for a government to follow the Constitution.

They struggled to answer a know it in their gut.

Nobody really knows why they don't even know the Constitution says and I really want to make it very simple for people, so people can like digest okay this is what the Constitution is. This is why it matters for government to follow it and this is what the Constitution says that the goal of what I'm doing. That's the goal of all my speaking engagements.

That's the goal I want to make it bite sized digestible for people so they can take it and then they can actually hold their government officials accountable to something rather than just letting them get away with life will I was at Golden corral install this group meeting and stuck my head in and they called themselves the conservative lunch that I got a figure this out. This looks interesting to me and I went again and we had a small group of people in there that sat around talking about how they thought the world should work better, particularly to the state and the federal government and then this young lady came in and talk to this group, and every time she comes and talks to our group. It gets bigger and bigger and bigger and it just absolutely has been one of the most wonderful parts of the conservative lunch from this year. She has talked to many, many other groups in Forsyth County and surrounding areas including the Sheriff's what are some of the groups you talk to in the last years.

Wow.

I mean, I kind of it varies and talk to groups all over the state and if anything is actually nonpolitical grips I had a real estate investment group have me come speak for them, which was super interesting because I've never spoken to a nonpolitical group is one of the most political mistake I promise Christopher but I was excited because I was like well can I can I get to everyone you know like is there is there this level of liberty. That's just ingrained in African-American regardless of their political beliefs, where political activity and I find pretty much. And I got this very good response from this group of people that I do know where they were politically added know anything and they were like like every American needs to hear what she have to say this very encouraged because they faced all the unifying aspect of the Constitution, which is what I'm really trying to push is that the Constitution is not a partisan issue with actually something that if we don't hold our government. Our government accountable to something were left with an arbitrary unconfined government and aside from government really ones that will that you haven't found anybody that wanted to government. They wanted could be so powerful it can do anything it wanted to take away all your brought your is so other than government by the elderly are that really wants an all inclusive powerful godlike organization that can tell you what time to get up you would you would think that they would pass a law that could change the time I get up every day, every day and nobody would be upset about.

That was the article I read this it was that what we voted for. You say that "I had an article with a witty and and they said, would you please explain why you felt it was important to make daylight savings time, a national law locked in forever and they said what are you talking about will.

It was a unanimous why would there was no one there. When they passed the law was expected when we brought this law that somebody was going to object because it was all set up to have these debates. The person that was supposed object didn't make it. Oh just went through went through without it, but I really really love with the best cotton government we've got now we've got bills that are so huge. Nobody knows what the blankety-blank blank is in and we've got when we desperately in Dia. We've got legislation that grants billions of dollars to things nobody in their right mind would wanted to go to the best where we are today. Yeah.

And I mean I emphasize a lot. Is that our government is our employee right we created them to do a job with what I say our government as shocking as this might be is our employee and in our society we create a government that in thrones and the seventh was because we treat them that way right and so this is why am passionate about what I do because I really want to in how where the people in this is what's interesting is, and any talk I get the only group of people to give me dire eyes are the politicians room right behind Wednesday. I know right I want to can find their power but leaving week we gave him a job to do and we gave them a job description which and in the federal government context is the Constitution and tells them what they can do you tell them to read that and then swear that but the problem is most people in the United States don't even know it themselves and so how motivated are our employees going to be 10 know, much less follow their job description.

When they know the employer themselves don't know it, you got a friend we have a friend that went to meeting one time with a bunch of government officials had the nerve to ask them if they knew what was in that oath and what was in the Constitution and the answers that came back where jiggles and layoffs and one person got the answer wrong.

It's amazing to me.

Yet every job I ever applied for, into agape. I had to understand what that job was where my authority ended where my authority started but we don't do that with government officials exactly and that's my goal with the Liberty Bell's charm but with less knowledge. We want you all the Tunisians here come back to this commercial right… Just a little bit of what we should put a lot of money you're listening to TruthNetwork.com tomorrow and see all radio show always yes the my case this really easy to give her a chance to just talk to the audits and tell you a little bit more about the Constitution and why it's important's and how it's supposed to work. I think he is so tight and capsize this much as I possibly can in a small bite-size segment to give a talk I can't talk about the Constitution were things that I feel about government laughing, lay a foundation for people very much when I teach. I think of it is like building a house. So I've got a bill that foundation before I get to the walls and so on and so forth and so anytime I start talking about our government. I love to challenge people to really answer the question why do we actually have government right and so does funny things because I don't think that we've ever really thought to ourselves why we have government not in the anarchic sense, but in the sense of what's government supposed to do right. We sit around and we talk and we debate and we could keep government behavior all day every day right but we have no idea what they're supposed to do. You can't really critique someone or something if you don't know what is supposed to do would be like taking a Chick-fil-A employee, but having no idea their job description. We don't know what they're supposed to do and were critiquing them they were implying that we do right and so I let would be a lot easier if the art would be the real thing.

But you know what I'm saying this is the thing that we were debating and discussing well government ought to be doing this in government shouldn't be doing this all with the assumption that we know what they're actually supposed to do and so I want to start if I always like to start any talk I gave without basic foundation and I can't get into all that on here because it's so fast. But I want to basically set the stage that we created government in the United States to protect us in our private property from each other and that comes from some very broad liberal philosophies John Locke Thomas Hobbes Montesquieu back during the Enlightenment era and this is what the founders used in they understood private property, and I think a lot of Americans were very spoiled because we hear the word private property are the words we automatically know what that means but back in the 1500s and the 1600s, private property was a very foreign concept to people right and most people were the property of whoever was in charge and so this is unique that in United States. This is why we have government to protect us in a private property and stripping it down. Very simply, but in order to sort of build that foundation. That's where we should start so then why do we actually the Constitution and this is where it gets really important and exciting for me because we need to know why we have a Constitution African actually care about what the Constitution is doing or how to protect it and so I think I I asked all my students or anyone else that I'm speaking to them like so the funny thing about government is we created government because we needed something to protect us from each other because we were, you know, we can be violently to be overly indicia selfish all the things we needed to get out of the state of war or chaos. And so we create government to protect us in our private property, but the irony is we take the same flawed human beings that needed government and the first place we do with them. We put them in positions of power and so now you have this very unique situation and in the United States are founders did not have rose-colored glasses on when they look to human behavior or human nature, and so they knew that we now have these flawed humans in positions of power and we need something to protect us in our private property from our government itself right so this is where this sort so unifying for everyone because I think that anyone can get on board with this, and I have yet to find someone to come up and to contradict this because you need something to protect us from government and what I explain as we created government right so there are employees where the employer what employee doesn't have a job description. This is where the Constitution comes in a member I said at the beginning I want to make this bite-size right fortunately none a lot of employees job well probably not very effective right to counter the guy exactly so.

But as we hire these politicians. I guess you can say, and we expect them to do anything at when in fact actually have a job descriptions at the federal level, the Constitution very literally simply is our government's job description and tells our government what it can do and therefore what he can do that which both define this power and by default of defining it confines its power so our government literally gets the power it has from the Constitution which is amazing right so it's not arbitrary.

Now the word arbitrary is aware that did you think about that word much before I started kind of starting and into the political read it a few times. The books okay what I've been noticing it more frequently because I've been pushing it a lot but arbitrary power that comes from nowhere. If it comes from nowhere can't be defined are confined and that's what the Constitution is best to do his best to prevent arbitrary behavior and in our government. So when our government does so because it has the power to do so from the Constitution now suggest something outside of the Constitution from where does he get the power to do what it did well from nowhere and he forgot the power to do what I did from nowhere that powers arbitrate which music can do very literally anything and so this is what I want.

This is how I laid the foundation for anyone of my talks because of him and talk about the Constitution right what is the Constitution what's her government job so and so forth. Make sure that the people in talking to understand the significance of following that Constitution. So if I understand you correctly, your point is if somebody is over me has the right and responsibility to take a gun and pointed at me. They can then decide how much of my property. They can take and they can decide what I do every minute of the day and that they can tell me whether I can or can't buy a car or whether I've got to put on solar panels are not that sort of makes my day more complicated. I mean essentially it's like living under a king or tyrant right you.

Anyone that throughout history I can say to you that you have to do whatever they say and you have no recourse. You have nothing to protect you from them. Our Constitution protects us from the government. This only if we use this like a good tool if it sit there in the tool shed and you don't pull it up to help you dig the hole. The need to suffer through with that spoon trying to make it bigger and bigger understand all the points they make a whole lot of sense, but I really don't understand how we got where we can have inflation like dollars, all that will save this little little frustrated after the boy let's talk about what should or should be done should you're listening to TruthNetwork.com tomorrow and see all radio show will is Rob even more impressive more than he appears on the radio and you he is a brilliant some of the very best conversations we have on the brakes and it would just be really neat dislike those so that we can plug plug him what we were discussing before is that were in a position we don't want to but we keep going in this direction of giving the federal government more and more power because the federal government keeps creating larger and larger problems and then we think that the federal government's going to fix these larger and larger problems they come up with bigger and more bizarre ways to fix the problems and the problems get worse and worse and worse. So in my mind where we should not be.

We need to stop and start heading in the direction where we want to be, we can't just burn it all the way down to the ground like one dear friend of mine thinks we should start over again so you Kristin hello, we had we hid in the right direction constitutionally. What should we expect the federal government to do were not as some of the friends love listen to you come into the meeting and they said the federal government should do nothing well you baby. It certainly should do far less, but I'm not ready for to do absolutely nothing because it's created things too big and mean and awful for me to fix. So where we go from here.

What what do you think we should require our public officials to do other than stay home and not go to Washington yeah why don't I think we shouldn't expect them to do nothing. I mean, the founders created the federal government with intention with purpose. There was a goal behind it, because things weren't going so well under the articles of Confederation, which is basically the Constitution before our Constitution so we needed something to bring order to an otherwise chaotic situation worse states and their governments were dealing separately and it was a problem. So we do want the federal government to have power. We need that we need government obviously to protect us in private property, but I would say so what should we require our politicians to do. I mean, I think the first step is. Let's start requiring them to actually know and follow their job description. Obviously, where and how that applies to all the specific circumstances like you mentioned inflation that's going to come into play but the first step we gotta stop with the fluff. That's all they do not really starts in the hearts and minds of the people right where the employer so our expectations and then empower them so we expect them to do more than there actually empowered to do. Therefore, they do it because there are more than happy to violate their job description all day every day until nine goal is more to help change the hearts and minds of the people rather than change what politicians are doing because the politicians will eventually come along if the people no longer treat them as if they are God's right that are empowered to do whatever they want to fix everything so this is where our mindsets are really skewed initially happened in the 1930s where at least when it comes to the economy. We as a as a public shifted in our perspective and our expectations of governments job when it comes to the economy fixing the economy or not so prior to the 1930s. We were pretty laissez-faire, but we did not believe that as a collective citizenry that the government had a federal level should be lazy what laissez-faire.

This is like the French word fair enough. We government stay out of my business more or less lease federal government stay out of my my economic business.

So we expect government to fix everything and that's where really the key thing so when you said government should do nothing.

No, I don't think government should do nothing. However, I don't think the solution is to have government fix more things because it's it's just going to cause more problems because they're never supposed to be fixing things up, not their job. Their job in the Constitution has nothing to do with helping the poor at providing healthcare, making sure the economy is stable. That's not their job. That doesn't mean the study. The study that those responsibilities is yet for some reason I think North Carolina might be a little bit different than Washington state or California. Not real sure that a solution that works in North Carolina is going to work in Alabama right that's why the founders and these powers to the federal government because there is no one-size-fits-all.

You know that's that's ridiculous. And so this is interesting. So like I said, our perspective switched around the Great Depression era and we started expecting government to be the solution to most of our economic problems and so because we expected the government to solve our economic problems. The private and it's the private industry at church is local communities or even states themselves stepped back and so when they stepped back federal government and more into the more the federal government stepped in more the more the rest of us stepped back, so much so now if the federal government doesn't step then there's no one. Therefore it's like they have to step in right and so is this really weird assumption. I don't know much. I'm happy, there's this weird assumption that the federal government. It's their job to make sure that the economy is stable right and this led to a Supreme Court ruling called boy it sure looks stable my only I know right there is a Supreme Court ruling called Wickard, something I can't remedy the other side and basically, the Supreme Court interpreted the commerce clause and for those of you don't know what that is. It's just a clause that deals with commerce amongst the states interpreted the commerce clause to mean that the federal government okay this is really and this is important. The federal government has the right to write law that would regulate an individual who is growing wheat in his backyard and eating his own wheat right so the individual grows wheat makes the wheat uses the meat eats the wheat and I don't sell it to anyone, and the justification the Supreme Court had for this regulation was that because the individuals growing your own wheat they're knocking to go out and buy wheat from another person from another company. Therefore, it affects the economy at large point B in the youth you're saying that the government said we can get all the way down and get in your pocket which you can plant in your own backyard which you can get because the fundamental assumption is that the federal government job is to maintain the economy that when we do that than were trying to affect an entire world economy. Yeah it it it one time, the way God intended this was that I take care of my family and then my family take care of my extended family and were supposed to look after our neighbors were supposed to look after our extended neighbors than all of us are supposed to try look after our city and our county that from God's point of view were supposed to be taking care of the people that we actually come in contact with yes and if we did that it would be very little need for all these great big federal programs. If the church took care of itself first and then it looked.

On the other side of the walls and it took care of the neighbors to the church and the neighbors of the members, then they would be far fewer need for a federal government cooked to come in and take our money and spend most of it on absolutely nothing. We intended to give a little bit of the money to solve the problem.

We wanted them to fix yeah exactly and really like and it's interesting because your talk about community and family and then you jump right to federal government have to get that's where we automatically have gone.

We don't even turn to our local governments or state governments first, which is where we really should have been training because were going to be much more likely to be able to hold them accountable to how they do things and we are at the federal level right and then of course were not even thinking about their job description. In any of this were just thinking of this is what we want them to do and this is why I am so passionate about the job description because even if it sounds noble and great for the federal government to help out the poor do something that is supposedly noble if it's outside the job description that the government of the federal while being under the auspices of the state and local go. But if we asked them at the federal level to do something outside of their job description were asking them to have arbitrary power that they have arbitrary power.

That means they can literally do anything. I wish I could remember which communist said that the one of the main communist early and said I see a group of people going by the front of our building a need to go find out what where they're going so I could lead them as a nation we say oh we got this great big problem and then there's somebody in Washington this is they all agree with got a problem I would pretend up, got a solution bill, empowerment, and then give up a big chunk of their money in their right there privileges said over and over and over and over and over again we elect these people to go to Washington who think their job is to help us so that they can enrich themselves and enrich the people that gave them the money to get elected enough, the fluff I talk about and they love crisis because crisis is the most empowering thing for any government never miss a cross there always wonderfully empowering his Bob Bob favorite room to be contacted and I asked, but if we allow the government more power they will need as much is of our powers, we give up that powers are what you're listening to the TruthNetwork.com see all radio show with this show.

This Dr. Christian McMasters is a PhD in political science is got a wonderful webpage and a wonderful blog that help you understand the were supposed to be in charge we elect people who work for us, and that those people that we elect are supposed to be accountable to us that the things that they should do should be open and above board is invisible and that when we sin them there to solve problems that they should solve the problems and this should solve the problems in a way that makes sense. That's clear. We got a lot of problems in this country that we need to fix from affordable housing to the fact that I paid four dollars a gallon for gas to the we need to hold the people we elect accountable and that starts with making sure we elect the right people that we elect people that understand were not sending them up there to enrich themselves or their family members were sending up there define common sense solutions to the problems that we and our neighbors hay up will have a whole lot of time in the segments I want to make sure you tell people about you with website and the webpage and what they'd find if they go there so it is the Liberty Bell in C.com and that's PLL you set the little play on words but I mean essentially that the website is kind of what we talked about today is a microcosm of what I talk about on my website and my YouTube channel and any of the speaking engagements. I gamble in the book that I published a year and half ago and I'm I'm just trying to empower the people and like you said we are the boss and in the thing that I kind when and then my statement as far as asking the employer we are the employer and then the government is our employee, but we are not the final say. The people are not the final say and that's because that the founders were very aware of human nature, right, and they were very wary of human nature, and that's why they created a government with – and counteracting — and which basically just means they wanted to pick power against power they expected government to take on ago after power, but they would also expect that from the citizenry because it's not like we are angels. Madison said men are not angels. Which is why we need government.

Government is not angels. Which is why we have checks and balances right into the thing I like to leave a lot of the speaking engagements with is. We are a constitutional republic. We are not a Democratic Republic with intention and the differences if the final say as the people we would be a Democratic Republic right so we ultimately could tell our government exactly what we wanted to take everybody else's property away from me.

If I can't vote for right exactly CME people voted for Hitler right. We actually wanted Japanese Americans to be interned in the 1940s, 700,000 of them stripped of their property and put in internment camps. By popular demand right and so what the government should have done is say no. Our job is to follow the Constitution.

First and foremost, so when it comes down to it in a constitutional republic. The final say is not the people to final say as the Constitution because the Constitution literally protects us not only from government but also from ourselves because we can be a rational and emotional and through rational emotional wins, we can demand things I will end up damaging our liberty and so were the liberty of some group of people so that's why the Constitution is supreme. It is the literal job description of our government confines their power and it also combines our power right because it's not arbitrary, where arbitrary and so is government. We don't want that.

We don't want arbitrary power from us or from government itself. And so, and the other funny thing is the government. The founders expected our government to be corrupt right and that's why they gave it a job description.

That's why they built it in such a way where one of the only countries I know what else on the assumption that men are bad which is beautiful would rather say self-serve, self-serving sure, yet self-serving, selfish, ambitious, was the entire fundamental understanding when he built this country is that they knew have to figure out a way to sort of pay. All of this ambition against itself to keep it at day which is remarkable.

It's really ingenious and I think the only reason it lasted this long and this is why so important that we understand how it function so that we can actually continue to protect the liberty that does exist to this day right were very blessed that we still do have liberty on something I would say is listen. If you if we believe men are all good. We don't need government so the mere fact that we need government means that there something we believe is wrong need some sort of you know, correcting in lawful and we also need to teach histories throughout the land on this. The problem is been the man Condon stood a woman, but because throughout history there been people doing things they shouldn't do the other print exactly and so you know theories like socialism and communism melodies there really sort of push the idea that man is Jen genuinely selfless, genuinely sort of out for the good of of the rest of the communal society right and true. If you're one of those top two or three big right exactly and so that's why that's right. These theoretical foundations are so critical. This is why am trying to sort of help build a theory theoretical foundation for people who follow me because we need that foundation and fundamentally does come down to what we believe human nature is an we believe human nature is fundamentally good. While we don't need government or if we do we can have some sort of communal society and we see throughout time that one bad apple ruins the whole thing and so you know one bad apple in a selfish society that we assume is selfish yet about AppleCare. That means the person selfless, I can hurt or ruin the whole thing. In fact, it's probably to do something good for society and so sort of. The whole point of the Liberty Bell is just to help arm people with answering these deeper "why" questions.

These deeper "why" questions and I think most people to never push themselves to actually answer and that's really I believe the fundamental way working to save liberty is because we ourselves need to know why we believe what we believe we can start holding our politicians accountable to why they're doing what they're doing, rather than just taking the fluff right there. They know how to itch our ears. They know what to say they know that they popular statements and most of them are not even part of their job description and were letting them get away with it. At its most exciting thing for me to see people starting to say hey that's arbitrary. You don't have to job that's not within your job description, the other side of this is who is the job who is responsible for solving these problems.

If you got Jesus in your heart if you're Christian or problem is that we quit taking care of our family and we quit taking care of our extended family would quit to acquit take we quit taking care of our neighbors. Churches turned inside and didn't reach outside instead of being Coast Guard cutters help us rescue people. We turned into these little life rafts scared to death to bring in another. So yeah, we've got an obligation.

We've got a responsibility to remember the where cross shoulders. The war hands or crushed aliens that were supposed to be out there making a difference in the lives of the people around us. If we did that, then we wouldn't have to have the federal government taken huge chunks of money from us. The give a few to dollars back to do services. The newly don't operate that will yeah and the thing that II think is I always tell people is there's two sides to every question if there's how you feel about it. And then there's where it is government because there are some legitimate real issues in the world right just like what you said, what's the solution, because where it is government. Yes, we see poverty. Poverty is a real thing and we don't need to pretend like it, but where does government fit and what level of government that where we feel and where do we see a problem that needs taking care of you probably should.

I help this person will publish a problem is this is not going to say will toss that the federal government is as good as that.

If you're there you see in the you got the opportunity to help somebody you need to stop and help them and if it's too big a problem for you.

You need to reach out to the other people that you know your church. You need to solve the print problems that are put before you. Thank you so much for coming. I hope everybody goes to the Christian Car Guy website and looks at the links the Liberty Bell is just a pleasure when I see it pop up in mud news feed on Facebook and when I get an email about it. I really enjoy spending some time each month about things I really should of learned school price for the men's group that Robbie's leading today. Look for an opportunity to be a time of refreshing and allied on the hill in your community like so much. This is good Truth Network