Life, Liberty & the Pursuit of Happiness: What Jefferson Really Meant | Bill Norton

[00:00:14] Welcome to The Jenny Beth Show. Jenny Beth Martin Welcome to The Jenny Beth Show. I'm Jenny Beth Martin, and we are doing another episode of our Constitutional and Founding Principles training with constitutional scholar Bill Norton. Today, we are delving into the second lesson on the Declaration of Independence, and soon we'll be covering the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Bill, thanks so much for joining me again today. Thank you. Thanks for having me.

[00:00:41] Jenny Beth So, in our last episode, we talked about the Declaration of Independence, and we're picking it right back up again today. Jenny Beth Yep. Jenny Beth Where are we headed? Jenny Beth So, we ended the last lesson with all men are created equal. So, now let's just dive right in and see what happens next. Right? So, the Declaration after it talks about all men are created equal, then it says they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.

[00:01:11] Jenny Beth So, there's a lot. Jefferson just packs so much into every word here. I just love it. And we can... Jenny Beth What's amazing is how we can talk for hours and hours and hours on just these small little phrases. Jenny Beth Yes. Jenny Beth Which is an indication of how much he packed in there. Jenny Beth But first of all, and we already kind of talked about this when we talked about all men are created equal, the same thing that we are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights. So, that presupposes that there's a Creator.

[00:01:40] Jenny Beth And again, the laws of nature and the nature's God. If you believe that that Creator is nature, then that's fine. If you believe that that Creator is a God who created the laws of nature, then that's fine too. Jenny Beth Either way of... Whatever worldview you have fits into these principles. Jenny Beth But let's talk about this presupposition that there's a Creator. Jenny Beth So, John Adams said it pretty directly. He said,

[00:02:08] Jenny Beth Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other. Jenny Beth So, we do have to have a set of moral codes to live by. Jenny Beth And some of those can be pretty personalized. Jenny Beth But for the most part, we all agree to certain moral codes, right? Jenny Beth We shouldn't kill each other. We shouldn't steal each other's stuff and so on.

[00:02:34] Jenny Beth And so, if we don't live by those moral codes and if we don't live by natural law principles, Jenny Beth Then the reason why he's saying our Constitution is wholly inadequate to governing Jenny Beth Is because that's part of the duty of self-governance. Jenny Beth Part of the duty of self-governance is that we Jenny Beth Take some responsibility for ourselves and that we strive to not harm others. Jenny Beth It's the golden rule, right?

[00:03:04] Jenny Beth Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you. Jenny Beth That's critical for self-governance. Jenny Beth If you're not going to do that, then at that point, you need a tyrant. Jenny Beth You need an oppressor to force that. Jenny Beth And so, if you don't want a tyrant, you don't want an oppressor, Jenny Beth You've got to follow the golden rule. Jenny Beth And so, that's, I think, where the founders are pretty critical.

[00:03:29] Jenny Beth It's critical for them to recognize that we have a creator and that there's some certain rules and guidelines. Jenny Beth But John Adams then kind of reels it back in from this kind of spiritual, religious point of view. Jenny Beth And so, no man has yet produced any revelation from heaven in his favor, any divine communication to govern his fellow men. Jenny Beth Nature throws us all into the world equal and alike.

[00:03:58] Jenny Beth So, what he's getting at here is we don't, there's not a single person who has received revelation from God where God has said, you have the right to govern others with or without their consent. Now, that's very different than kings, right? Jenny Beth Yes. Jenny Beth They believe they have the authority from God. Jenny Beth Exactly. The doctrine of the divine right of kings is just that.

[00:04:24] It's, hey, God has given me the authority to govern you whether you like it or not. And that's what the founders are rejecting here. It was like, where? Where is that revelation? I mean, even Moses, who's the great lawgiver, right? Moses' portrait is up in the Supreme Court, not as a religious leader, but as a lawgiver. And even Moses set out, you know, some statutes that allowed people to govern themselves. In fact, that was the whole change.

[00:04:54] Moses was there telling everybody what to do in every aspect of their lives. And there's a big line of people, you know, asking him to solve their problems and all that. And that's when his father-in-law, Jethro, said, you know, you're going to waste away with this. You're going to waste the people away, too, if you keep governing like this. And that was governing basically like a king or a tyrant. And that's when Moses made the change that, hey, no, it's, we need to have some statutes.

[00:05:24] We need to let people govern themselves. So that's just a great indication that even in the religious world with Moses, that even he didn't try to claim that he had divine authority to govern you without your consent. So I love that from John Adams. So that gets us now into this phrase that we're endowed by our creator with certain and even though.

[00:05:54] So endowed. The word endowed is such a significant word that Jefferson's using here. He doesn't say that we're given by our creator or we are even bestowed, whatever. The word endowed has a lot of power to it. When an institution like a university or something receives an endowment, that is a permanent donation or contribution in perpetuity. Even the donor cannot make the change.

[00:06:23] Once they've established that endowment, they are guaranteeing and promising that those funds are going to go to that institution and they can't pull back from it. So that's pretty significant. What Jefferson's saying here is that God or nature is endowing us with these rights and they cannot be taken back even from the creator. The creator can't even take them from us. And that's pretty significant.

[00:06:52] And then he talks about how they are unalienable. They're unalienable rights. And explain what unalienable means. So unalienable, it comes from property law where once property is transferred, it can't be undone. Once it's bestowed, it can't be. So it's similar to even the word endowed in the sense that once it happens, it's permanent. Well, these are unalienable.

[00:07:21] We cannot be alienated from them or separated from them. So James Madison talked about unalienable. And I find it interesting, the right that he chose to explain unalienable. He was talking about the freedom of conscience. He said, this right, as of the freedom of conscience, is in its nature an unalienable right.

[00:07:50] It is unalienable because the opinions of men, depending only on the evidence contemplated by their own minds, cannot follow the dictates of other men. So Madison is using a self-evident truth here. And I find it interesting that he's using freedom of conscience instead of like life or liberty or property or any of those things. Because this one is more self-evident than any of the others.

[00:08:19] That what you're thinking, nobody can take from you. Right. Nobody can change. Nobody can. I mean, people can try to manipulate and they can gaslight you and they can do all that. But still, they really don't have control over what you're thinking. And even the right to life, you know, people can, they can take that life and they can, you know. So I just find it interesting that that's the one he chooses.

[00:08:47] But he's making it clear with this self-evident truth, something that's super obvious, that you cannot be separated from or alienated from your own thoughts. And so that's unalienable. Now, I would say that we then go back to John Locke when John Locke was talking about natural law, that if we try to alienate ourselves from these rights, then there will be a greater punishment, like he says.

[00:09:14] It's like, remember, he said, it's like fleeing from yourself. So, for example, if you decide to run across a busy freeway and you decide to alienate yourself from life, then the penalty is death. So if you do try to alienate yourself from these particular rights, then there will be a penalty. And it will be, you'll suffer a worse punishment, like John Locke said.

[00:09:43] So that's, I think, so significant that he puts that endowed and unalienable to really lock these things in and make it clear. So the question is, what are some of these rights? Yes. Right? So they're endowed with certain unalienable rights that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And we like to just jump right to these rights, right? Right. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

[00:10:14] And we miss the phrase that Jefferson puts right in there. Among these. Now, that's significant because that indicates that there's a lot more. Among these rights are these three. And so there's more rights. And when the founders were referencing rights, particularly when they were talking about the Bill of Rights and things like that, they said there's innumerable rights.

[00:10:43] And we don't even know how many. There's rights that are undiscovered. And the courts over the years have done just that. They have brought up additional rights that have been discovered, rights of privacy and other rights. And so I think that's part of our job as we continue to figure out how to self-govern is let's continue to identify what these rights are.

[00:11:11] And not forget that Jefferson is reminding us that there are more rights among these, or life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. So now we get into the three great rights. And why would he choose these three? Yes, why? So I think because they are the most fundamental. And all other rights come out of these rights. Okay. And they're very methodic. Founders are always so methodic the way they do things.

[00:11:40] And they build on each other. These aren't just three separate rights that live independent of each other. These rights are connected and they build on each other. And so let's explore that. So the right to life. I mean, what does that mean to you? Life. What does it mean to any of us? To be alive. To breathe. To have my heart beat. To be able to use my body. Yeah.

[00:12:09] And that's what the first thing that we always think about is our aliveness, right? And John Locke actually referenced the body not as our life, but as our property. So John Locke kind of indicates that there's something more to life than just our body. So while that's true, our heartbeat and our breathing and all those things are part of what it means to be alive.

[00:12:38] What is it that actually animates this property, right? And that would be my soul. That's right. And so whatever your belief is on what animates it, there's something behind it that animates it. And that's what science continues to contemplate and try to figure out, right? What animates the body. And so religiously, we might believe that it's our soul.

[00:13:01] Scientifically, we might just believe that it's some type of intelligence that animates chemicals and keeps things moving in the body and whatnot. But regardless of what we believe, it's the right to exist. Yes. Right? However we believe that existence happens, it's just the right to be here. And we know that nature gave us that right because we're here. Right?

[00:13:30] It's like, again, John Locke said that when he was talking about life, he's talking about, he says, with God, we can say, I am. And so he's referencing, of course, when God is talking to Moses saying, hey, tell them that I am sent you. And essentially, when you go back to the original Hebrew on that, essentially what he's saying is, tell them that the God that exists sent you.

[00:13:58] And with God, we can say the same thing. We exist. We are something. And then John Locke then says, we know that we are something and something cannot be created by nothing. So that's when he's saying there must be something out there that created us because something can't come from nothing. And so this is what he's talking about with life. Life is whatever it is that animates the body.

[00:14:28] And so the enjoyment of that life or the ability to keep that life moving is completely our right and our right to protect it, to sustain it. So now this gets into, we'll get into more detail in lesson four on the Second Amendment. But that's really what the Second Amendment is about, is it's not about the right to carry a gun or a knife or anything. It's about the right to self-preservation. Yes.

[00:14:58] Which ties directly to this right to life. It's no different than having the right to plant a garden, to go to the grocery store, to take medicine. We all have that right to sustain our lives. And the right of self-defense goes right along with that. So now's the big one that we all love, especially in the liberty movement. Yes. Is liberty. Yes.

[00:15:28] So what does liberty mean to you, Jenny Beth? It means the freedom to exercise my rights as I see fit without the infringement of government or anyone else, as long as I don't infringe on somebody else's rights. That's right. And that's perfect. And that last part that you put in, you just expressed the right, but then you expressed that there's a duty in association with that right.

[00:15:55] And that duty is that you don't do to others what you don't want others to do to you, which is kind of the backwards way of saying the golden rule, right? Do unto others as you would have others do unto you. And that's exactly right. And so Jefferson defined this. He defined what liberty was, and he defined it exactly the way you explained it. And I love his definition. The only thing I don't love is that he- He's probably more eloquent than I am. He is, but he gets sloppy on one thing. Oh.

[00:16:25] Basically, he defines wrong liberty and then right liberty. And it's like, I wish he would have used a different word for wrong liberty and then just called right liberty just liberty. Liberty. Right. So what we've done is, like we did this in speaking the language of liberty, is we've changed the word for Jefferson. Instead of him saying liberty and then he says rightful liberty, we say freedom and liberty. Because essentially that's what he's defining is freedom.

[00:16:55] And he says freedom is unobstructed action according to one's will. So do whatever you want, right? But then he said liberty, on the other hand, is unobstructed action according to one's will within the boundaries drawn around them by the liberty of others. I love that picture that that paints, right? Right. We all have this little bubble around us of our liberties.

[00:17:22] And those bubbles, the moment they come in contact with each other, we can't go beyond that because we'll be trampling on the rights of others. Bill, that reminds me of something that former Congressman Paul Brown, who is from Georgia, said. He always encouraged people to read the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. And he had a copy of them on his desk. I mean, we have a copy here.

[00:17:49] But he also had the Federalist Papers and he encouraged people to read that. And he would say wild dogs are free and they can do whatever they want and they can just ravage whatever they want. They are free to roam around and do whatever they want. We have liberty. And liberty means that we're not going to just go around fighting with each other and getting into scruffs with other people.

[00:18:16] That there are some constraints on it that we have agreed to so that we can live a more full life. That's right. And that's a great way to explain it and picture it. These wild dogs can just do whatever they want whenever they want. And I don't think we want to live that way, right? So this gets us back to that primitive natural law versus sophisticated natural law. And this is where I think these three rights totally build on each other.

[00:18:44] If we just look at life, just the right to life, and we just talk about living on this earth, then yeah, that's a pretty—life by itself is pretty primitive. And if it's all about just surviving, then we are just going to be that pack of wild dogs. But liberty now takes us to a different level because we want to do more than just live. We want to do something with that life.

[00:19:13] And in order to do that, we have to follow some more sophisticated natural law principles. So if we want to just live life, then we can be the pack of dogs. If we want to live a more sophisticated way and do more than just growling at each other and snapping at each other and fighting, then we've got to do more, which means not trampling on the rights of others, which is exactly how Jefferson's defining this.

[00:19:43] So let's go ahead in the declaration just a little bit, and then we'll come back to the pursuit of happiness. Okay. Because that's the next step. So if life is at one level, liberty is at the next level, the pursuit of happiness is even at a higher, more sophisticated level. Okay.

[00:20:03] But in order to really understand how we can pursue happiness as a society, because as an individual, we can do that, but we have to figure out how to do it as a society. It's a lot more complex than even just individual and relationship stuff. To do it as, you know, 300 plus million people, it's a challenge. Yes. I think we're seeing a lot of that right now in our country.

[00:20:32] It's a real challenge with being able to find happiness when we disagree with one another. Absolutely. And just so you know, the viewers know, this isn't the first time that our country has been, you know, highly polarized. There's been multiple times in our country when we've been very, very polarized.

[00:20:56] Even as early as 1800, the election of 1800 between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, it was bitter, bitter arguments. And that's when Adams and Jefferson at one time were great friends, became bitter political enemies. And they wrote this together and then they became enemies. That's right. Because politically, they disagreed very strongly on some issues.

[00:21:23] And then it made it so that they started badmouthing each other. And then they started, you know, making some things personal. And the newspapers and the press and media didn't help. And their political parties that they had created and become part of didn't help because you started getting partisanship in there and all that. So it is a challenge. So let's, we're going to jump ahead in the declaration just a little bit and then we'll come back to the pursuit of happiness to kind of talk about that.

[00:21:52] So to secure these rights. So remember, this is more than just the three rights. Okay. When Jefferson is saying to secure these rights, he's also talking about among these. Yes. So it's more than just the three rights that we're securing. Um, but to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. So that's why we institute men.

[00:22:20] This also goes back to Frederick Bastia when he talks about the purpose of government, um, was, was to secure rights. Um, and, and that's what comes first. And then, then we make laws after the fact. And so the consent of the governed is, is really key that, that we have consent. So let's, let's explore this just a little bit.

[00:22:45] So do you have the right to sit at your doorstep, uh, with a garden hose in your hand, just in case your house starts on fire, you can put it out? Yes. You do have that right. Absolutely. That seems pretty obvious. But do you also have the right to stand at your doorstep with a gun in your other hand, just in case somebody comes in to attack you or your family, you can protect them? I, I, I feel like you're about to ask me a trick question, Bill.

[00:23:14] Um, yeah, you do have that right. Yes. Now some states might question that right. They might question it. Normally I don't go around sitting on my front porch with a gun, but you get in my house and you might find a gun. Yeah, that's right. And, and, and so you, but you're, but you don't want to sit there 24 hours a day on your front porch and, uh, and do that. Um, I don't want to be in a place where we have to defend it 24 hours a day. That's right. And we'll be back like to your other episode where we were like in the woods having to stay awake and watch for bears.

[00:23:44] Exactly. And that's, now some states that, that some of our viewers might live in, they might question that and, and they might, um, some of those state laws might be more restrictive than others. But we're talking about just these natural law fundamental principles. If it's my property, you don't have the right to come infringe on it and I have the right to protect. That's right. To protect against it.

[00:24:07] And so whether, whether that's sitting there with a gun in your hand or whether it's, you know, whatever you're, you're able to protect it. Um, and, but you don't want to do that 24 hours a day. Although I was teaching a seminar once in, um, Asheville, North Carolina. And in, in the back of the room, there was a rough looking character. And, uh, and when I said, you know, do you want to do that 24 hours a day so that you doorstep with a gun in your hand? He said, I do.

[00:24:37] And so I asked him to expand and, and I guess he does. He sits on his doorstep with a shotgun in his hand just so his, his neighbors know who's in control of that property. And, and so, so he does do this. Yes. But nonetheless, the rest of us don't necessarily want to do this 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Um, because we want to go to work. We want to go spend time with our family. We want to, you know, do whatever, go to a sports game.

[00:25:02] And so we get together as a society and we ask, uh, we say, Fred, do you want a job? And Fred says, sure. What do you want me to do? And so we say, well, we're going to give you a big truck and we're going to, you, we want to keep it full of water. And we're going to give you a phone. And when that phone rings, you better come running because it means that one of our homes is on fire and you need to come help us put it out. Can you do that? And Fred said, absolutely, I can do that. And then we get ahold of Sam over here and we say, Sam, we want to give you a job.

[00:25:31] He say, oh, what do you want me to do? And so we said, well, we're going to give you a car and put some lights on top. Uh, and then we're going to, we're going to give you a gun and let you carry that because we have the right to carry a gun ourselves. And, uh, we just want you to drive around our neighborhoods and just make sure that our property is secure and that nobody's harming our, our family and friends. Can you do that? And Sam said, absolutely. I can do that. So what have we just created with Fred and Sam?

[00:26:00] A fire department and a police department or a sheriff. That's right. Yeah. We just created law enforcement and the fire department. And what gave us the right to do that? What gave us the authority to create that? I would assume that at this point we're establishing some form of a government in order and people are deciding we're going to, to pay to take care of the fire department and the police department. That's right. Which is what happens.

[00:26:30] And we were able to do that because we had the right to do that. Yes. We had the right to sit at our doorstep with a garden hose and a gun. And we had the right to assemble a government. That's right. Because we have the right to establish, alter, and abolish our own form of government.

[00:26:45] Because we have the right to self-govern, we can then delegate some of that to somebody else to temporarily watch out for the bear or to bring the hose with the water in case of a fire. So we have the right to do that. And so we can assign that to somebody else, certainly temporarily or permanently or whatever. We can just assign that to others because we have the right.

[00:27:15] But once we assign it to Fred and Sam, did we lose our right to sit at our doorstep with a garden hose and a gun? No. No. So the assignment doesn't mean that we gave that away, especially if those are unalienable rights because we can't even alienate ourselves from them. Yes. So really all we've done when we've created government is we are just delegating the administration of some of our rights. But we're not giving them our rights.

[00:27:44] So like, for example, if our rights are our power, we're not actually giving our power to government. We're just giving some of the control to government. And so that's consent. We have the consent to do that. We can consent to giving those rights to government.

[00:28:07] Now, where the problem ends up happening is when we start abusing it and we started going beyond what we ourselves have the right to do. So for example, Frederick Bastiat said, government is a great fiction where everybody seeks to live at the expense of everyone else. Right. So it's like, we're like, wait a minute. We just told Fred and Sam to go do these things and that made our life easier.

[00:28:33] Maybe if I told Sam, the sheriff, that I think I want some of Jenny Beth's property, go get some of her property and bring it back over here to me. That'll make my life easier. No, no, no. It'll make my life harder. That's right. And so it's an abuse of that control that you're giving. And there's a line that's drawn there. But nonetheless, we do it. We try to do it.

[00:29:01] So many groups, individuals, whatever, will go to government and try to get government to take things that are others. Or even prevent. Like you might have a company that goes and tries to pass a law that prevents their competitor from doing something. Yes.

[00:29:21] So they might not be taking from their competitor directly, but they're preventing their competitor from doing what they want to do or pursue happiness in an attempt to make it so my life's easier. So there's a line that is crossed. So let's figure out where that line is. So let's say, for instance, that I'm in my neighborhood and I've got a neighbor.

[00:29:47] So I've got a wife, four kids, and we have one car. And my neighbor here has just a husband and wife, and they have no kids, but two cars. So it's the Smith family. So their life is so much easier. Two cars. They can drive together. So the Joneses are even worse. Their life is hard. Smith's life's easy. But the Joneses, husband and wife, six kids, no car.

[00:30:19] So that's tough. Hard to get the kids to school. Hard to get to work. Tough to go to the grocery store. It's very difficult. Now, I'm a kind, compassionate, merciful individual. And so I'm over there talking to the Joneses, and I'm feeling really bad for them. And I get this idea. Yeah. So I go talk to Mr. Smith. And I said, Mr. Smith, do you know the Joneses? He says, no, not really. So I tell him the plight of the Joneses. And he says, well, that's unfortunate. That's a hard life. And I said, well, I've got an idea. You've got two cars, no kids or anything.

[00:30:48] So why don't you give one of your cars to the Joneses? And he said, well, that's an idea, all right. And I said, well, it's more than an idea. I insist. You insist? Get out of here. I'm not going to give my car to the Joneses. You can go work for their own car. Now, this infuriates me because he has such a lack of compassion. And I'm such a kind, compassionate, merciful individual. And so I can't stand this guy now because he's just so hateful.

[00:31:16] And I can't even sleep at night because this just got me riled up. So I decided to get up one night and I go over to the Smiths and I hotwire that car and I bring it over to Mr. Jones, knock on his door, wake him up to Mr. Jones. Here's a new car for me. Really? Yeah. Nice new car. Now you can get to the kids to school easier. You can get to work easier. Sorry, I don't have a key. But if you just touch these two wires together, you'll be just fine. Right.

[00:31:43] And then I go home and sleep like a baby because I'm so compassionate and look at this great thing that I just did. And all of a sudden, three o'clock in the morning, I get a knock on the door. It's the sheriff. He says, your fingerprints are all over that car. Well, of course they are. You'd have done the same thing if you were as great as I am. And he didn't want to hear any of that. And so he calls me off. And I end up doing some time in jail for Grand Theft Auto. And they return the car back to Mr. Smith.

[00:32:11] And I'm writing letters to my wife while I'm in jail and finding out that this injustice, at least what I perceive to be an injustice, is still happening. So I had plenty of time to think in jail and come up with a plan. So I get out of jail. I get back home. And I start campaigning. So there's 100 homes in our neighborhood. Each home gets one vote. And I start campaigning that Mr. Smith has to give his car to Mr. Jones.

[00:32:39] Now, you've done a lot of campaigning. You're probably pretty good at it. Yeah, but I never campaign for that. Well, I'm a good campaigner, too. And because I'm so compassionate, I'm pushing this one hard. And the election day comes. And we have a vote. And it's 99 for and one against. That's a mandate. You can't refuse a mandate of the people, right? And so 99 of us go over to Mr. Smith's, hotwire his car, and bring it over to Mr. Jones.

[00:33:09] And, of course, Mr. Jones is happy. We're all happy. We all hate Mr. Smith now because who do you think the one vote against it was? Right. Mr. Hateful. So now what happens? If you were to actually do this in your neighborhood, what happens next? Well, I think that if I were Mr. Smith, I'd leave. Yeah, get out of the neighborhood. Just get out. I'd move to Florida. Exactly. There's going to be somebody else who doesn't have something. Yeah.

[00:33:38] There's always going to be somebody else. And there's always going to be this kind, compassionate thing. But under the law, if you did this in your own neighborhood, 99 people are going to jail. Right? Right. So you don't have the right. Yes. You don't have the right to take from one neighbor. As an individual, you can't take from one neighbor and give it to the other.

[00:33:59] And then when we get together as a society, as a group, we don't somehow mysteriously get more rights as a collective to be able to take from Mr. Smith and give to Mr. Jones. We don't have the right. 99 of us don't have the right to do that. So if we don't have the right to do something ourselves individually or collectively, then how can we ever delegate that to our agents, the government? Well, you should not be able to.

[00:34:27] It happens because we can look in New York City, but it should not be able to. That's correct. It violates natural law. Yes. You can do it just like you can steal people's stuff and you can, I mean, I physically could go over and steal the car from Mr. Smith. But I don't have the right to. That violates his right. And that's infringing upon his rights. And so we can't do that. We cannot delegate that to our agents, the government.

[00:34:55] So if we ourselves don't have the authority to do something, then that can't be given because you can't give that which you don't have. I'd love to give you a million dollars, but I just don't have a million dollars to give. So we can't give or delegate something that we don't have. And so this is the significance of government deriving its authority by the consent of the governed.

[00:35:21] So, yes, we can consent to giving government these things, but we can only give that which we have the authority to give. And so what is it? I mean, so what's the only way that Mr. Smith, that we can move Mr. Smith's car to Mr. Jones? It's a voluntary transfer of some kind. That's right. In fact, you could say, well, if he purchases it.

[00:35:46] Well, if Mr. Jones offers Mr. Smith a million dollars, Mr. Smith still does not have to give it to him. Yes. Right? So it has to be voluntary. It has to be consent. And so the big question now is, what is it that binds Mr. Smith to his car so tightly that only Mr. Smith can consent to that car moving over?

[00:36:09] And so now this gets us into the thinking of John Locke and his ideas on property that the founders really embraced. And this will help those also who might struggle with private property rights. I mean, we all, it seems like it's a logical thing that if we own a car, then that's our car and we get to keep it.

[00:36:34] But in some worldviews, that's a struggle to understand that because some people are not sure if we should have private property rights. Like why should some people have more property than another? And so it's a struggle for some. Well, and we're recording these episodes and as we record them, Elon Musk has just become a trillionaire with a T.

[00:36:59] And I heard a speech Elizabeth Warren was giving and she thinks it's completely wrong and needs to fix this somehow. So he's no longer a trillionaire. Yeah. And she wants to do the exact same thing, take from him and give to others. That's right. And where does that right come from? Well, she sure doesn't have it. She doesn't.

[00:37:22] But there could be 99 people out of 100 who vote for it, which would harm Elon Musk. That's right. Which is an indication that pure democracies could be a problem. Yes, it's an indication, as we talked about in our first episode, that we need to educate more people. That's exactly right. And in our next episode, we'll talk more about democracies and all that kind of stuff. Yeah.

[00:37:49] The thing that frustrates me when you get somebody like Elizabeth Warren talking about that is a trillionaire is a big deal. Yes. Because a trillion dollars is a lot of money. Do you know there's only a handful of countries that have budgets over a trillion dollars? It's amazing. I mean, it is. I think it's one of the most amazing things in the world that there's a person who can have made a trillion dollars. Yeah. It's so, so amazing. It's so significant.

[00:38:19] And what frustrates me, though, is, you know, there's only approximately 15 countries or so in the world that actually have budgets more than a trillion dollars. And obviously we're one of them. And Elizabeth Warren is, has a lot of control over that budget. Yes. So if she has a problem with people controlling a trillion dollars, then she needs to have a problem with herself and her colleagues, which many of us do have a problem with them controlling that much money and that much revenue.

[00:38:48] And so she is in the same camp as Elon Musk when it comes to being in control of this kind of resource and revenue. And in her case, it's even worse because it's not her trillion dollars. And so she's redistributing or at least wants to redistribute.

[00:39:06] So anyway, so that's that's a side note frustration that I have when these politicians complain about millionaires, billionaires and now trillionaires when they themselves operate control over that kind of money. And plus they have the force of government with it.

[00:39:24] So let's let's explore this, though, because because this is important property and how it's inseparably connected to us and how we use it for things like roads and schools and eminent domain and and how socialists and communists think that they just have a right to other people's property. So John Locke explained this really well. So if I'm out in the wilderness, again, we're there's no bears yet. All right.

[00:39:53] But I'm out in the wilderness and I come across a wild apple tree. And it's not on anybody's land. Nobody planted the apple. It's just purely it's it's purely wild. And I come across that wild apple tree. Do I have the right to pick that apple and to and to eat it? If it doesn't belong to anyone else. And yes. Yeah. So John Locke's contemplating that. And he's like, it seems like if it doesn't belong to everyone else, then they can eat it.

[00:40:23] But if it's but then he's like, well, so who does it belong to? If God gave us this earth for all of us to enjoy, then it really belongs to all of us. So he first contemplates the question, if it belongs to all of us, then do I need permission from everybody in order to to take a bite of this apple? And he immediately concluded, no, that's ridiculous. Because what would happen? The apple would go bad before you could pull everybody.

[00:40:53] Exactly. And I would die long before I ever got, you know, the billions of people on this earth to all agree that I can eat the apple. So he's like there's some. So is there something that can make it so that so that I can possess this apple? So he's contemplating this. So it's thinking, OK, somebody eats the apple. So I'm going to take a bite of the apple. This probably isn't the best thing to do on air. Right. So now what's happening?

[00:41:23] I'm chewing it, right? Yes. Pre-digesting it. And then as I swallow it, it's going to get into my intestines. And then what's my body going to start doing with it? It's going to turn it into energy and use it. That's right. It's going to start sucking the nutrients out of it. And as it does that, then I get this energy and I get to continue to live.

[00:41:51] And so John Locke poses the question, well, is there any doubt as to whose nutrients it is? I mean, you don't want the nutrients at this point, right? Now that you have had those nutrients, you can keep them. That's right. You don't want them, but. I won't be trying to take those and give them to somebody else. Exactly. It'd be difficult. At least not that way, right? That's right. And so John Locke's then thinking, OK, well, so there's no question whose nutrients it is. It's now mine.

[00:42:21] But what made it his? At what point did it become his? Was it the gathering? Was it the bringing at home? Was it the preparing of the meal? Was it any of that stuff? And he concluded that if the first action, the picking of the apple, didn't make it his, then nothing else could. Because if it was the eating, if it was the taking the bite,

[00:42:47] then that would have meant that the time from picking to the eating, I would have stolen the apple. So it had to have been the picking. So the question is, what is it about the picking that made it mine? And John Locke said he added something to it. So let's just read a couple of his quotes rather than me paraphrasing him. He said, will anyone say he had no right to those acorns or apples he thus appropriated

[00:43:15] because he had not the consent of all mankind to make them his? If such a consent as that was necessary, the man would have starved, notwithstanding the plenty God had given him. I like that picture he paints, right? There's plenty for you to survive. Right. But you would have starved had you had to ask him. So then he goes on. He says, though the earth and all inferior creatures be in common as a gift from God to all men,

[00:43:43] yet every man has a property in his own person. So now this is where he's talking about this. We have this property. This nobody has a right to but himself. So my body is my right. Nobody else has a right to it. The labor of his body and his work of his hands, we may say, are properly his because the labor that I do with this body is an extension of this body.

[00:44:12] Whatsoever then he removes out of the state that nature hath provided and left it in, he hath mixed his labor with it and joined to it something that is his own and thereby makes it his property. So that's what made this apple mine was the fact that I mixed my own labor with it. I took some of my property and mixed it with that natural object and made that my own.

[00:44:42] So then he goes on. He that is nourished by the acorns he picked up under an oak or the apples he gathered from the trees in the wood has certainly appropriated them to himself. Nobody can deny but the nourishment is his. I ask then, when did they begin to be his? When he digested or when he ate or when he boiled or when he brought them home or when he picked them? And it is plain. If the first gathering made them not his, nothing else could.

[00:45:13] So the picking, the labor. So let's look at what this, let's explore what this looks like now. So I want you to think of an equation of time plus choices equals property. Time plus choices equals property. So let me illustrate what this looks like in real life.

[00:45:38] So if you make $60,000 a year and you purchase a car for $30,000, you just spent six months of your life working to make the money to purchase that car. So time, the time part of the choice is six months. Choices, I mean, it's almost infinite the number of choices that you have to make, right?

[00:46:04] What car to buy, what to save up for, what not to buy so you're saving the money, what job to have, whether to get up every day to go to work, all those choices. So let's just say you had to make 1,000 choices. And so now you have time, six months, plus 1,000 choices equals a car. So time, so you thought that you bought your car for money, but you didn't.

[00:46:27] What you actually did is you got money with time and choices and you exchanged that money for a car. And so now I want you to think of that equation not as time plus choices equals property, but life plus liberty equals property.

[00:46:47] Because that's really what life is, is our time and liberty are our choices and that equals our property. So life, liberty and property are inseparably connected. So what happens, you remember your algebra teacher? What happens if you take from one side of the equal sign? What do you have to do? If you take from one side of the equal sign, you've got to move something, right?

[00:47:16] Yeah, you have to take something from the other side. The other side, you pull it out. And so if somebody steals that car, so if they take, so you have life plus liberty equals property and they take that car, which is the property, what do you also then take from the other side? If you take, I'm sorry, we're going to have to add to that part. Tell me again, say it again. So if you have life plus liberty equals property and somebody takes that property, takes your car,

[00:47:45] what do you also then take from the other side? You're taking the life and the liberty from them. That's exactly right. Yes. Which is why you get so angry if somebody steals something from you. Precisely. And that's why you also feel so violated. Yes. And some people, if they've ever had like their car broken into or their home broken into, they might feel like bad because they feel like, why am I so attached to these material objects? Like if you're a religious person, you think, well, I'm so materialistic. Why am I so attached?

[00:48:13] Well, because it's a lot more than just a material object. It's everything it took for you to have that. That's right. Those things are representative of your time and your choices. Exactly. And so you feel completely violated because they didn't just steal your property. They stole your life and your liberty. And in the case with the car, they stole six months of your life. Yes. And your liberty. I mean, they literally killed you for six months because if you never get that car back, you will never get that six months of your life back.

[00:48:43] Yes. And all the labor that you put into it. Yes. Which is the other significant thing that politicians need to realize, that when they are spending money, they are spending lives and liberties. In fact, what kind of value would you place on life? I don't know how to value life because it's invaluable. That's right. It's priceless. Yes.

[00:49:05] So if we were to place the only kind of value we can, and that would be how much can the average human being make in their lifetime, then it's approximately $1.2 to $1.4 million because that's about what the average person makes in their lifetime. So while life itself, what animates life, is priceless, if we look at just the value of the human while they're alive in monetary terms,

[00:49:34] then it's about $1.2 million. So what that means is for every $1.2 million that a politician spends, they just spent a life, which is really significant. It took a whole life to make that. And so when they're spending billions and trillions, look at all the lives that they're spending. And when we go into debt, we are spending the lives of our children and our grandchildren and our great-grandchildren.

[00:50:02] We've already spent their life, which is so immoral of us to do. Yes. We have no right to spend the lives of our great-grandchildren. Talk about- $39 trillion. Taxation without representation, right? So using this equation now, life plus liberty equals property. Essentially, property is whatever you've used your life and liberty to obtain.

[00:50:31] So what else is our property then? Beyond the tangible things, it can be the things that we learn. That's right. And we've done two documentaries on intellectual property. And so we understand that the ideas that you have are also things that you can own. That's right. You own them because you've spent your life in liberty. Tangible, yes. Yeah.

[00:50:59] So we will, and we see that people will trademark logos and ideas and the contents of books. That's right. Are copyrighted, not trademarked. But there are a lot of things that aren't, the book itself without the words is just paper. That's right. It's the ideas that go inside of it that make it much more valuable. Which is why we're having a debate now, like with AI.

[00:51:28] You have these different companies that have gone in and taken all this property of others and trained the AI on this property without compensation, without attributing to any of those authors, to any of that. And so now there's this debate, okay, how, was that ethical? Was it legal? Was it correct? Sure was not ethical. In a lot of cases, I don't think it is. Unless it was available in free, in a free domain.

[00:51:58] That's right. If you're going and taking from a website that has a paywall, then it's not. That's right. And you have, and now you have, you've created a product. So I can't go and just take your stuff and create a product out of it. I have to, I have to pay you for the materials that I'm putting into my product. And that's, that's exactly what, what some of these companies need to be doing is if they're going to create a product in a chat GPT or a Claude or a Grok or whatever, that's a product

[00:52:27] that they're using other people's property to, to produce. Yes. And so, so I, I do think that there absolutely has been a violation of, of some property rights there. And in other places with public domain and stuff, they absolutely have a right to use any of that just like you and I do. But nonetheless, intellectual property is great. Relationships. I mean, how much, how much of your life and liberty do you spend on relationships? A lot. Yeah.

[00:52:54] And those, and, and relationships that fail, when you look at the, the primary reason it's always because one or both, uh, decided not to sacrifice any more of their life and liberty for that relationship. Yes. Or, or somebody wanted you to sacrifice more of your life and liberty for the relationship than what I'm willing to sacrifice. And eventually that imbalance will destroy the relationship.

[00:53:19] Um, so relationships, uh, are, are your property, um, your good works, the good things that you do, you spend your life and liberty on that. What about your bad works? Well, yes. Cause you still have spent life and liberty on them. That's right. You've made choices and spent time on them. The phrase you own your sins. You better believe it. You've purchased those sins. Right.

[00:53:44] Um, and so, so all the, the good things you do, the bad things you do, your reputation, everything is part of your, your life and liberty. Um, and it, so it becomes your property. So if the bad works or the sins that you do are your property, then if you try to, uh, resolve those bad works or those sins and you repent and you, you, you, uh, pay restitution

[00:54:11] and all that, that also, that redemption, that forgiveness also becomes your property because you spent your life and liberty to obtain it. Right. So the founders really recognized that property is so much more than just tangible, physical property.

[00:54:34] Um, that it is the things that we are, it's things of value, things of real value, things that, uh, that, that bring value in life to you and your family and your friends. And, and that's what the pursuit of happiness really means is the pursuit of things of value. So we should have the freedom to pursue happiness. The founders are not talking about the things that just put a smile on our face.

[00:55:03] They're not talking about immediate gratification. They are talking about, um, the pursuit of things of value that can make our lives better, um, as individuals and make us better people. So Jefferson said this, he said, happiness does not depend on the condition of life in which chance has placed us, but as always the result of a good conscience, good health, occupation, and freedom in all just pursuits.

[00:55:33] So I love how he brings that word pursuit in there because he's talking about just pursuits. So when we're talking about pursuit of happiness, we're talking about just or correct pursuits, pursuits of good things. Um, and so, so that answers the question, what is it that binds Mr. Smith to that car so tightly that only Mr. Smith can consent to losing that car? And the answer to that question is because it's his property because he spent his life and liberty to obtain it.

[00:56:03] And so it is his life and liberty. Um, so you see how beautiful those three rights are, how they build on each other. Life is just this core existence. Liberty brings it up to another level, taking that existence and doing something with it. And then living in an environment in which we can take that liberty and pursue things of value, just pursuits. Um, so it takes us higher and higher and higher to more sophisticated natural law principles.

[00:56:33] Um, so George Sutherland, who was a U S Supreme court justice, he once said this, he said, the individual, the man has three great rights equally sacred from arbitrary interference, the right to his life, the right to his liberty, the right to his property. The three rights are so bound together as to be essentially one, right to give a man his life,

[00:57:00] but deny him his liberty is to take from him all that makes his life worth living to give him his liberty, but take from him the property, which is the fruit and badge of his liberty is still to leave him a slave. So if property is the fruit of what you've done with your life and liberty, then anybody taking that fruit without your consent is a form of bondage or slavery.

[00:57:27] And the ultimate form of that is slavery itself, right? Where you're taking 100% of the fruit of somebody's labor. I mean, that literally is the definition of slavery. And so we can have, we can incrementally have forms of bondage that eventually slavery becomes the ultimate. But anytime we're taking any property, too much taxes, whatever, stealing that as a form of bondage,

[00:57:56] uh, what, what, uh, George Sutherland saying here. And then I love this from, uh, Abraham Lincoln. He said, property is the fruit of labor. Property is desirable. It is a positive good in the world that some should be rich shows that others may become rich. So, so that Elon Musk can be a trillionaire shows that you and I can be a trillionaire. Yes. Which is great. That's why it's such good news. Yes. Yes.

[00:58:26] It's reachable. Someone has done it. Yeah. It's something that is attainable. Which is so remarkable. So, so, so yeah. So Lincoln is saying here that, uh, uh, that some may be rich. It shows that others may become rich and hence is just encouragement to industry and enterprise. It, if we didn't know that we, that we weren't going to get rewarded for our industry and enterprise, then why would we ever work hard? This is where communism and socialism always fails. Yes.

[00:58:55] Is when we finally, when we realize, why am I working so hard when I get, I get stuff even when I don't work, you're not going to work. So then Lincoln goes on, let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another, but let him work diligently to build one for himself. Thus, by example, assuring that his own shall be safe from violence.

[00:59:21] I take it that it is best for all to leave each man free to acquire property as fast as he can. Some will get wealthy. I don't believe in a law to prevent a man from getting rich. It would do more harm than good. So what, what, uh, Elizabeth Warren is proposing trying to prevent Elon Musk from being a trillionaire would do more harm than good according to Abraham Lincoln.

[00:59:46] So then Adams said, the moment the idea is admitted into society, that property is not as sacred as the laws of God and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it. Anarchy and tyranny commence. So what's cool about this is now we, this totally gives us the blueprint. We now know how to protect these rights. It's by protecting property.

[01:00:17] Because just like we concluded that if we take property, then it's the same as taking life and liberty, right? So if we protect property, then what's that the same as? It's the same as protecting life and liberty. Exactly. So life is kind of intangible. Liberty is kind of intangible. If we really want to protect life and liberty, all we have to do is protect property. Yes. All of our laws can be based on protecting property.

[01:00:46] Even, even thou shalt not kill, you know, you can't murder. That's protecting this, this property of the body. You don't steal. That's protecting property, intellectual property, copyright law, all those things. If we just write laws to protect property, that's all we have to worry about. Because it will automatically protect life and liberty. Isn't that cool? It is cool. It is cool.

[01:01:09] So now that we established that's cool, what's also great is now we can use property as the gauge to determine how well we're doing with our laws and with government and all that. Because if we don't have the total right and control of our property because there's too much theft, too much fraud, then that means we've gone too far toward anarchy.

[01:01:35] If we don't have the total right and control of our property because there's too much regulation, too much taxation, then now we're too far toward tyranny or oppression. Yes. When we have the total right and control of our property, we know that we've found that balance center between anarchy and tyranny. And so we know that we have found and established a government that is truly founded on natural law principles and on these natural rights.

[01:02:00] And so it becomes this gauge to see what kind of society we've created. Property becomes this beautiful gauge. So how well are we doing? In America, in some states, we're doing a lot better than in others. And I think that oftentimes it's right now in America how you have to look at it, because certainly the federal government with those who are in control of Congress right now.

[01:02:29] And as we're recording this, both chambers are controlled by the Republicans and you've got Trump at the White House. They are not doing as much to infringe on property rights and, in fact, ending regulations that would. But at a state level, those regulations keep coming. That's right. We can look at California and New York as examples of this. Alarming examples of this. Yeah, very alarming.

[01:02:54] And if we look at that gauge I just explained with too much fraud or theft versus too much regulation, we're actually seeing both of those extremes in our country right now. I mean, look at the fraud that's been happening with Medicare and with hospice and all that, right? Yes. And then also the crime rates. Right.

[01:03:18] Crime rates are so high that even our own lives are at risk in many cities. And that's luckily changing because there's some policies that have been in place that's helping to reduce crime rate significantly. So that means we are too far toward anarchy with some of our laws. But because we are also over-regulated and over-taxed, we're also too far toward oppression in some of our laws.

[01:03:44] So we're doing pretty poorly when it comes to regulating our property in a way that promotes liberty. Uh-oh, Bill. What happens when the two bad things equal out? That's a bad thing. We still don't have our natural rights protected. That's right. But we're not—it's not a scale. It's looking at it on a spectrum. That's right.

[01:04:07] And it's just—and it's terrible that we are—that we're in a situation where we're—we now have to be fearful of both anarchy and tyranny. It's put us in a tough spot. And that's why we need some pretty significant correction, which is what I think we're seeing in our country today. And whether policies that are being put in place today are good or bad, the fact that they are shaking things up and that they are shining a spotlight on the anarchy and tyranny,

[01:04:37] just that action alone, whether the policies are perfect or not, just that action alone will have significant help in getting us back on track. So when I came up with that idea of property being this perfect gauge, I thought, man, that's a cool concept.

[01:04:57] I thought that was pretty smart because I thought that was pretty original until I read James Madison has a paper on property, and he outlines that exact very thing. But to be in the company of James Madison is pretty good. And then John Adams said at the very end, he said, property must be secured or liberty cannot exist.

[01:05:23] So I want the viewers to, when they read life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, to transcribe that in their minds, pursuit of happiness to property. And that is actually the original phrase. If you go back to the original documents prior to the declaration, the founders often talked about life, liberty, property. Life, liberty, property. And then you saw it change to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. And then property was dropped in just the pursuit of happiness.

[01:05:51] But that's truly what the founders are talking about with pursuit of happiness is pursuit of property, things of value, the types of properties that we've talked about. So that's one of my very favorite concepts with these natural law principles is this concept of property because it just resolves so much. It does. It does. And it's important. I think there are a lot of people who don't understand this.

[01:06:18] And they understand instinctually that they want to protect their own property. And then in America today, there are a lot of people who want their own property protected, but they're okay taking others to have more of their own things. That's right. And it's not okay. It is a violation to the people you're taking from. That's right. You remember a few years ago, the Occupy Wall Street? Yes.

[01:06:42] And those folks that were there were demanding that Wall Street, you know, give of their wealth to others. Yes. And there was a push to actually have that redistribution of wealth. But yet when any of those folks were approached about, well, give me your laptop then or give me your food or give me your tent, then they were appalled by the suggestion that they lose their own property.

[01:07:12] And so, yeah, it's important that we recognize that property is important regardless. Protecting other people's property is important regardless of how unfair you might think it is that they have more than you. I think that the Marxists in New York have moved from Occupy Wall Street to Occupy New York City. That's right. And they're trying to take on the whole, they're trying to take on and expand that. And we see it with the current mayor.

[01:07:42] Yep. And how he's saying you shouldn't have that big building and that big apartment. And if you're going to have that apartment and you don't live here, I'm going to just tax you even more. Yep. It's really scary for those people in New York. It's completely against every founding principle that we have. It absolutely is. And they don't, there are so many people right now in government and in the country who have not learned about the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

[01:08:12] And they don't understand these founding principles. And that's why we're going back and doing this. Exactly. Hopefully we've got new people and hopefully we might remind others who have been part of our organization and part of the show for a long time. Because you have to keep having these ideas refreshed. That's right. You have to constantly go back to recurring, you know, back to the fundamental principles. Yes.

[01:08:39] And the only positive thing about New York is that it will just give us one more example of how that fails. Because, of course, it's going to fail. It will fail. And, but it's really sad that some of our fellow Americans are going to go through the struggle that that's going to bring to them. Well, it's sad that they will go through it.

[01:09:00] And it's sad that the entire city of New York, which is supposed to be the greatest city in the world, is going to go through and is going through the situation. And they have more crime right now. The whole thing is a mess. Yeah. If you don't respect property, you're not going to enforce the law. If you don't enforce the law, you're going to have more crime. People's rights are going to be violated. And then you're back to not respecting property. Yep.

[01:09:26] And it's all 100% predictable because it's all based on these natural law principles we're talking about. Yes. Yes. They're the laws of nature. That's right. And that's the point. That's the point that the founders were bringing up is, hey, this is observable. It's measurable. It's predictable. It's predictable. Yes. And so let's put in place the things that predict the good and not the bad. And unfortunately, we make those mistakes repeatedly. Yes.

[01:09:54] Here in this country and then around the entire world. Yep. So, okay. We've gone through your favorite part, life, liberty, and the pursuit of property. That's right. Happiness. Yes. So, let's keep going through parts of the declaration here and talk a little bit about what Jefferson's getting at with some of this other stuff.

[01:10:15] So, he then goes on that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it and to institute new government. So, this is revolutionary. Again, this isn't Jefferson coming up with a new idea because John Locke said this 100 years earlier and others have said it long before as well.

[01:10:42] But this is where Jefferson's really outlining it. And then the American people put this natural right in action. And that is the right to establish, alter, or abolish our form of government. And so, that's why at the very beginning of the declaration where he says, you know, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary to separate this connection. That's what he's doing here now is saying we have the right to do this.

[01:11:12] If the government that we are a part of is destructive of securing these rights, then no big deal. We can just change it. Yes. And that's what we're going to do now. We're not going to accept the government that's doing this to us. Now, it's pretty important that we recognize that this is a fundamental, unalienable right of self-governance, which means the ability to establish, alter, or abolish, which means we always have this right.

[01:11:43] The Constitution itself, though we revere it and we believe it's a great document and there's certainly some sacredness to it, that the Constitution itself does not eliminate this right. And though it may be controversial to some to say this, the South had a right to secede if they wanted to secede because they had a right to establish, alter, or abolish their own form of government. Yes.

[01:12:11] Well, the Constitution really codifies altering the government through elections. That's right. Because we can do that every two, four, and six years depending on the office at the federal level. That's right. So it took that right and just put it in so that we would repeatedly be exercising that right. That's right. And then also with the amending in Article 5.

[01:12:36] So between those two things, between amending and voting and being able to change government out, it's kind of like a release valve so that if tensions build, instead of changing out the entire government, creating a whole new constitution, we have the ability to make these tweaks and changes along the way so that we don't have to secede from the union or whatever.

[01:13:00] And then I was also going to say that just like the South had the right to secede, they also had the right to come back into the union. And so I'm not saying that they should have seceded or should be separate from us now. I think it's great that we're reunified. I think it is we are not separated. Yeah. So that's – but that right always exists. And it's so great that Jefferson – I love how he also put all three. We can institute new government.

[01:13:29] We can alter the government we have and or we can abolish it. Whatever we want to do, we can do it. But then he makes it a point to say, okay, but this shouldn't happen just willy-nilly. Right? He says prudence indeed will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes.

[01:13:57] So we need to be reasonable about it and we need to be – we need to have some reservations. So the question is when? When is the time? When do we know that it's right? Well, I think you're going to answer that and I have the cheat sheet so I know the answer. And Jefferson kind of answers it, right?

[01:14:22] Next, he says, all experience has shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. So we will. We'll put up with a lot. Yes. And one reason why we put up with a lot is because we're resilient, first of all.

[01:14:44] In fact, if you notice that among the most abused when it comes to regulation and property rights and things are business owners. Have you noticed that? Yes. And one reason why, I think, is because those entrepreneurs, that's their style, is to overcome challenges and difficulties. And so when government places another hurdle in front of them, they just jump it. Yes. And move on.

[01:15:14] And then they jump another one and another one and another one. And they'll keep doing that because that's their personality is to resolve challenges and conflicts and to overcome. And so government naturally takes advantage of that because somebody who is not going to jump the hurdle, government doesn't place a hurdle in front of them because they're not going to jump it. Yeah.

[01:15:41] So, but eventually those business owners and others, there's eventually there gets to be just too many hurdles. But one of the main reasons I was going to say why people are willing to suffer this, these unsufferable things, is because as humans, we don't like too much risk and we don't like the unknown.

[01:16:06] And so knowing our tyrant is better than an unknown liberty because that liberty may lead us to another tyrant. And so we're much more prone to just stick with the tyrant we know rather than go somewhere that we don't know.

[01:16:29] And it's the same reason why people stay in abusive relationships and things like that because it's very scary to go and try to do new things. But eventually, so to answer the question, when do we know it's time to change? When it happens is when it was supposed to happen, right? When the line is finally drawn and people finally say enough is enough and change finally happens,

[01:16:58] that's when we finally say, that's when we know that the time was right because it does happen, which is what Jefferson then goes on to. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations pursuing invariably the same object, Evans is a design to reduce them under absolute despotism. It is their right, it is their duty to throw off such government.

[01:17:24] I like how he adds duty because we have a duty to the next generation to leave them a society in which they can flourish, especially if we've had a society in which we've been able to flourish. It's really incumbent upon us to leave to our children something greater than what we had ourselves, in my opinion.

[01:17:52] And so it is our duty because if there's an absolute despot that's taking away all of our rights and all of our liberty, if we don't do something about it, then we're just saddling our children with that same burden. And I think that we should strive to not do that. I love how he brings it up.

[01:18:15] We're also saddling those in our own generation who don't have the strength to stand on their own. They might be abused so much that they need someone to stand up for them. Or they don't have the time or energy for it. Or, you know, you and I might be out there fighting for these rights, but we still need to wear shoes and drive a car and all that. So we still need others that are making the shoes and building the cars and things.

[01:18:43] And so if they're willing to continue in their efforts, then I'll continue in my efforts in trying to protect their liberty because they're providing a service to us, right? Right. So Madison brings up an important point in relation to this idea of prudence and then being abused and that we put up with it for a while

[01:19:11] and then eventually we have to stand up and throw off such government. He says, So that's really important that we remember that rarely are our liberties taken immediately and overnight.

[01:19:41] It's typically the frog in the boiling water where it's slow, it's gradual, and all of a sudden we wake up one day and realize what happened to our right to property. Which is why I think COVID was such a learning lesson for so many people because it wasn't slow, it was fast. That's right. And that rapid change made people realize, no, we don't want this. Yeah. The slow change is harder to see. Much harder.

[01:20:08] Which is why some people I think are even pushing back on some of the actions of the current administration is because there are some real sudden fast changes and those are jarring. Yes. And it's hard to accept sometimes. And the founders designed the change to be slow. And we're at a point where we're using both sides of the aisle and not picking on or pointing fingers at any particular party.

[01:20:36] We just have a lot of executive orders and that creates rapid change. Yeah. And if it's not codified, the next administration can change it again. And it pulls people quickly. It does. And then it makes it so it's unpredictable, especially, again, for businesses and stuff. Yes. They think, okay, well, we know what the policy is going to be for four years, but we don't know what it's going to be in five years. Right.

[01:21:01] And that's a challenge, which is also the other reason why we should have prudence when we're talking about even altering. You know, we're looking at this often and we think about it as just the abolishing part. But even the altering part, we need to have prudence and make sure that we're mindful about it. But also recognize that eventually we may need to pull off that Band-Aid and make something happen rapidly. Okay.

[01:21:25] So that pretty much gets through those first couple of paragraphs there where Jefferson's really outlining these fundamental natural law principles. And so he gets done with the document. And like we said in the last episode, he brings it to Franklin and Adams because those were the two people in whose amendments he wanted the most.

[01:21:51] And then he said their changes were two or three only. And so there were some alterations that they made, but then they brought it to Congress. And Congress, they just loved every minute, every bit of it. Boy, it was met with a storm of debate. And they debated every word, every period, every comma.

[01:22:18] And Jefferson had to withstand watching his beautiful document be just torn to shreds. And he did. He just sat by and watched it happen. And we'll kind of get to that in a minute. So by the time that it had been made, there were roughly 80 or 90 changes that Congress made to the document. And some were just a few words here and there, pretty insignificant.

[01:22:46] But others were very significant. And so I want to talk about a couple of the major changes. So, and some of the changes were for good. So, for example, in Jefferson's original second paragraph, it read that from that equal creation, they derive rights inherent and inalienable, among which are the preservation of life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

[01:23:11] So you notice that beginning part, that from that creation, they derive rights inherent and inalienable. They changed it. Congress changed it to that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights. So not only was it smoother, shorter, but I think is more impactful. Yes. They threw the word endowed in there.

[01:23:35] Instead of just equal creation, they were endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights instead of inherent and inalienable. So that was, I think, a positive change that Congress made. Another pretty significant deletion. So there's two significant deletions that I want to point out here. One is about the British people.

[01:24:01] Jefferson really wanted to hold the British people themselves accountable because he felt like these are our fellow citizens and they didn't stand up for our rights. They sat back and were complacent. And so in the original document, he kind of beat up on the British people quite a bit and actually called them out for being complacent.

[01:24:30] Well, other people in Congress were like, no, these are still our friends. These are our family. They were still going to need to be friends and do business with them after we settle things down. And so they changed it to hold them as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace, friends. So they got rid of a lot of the criticism that Jefferson had against the people themselves.

[01:24:59] They still recognized that they're enemies in war. So they still kept that point in there. But then in peace, friends. So that was pretty significant. So really, the main focus then on the document was targeting the king and parliament. So then the most significant deletion was the slavery grievance. So... I'll operate on that.

[01:25:30] As we've already talked about, Jefferson is constantly beat up in history because he was a slave owner. And he should be beat up for that. But they beat up on him as if that's the only part of the story is that he was a slave owner. They don't look at any other part of his dealings with slavery.

[01:25:55] So the longest grievance that he wrote, the one that he thought was the most significant and important, the one that John Adams thought was the best grievance, was a grievance on slavery. And so though it's a little bit long, I think it would be a good idea if we read it and talk about a few things in it. Okay. Because it really changes the narrative of Jefferson and slavery and the founders in slavery overall.

[01:26:24] So he writes, He has waged, talking about the king, He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him. Of course, he's talking primarily about African slavery. Distant people, different country, never offended him, but violating these rights of life and liberty.

[01:26:54] Captivating and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere. Or incur miserable death in their transportation thither. This radical, talking about, I don't even know if that's a real word that Jefferson made up here, but it's a pirate warfare, essentially. This radical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is the warfare of the Christian king of Great Britain.

[01:27:24] I love how he throws in Christianity there. Like, you're a Christian and this is what you're willing to do? He kind of, he's kind of chastising him here, right? Calling him to repentance. Determined to keep open a market where men, and he capitalizes men, should be bought and sold. He has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this excrable commerce.

[01:27:54] That line right there is so key. He has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or restrain it. So there were attempts in the colonies to eliminate slavery, to free the slaves, to outlaw slavery, to outlaw the importation, all that. And the king vetoed those laws and wouldn't allow them to be put in place. So that just changes the narrative, doesn't it? Yes.

[01:28:21] Because we've always been taught that how bad America was because slavery and we, you know, fought for the institution and all that. And while there were some who did fight for the institution, overall, we were trying to get rid of it. Jefferson himself tried to pass laws in Virginia to get rid of it. And so, which would have helped him get rid of his slaves. So when people criticize him, like he never tried to free his slaves.

[01:28:50] Well, first of all, he couldn't legally for a number of reasons, which we won't necessarily get into. But the laws that he tried to pass in Virginia would have freed his slaves. And so, so he was going against, you know, his own, his own personal interest when it came to his interest as a slaveholder. Okay. Then it goes on.

[01:29:18] Oh, and, and by the way, actual, actual, that word is such a hard one. Excarable commerce is basically, it's, it's pretty much a swear word saying that it's, it's crappy commerce. Um, and that is this, uh, and that this assemblage of horrors might want no fact of distinguished die.

[01:29:41] He is now exciting those very people to raise, to rise in arms among us and to purchase that liberty of which he has deprived them by murdering the people upon whom he also obtruded them. Um, so the king was trying to, uh, recruit slaves, telling them they'll be free if you fight in this war for us.

[01:30:03] So, so I'm going to give you liberty that I took away in the first place and forced slavery upon the very people now that I want you to go kill. So he, he pitted us against each other in the first place by, by pushing the slavery, uh, economy. And then now he is, he's pitting us against each other again and wanting those slaves to actually murder, um, American citizens.

[01:30:33] And to purchase that liberty, which he has deprived them by murdering the people upon whom he is obstrued them. Thus paying of former crimes committed against the liberties of one people with crimes, which he urges them to commit against the lives of another. It's like, he's going to take this horrible, terrible thing of slavery and make it even worse. By, by forcing those slaves to kill others in his behalf. Right.

[01:31:01] So this is really a significant, um, grievance that was taken out. So he talked about how it was pirate, uh, warfare. Um, it was bad commerce. Uh, and then, um, and then the legal issue of how he, he refused to accept laws that were trying to do away with it. So Jefferson, when he was asked, well, why did we get rid of it?

[01:31:28] Um, first of all, Jefferson, because as we already explained in the last episode, he wanted this to be an expression of the American mind. And so because of that, he actually remained silent in Congress as it was being debated. He said that he was a passive auditor. And can you imagine how difficult that would be? Yes. Um, he's a great writer. He knows he's a good writer. He really understands these principles well.

[01:31:58] And now he's got a group of people who are just tearing this document apart. And he sits in silent at silence as a passive auditor. That shows you how much he wanted this to be the voice of the American people and not just his own voice. Right. So then later when he was asked, well, why did, why was the slavery grievance removed? He said the clause reprobating the enslaving the inhabitants of Africa was struck out in complacence to South Carolina and Georgia,

[01:32:28] who had never attempted to restrain the importation of slaves and who on the contrary still wished it to continue. So that was the challenge was South Carolina and Georgia were not going to, um, sign or vote for the declaration so long as that existed. Because it, it, um, it really challenged their main economy.

[01:32:56] Um, and, and it was, it was really a challenge. And so the founders realized that they needed to put this on the back burner, um, because if they couldn't declare independence and couldn't break free from great Britain, then there would be no ability to, to get rid of slavery in the future. Because as Jefferson had already just outlined, the King was pushing to keep it. And so if we ever wanted to get rid of it, we needed to get rid, get away from the King that was, that, uh, was keeping it in place.

[01:33:26] And so it, so the way that, again, the way the narrative is, is that, well, you know, we wanted slavery so much that we got rid of that and we refused to, to take action. Well, that was an action in and of itself. Independence first for us. And then, and then, and then slavery, we can eliminate slavery in the future. But I do love how he doesn't just place all the blame on South Carolina and Georgia.

[01:33:50] Because Jefferson also then says, our Northern brethren also, I believe, felt a little tender under these censures. Uh, talking about the censure being the, the slavery grievance. For though their people have very few slaves themselves, yet they had been pretty considerable carriers of them to others. So he's like, they're not, the Northern states weren't innocent completely in the slave trade.

[01:34:16] Um, and so he doesn't place all the blame on South Carolina and Georgia. Um, but nonetheless, uh, they got rid of the slavery grievance. And, and I understand that under the circumstances, but I wished it would have stayed in there. It, it would have been so good if it had stayed in there. Absolutely. We would have avoided a civil war. I think we would have. And, and here's the reason why I think we would have.

[01:34:43] Is because every, every single grievance in the declaration, every single one of them, we resolved or we created a solution to prevent that grievance from happening again in the constitution or the bill of rights. Every single grievance is taken care of. Um, and so theoretically, any other grievances that would have been there would have also been resolved or at least resolved more so.

[01:35:11] And so had the slavery grievance remained, uh, that we would have gone further in the constitution to either eliminate it altogether or, or put in even additional steps to make it easier to eliminate in the future.

[01:35:29] Um, but, but, but they could have done more.

[01:35:58] He tried to free the slaves, um, he was, he happened to be, uh, president when it was time to, uh, stop the importation of slaves. There was a specific date in the constitution that, uh, that allowed it to happen.

[01:36:14] And so Jefferson reminded Congress that date was coming up a year before and then encouraged Congress to, to pass the law, to stop the, the, uh, the importation of slaves. And then literally the very day that that law could be put in place, it was passed and signed. Of course. When Jefferson was president. Yeah. Um, so Jefferson did everything he could in his lifetime.

[01:36:43] Uh, to resolve the issue. So he, he wasn't the, in, in our modern day, we're not the only ones that recognize the contradiction in his life. He recognized the contradiction too, and it was striving to resolve it. Um, and in 18, uh, 1781, he wrote, I tremble for my country. When I reflect that God is just, the disjustice cannot sleep forever. And he said that specifically in relation, uh, to slavery.

[01:37:12] Um, but then he also wrote in 1821, he said, nothing is more certainly written in the book of fate that these people talking about the slaves are to be free. And so it was something that he knew was going to happen inevitably. And I was hoping that it would happen. So now the rest of the. Yeah. Cause you're like, oh, we're done, but there's still several pages here left. So what's in there? Exactly.

[01:37:38] So, so now most of the, of the document are grievances. All right. And we could go through each one of them, but, uh, in a, in a, in a, uh, situation like this, it would become kind of tedious. So what I encourage is that the viewers go and, and read through them themselves. They're fairly easy to understand. Um, it is good to have some background, uh, history background on some of them. So you can kind of understand why they brought those grievances up.

[01:38:08] And, and some of that history will be, um, is outlined in my new book that'll be coming out behind the Declaration of Independence. So that'll kind of can help you walk through these, but what I want would encourage viewers to do as they're going through each of those grievances is to, um, relate them to today.

[01:38:29] And, and they'll, they'll be amazed at how history repeats itself and how you can find similarities, uh, today in every one of those grievances. Um, but there's two grievances I would like to just point out because there's, there are a couple of significant ones that I personally think is one really feels like today. Um, and we call this the swarm.

[01:38:55] So he has erected a multitude of new offices and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people and eat out their substance. Wow. I love that eat out their substance because that's so, so much what it feels like, right?

[01:39:11] When we get all these government regulations, um, I'm a business owner myself and the burden of these regulations and the burden of what government asks me to do with this report or that report or filing these tax forms or whatever. It eats out my substance. It takes so much from me and takes so much from what we could even give to our employees. We can give to our employees so much more if they didn't eat out our substance so much.

[01:39:40] In fact, many employees don't realize that the taxes that they pay for FICA and Medicare, the seven and a half percent taken out of their taxes, their employer matches that. So as an employer, if I'm going to hire somebody new, I might say, okay, this particular position, we could afford to pay. We can afford $60,000 for that position.

[01:40:05] Well, that means when I interview people, I'm going to offer them 40 to $45,000 because it's going to cost me that extra money. It's yes, but that's what I could afford. So if I could afford the 60,000 and I didn't have all that regulation and matching taxes and all that business, that's what I'd be offering you. I wouldn't be offering you the 45,000. I'd be offering you the 60,000. Right.

[01:40:29] And employees don't necessarily realize that they don't realize that because government is eating out the substance of the business, it's making it so that they're getting paid less. And that's unfortunate. So that's a grievance that we can really feel today.

[01:40:47] The other grievance that I want to mention is one that is, it's just hard to comprehend how terrible and difficult this was for the people of the time. But Jefferson wrote, he has constrained our fellow citizens, taken captive on the high seas to bear arms against their country.

[01:41:10] So when they would capture a ship, the British would take those naval, those seamen captive, but then they would constrain them. Wow. And now make them fight for the British. So he said on the high seas to bear arms against their country, to become executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands.

[01:41:35] So we're either going to kill you or you need to kill your family and your friends and your fellow countrymen. And that's just a terrible circumstance that these people found themselves in. So those are just a couple of grievances that I point out, one because it relates to today and the other because it's just, it helps illustrate. And you were saying that was part of the slavery grievance as well.

[01:42:04] They were making slaves fight as well. That's right. Exactly. It's this exact same type of thing. So now we get, so once you get through those grievances, you now get to the, to the other famous portions of the Declaration of Independence. Um, and so this, this last paragraph, we therefore, the representatives of the United States of America and general Congress assembled appealing to the Supreme judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions.

[01:42:32] So again, they're, they're referencing a creator here, which is also significant due in the name and by the authority of the good people of these colonies. So I like how they point out twice there that, that this is by the consent of the people. So first of all, when they say, therefore the representatives of the United States. So, so that right there is indicating that they are representing the people. So it's by consent.

[01:43:00] So again, this, this natural right to establish, alter and abolish their recognizing there. And then they mentioned it again by the authority of the good people of these colonies. So again, we, we've been asked to do this. This is the, by the consent of the people that these colonies are and of right ought to be free and independent states. So that right there is a direct phrase from Richard Henry Lee's motion to declare independence.

[01:43:32] Which by the way, his motion was actually voted on and passed on July 2nd. Yes. And it was a bad storm and everyone couldn't get there. And, and it was the declaration. Yes. Itself that was voted on July 4th. So when, when John Adams later, when he's writing Abigail and he's saying, this should be a day that's celebrated by parades and all these parties and all that stuff. He's actually referencing July 2nd. Which is why we need three or four days every year. That's right.

[01:44:02] We should just have it be a, a, an independence week. Yes. Um, but maybe it's good because July 2nd just doesn't seem to, uh, ring as well as July 4th or 4th of July. 2nd of July is a little more awkward. Um, so anyway, so they declare their independence. Uh, so, so it's the same verbiage from the, from Richard Henry Lee's, uh, motion. And so that's making this document officially the acceptance of that motion.

[01:44:31] Um, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown and that all political connection between them and the state of great Britain is, and ought to be totally dissolved and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and do all other acts and things which independent states may have right to do.

[01:44:56] So he's outlining all the things that a, a, a, an independent government can do. And notice here, he, he doesn't use the term again, powers of the earth that he used at the very beginning, which is another indication that powers of the earth is not talking about equal, equal nations and powers of the earth. Um, he, he, he, he's talking about individual rights and powers. Um, because here he's, he's talking about specific states and countries.

[01:45:24] And then he goes on, um, and for the support of this declaration with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence, again, mentioning a creator there, we mutually pledge to each other, our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor. So of course, very famous last phrase, mutually pledge to each other.

[01:45:48] So, so I want to focus just on the very end first, and we'll go back to mutually pledge lives, fortunes, and sacred honor. Notice what that is similar to life. Now he changes the order here though. Yes. Fortunes is what I would say, pursuit of happiness or property. Yes. And sacred honor is in relation to liberty, right? We are being honorable in the way that we're living our lives.

[01:46:12] And, and, and you could perhaps even tie that to pursuit of happiness, but nonetheless, I see life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness in that phrase, lives, fortunes, and sacred honor. And then what, what's so significant about the mutually pledged to each other, they didn't mutually pledge to America, the United States. They didn't mutually pledge to Georgia, South Carolina, New York, Virginia, none of that. It was all to each other.

[01:46:43] They didn't even mutually pledge to these fundamental natural law principles of, of liberty. They mutually pledged to each other, irregardless of, of their disagreements, um, and their different religious views or their different political views, or whether they even thought it was time for independence or not.

[01:47:04] Um, they recognized that if you want to be a self-governing people, uh, and you want to, to exercise these principles of natural law, uh, and these, these rights, then you've got to be pledged to your fellow man and not to anything else.

[01:47:23] Because if I don't want liberty for you, just as much as I want it for me, then I'm going to be willing to allow laws to be passed in which your liberties are infringed upon, which means that in the future, my liberties are going to be infringed upon. Yes. Because I'm agreeing that if government can infringe upon your liberties, then they can infringe upon mine.

[01:47:47] And so that's why it's also so important that we mutually pledge to each other, that I protect you and your liberties at all costs, because in doing so, I'm protecting my liberties at all costs as well. And if we're doing that for each other, then we're in a pretty good society. Uh, very, very powerful. And they gave up, some of them did give up their lives and their fortunes, uh, to, to pursue these sins.

[01:48:17] They did. And some of them were captured. Some of them were killed. Some of the, some of their family members were killed specifically because they were signers of the, of the declaration. They were all, um, considered treasonous and, uh, and, and they really sacrificed a lot in order to sign it. In fact, the very first, um, declaration that was, that was printed, the Dunlap broadsheet did not have the names and signatures on it.

[01:48:47] All it had was the secretary's name and John Hancock. Um, other than that, their names weren't published because they were being protected. Um, it was the, uh, the, the Catherine Goddard version of the declaration that was printed that she was the first one to print the, uh, the names. Wow. And, and, and they, they did that because they did all want their names to be out there and, and for others in the country to realize that they're brave enough to put their names to the document.

[01:49:16] So let's all be brave enough to actually fight for it. Yes. So usually pledged, um, what a, what a beautiful ending, uh, to such a powerful document. And, um, it, it truly is. And it's very much what our, our military today is like as well. They're, they're doing that to protect our liberty today. Yep. For sure.

[01:49:42] Um, I believe that you wanted to cover one last quote from Thomas Jefferson and the last letter of his life. Yeah. So in the, in right when he, uh, again, back when he was, he was asked that he would attend July 4th, uh, celebration in, in Washington, DC, uh, the 50th, uh, anniversary, which we're now at 250, which is awesome.

[01:50:08] So in 1826, so he's invited to go and he couldn't because his health was poor. And, um, and so in the letter he wrote, all eyes are opened or opening to the rights of man. Let the annual return of this day forever refresh our recollections of these rights and an undiminished devotion to them. He's like, let this day always be this day where we go back to these, these fundamental principles.

[01:50:33] Now what's amazing is, uh, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, great friends. They became friends during the second continental Congress period. They didn't know each other prior and they became close friends. Um, and Jefferson and Abigail Adams became close friends. And, but eventually, by the time we get to the election of 1800, um, they became bitter political enemies.

[01:51:00] Um, Jefferson started the democratic Republican party and, um, Adams was, was still, uh, what was referred to as a wig or a federalist. And they became bitter enemies and it was terrible. Um, and some of the stuff they said about each other, terrible. Um, and so when we think today about how we live in this polarized society and we're so mean to each other and all that, it's, it's not the first time this has happened. Even these, these great individuals, uh, did it.

[01:51:28] Um, and they went on for years just being bitter political enemies, um, until, uh, later in life, John Adams, um, his wife died, Abigail. And many, many years earlier, uh, Jefferson had lost his wife, Martha, and he'd never remarried. Um, him and Martha just had a great relationship. He loves her so dearly. And so he had a really hard time.

[01:51:54] And that was one of his, he calls one of his greatest challenges in life was losing his wife. And so he understood. And he also having been friends with Abigail, um, felt really sad for John. So he wrote him a letter and just expressing his condolences and expressing the fact that he understood how he was feeling and how challenging life is after losing your spouse. Um, and that rekindled their relationship.

[01:52:23] And they wrote back and forth as old men. Um, and they gave each other hard times from time to time. They, they, they shared experiences of what they were learning. Um, they both talked about how, um, for example, uh, I don't remember which one was reading it, but one of them was reading Plato's Republic again. And the other one that says, yeah, I think that's ridiculous. And the other said, oh, I'm glad you said that because yeah, Plato is crazy. The Republic is terrible. And so they go back and forth.

[01:52:53] Um, and, and their letters, uh, between them is, are so insightful. Uh, because this is now when they're just these great sages, right? Um, and then poetically they end up dying on the same day. And it also happens to be July 4th, 1826 on the 50th anniversary. Um, and neither one of them were able to attend these celebrations. Obviously they're on their deathbed.

[01:53:22] And, um, so Jefferson died first. And then a few hours later, Adams died. And Adams last words were something to the effect of Jefferson survives or Jefferson lives. And, and, but he was wrong that he had, he had died a few hours earlier, but being the spiritual man that I am, I like to, to think of the, uh, the romantic, you know, story.

[01:53:47] Um, that, uh, Jefferson was there to greet his friend, um, in the next life. And that's why Adams last words were Jefferson survives because he was, he was seeing his friend, welcoming him there to the other side. Um, but nonetheless, they were two men who were mutually pledged to each other. And even though they became bitter enemies later in life, they realized how mutually pledged they had been all along. Yes. Even when they were bitter enemies.

[01:54:12] Um, they, they were always for liberty and the rights of man. And when they came back together, uh, and realized that they realized that all of the bad political stuff was water under the bridge. What, what mattered the most was their pledge to each other. Well, Bill, this has been very informative. I hope people have learned a lot and we've got two more lessons still to go. Yep. One on the constitution and one on the bill of rights.

[01:54:40] So before we end, remind people about your upcoming book. Tell them the name. So behind the declaration of independence, um, will be coming out soon. And so there'll be, um, ways of getting that on your website and Amazon and all that. It's a companion to a book that already exists called behind the bill of rights, um, which obviously is about the bill of rights. And then in September, um, we'll be publishing behind the constitution. Um, which will be kind of the same type of thing.

[01:55:10] So what happens with those books is it really just gets right down into the fundamental principles behind the documents. All right. Um, and so the declaration kind of goes through what we've, a lot of what we've talked about. And then, um, when we get into, to the next couple of lessons, then we'll find out all the great fundamental principles that are behind the constitution and the bill of rights. So those will be fun. Well, I am looking forward to it, getting ready to do our next two lessons.

[01:55:36] And we need to make sure everyone gets those books and stay tuned and tune back in for our next lessons on the constitution and the bill of rights. I'm Jenny Beth Martin. This is the Jenny Beth show. Thanks for joining this special edition for constitution training and founding principles training. If you enjoyed today's conversation, go ahead and hit like, and subscribe. It really helps us reach more people who care about liberty and the constitution.

[01:56:04] You can find this and other episodes at Jenny best show.com as well as Facebook, YouTube, rumble, Instagram X, and your favorite podcast platform. The Jenny Beth show is hosted by Jenny Beth Martin. The Jenny Beth show is a production of tea party Patriots action. For more information, visit tea party Patriots.org.