There is immense confusion about the nature of the State. There is even more bewilderment about what constitutes a patriot. Any discussion in the civic realm begins with a cultural viewpoint. An attitude toward the proper role of the individual’s relationship with government based upon one’s value system and interpretation of civil order is natural. One man’s patriot is another man’s traitor. Where do you stand on the sentiments behind the penning of the below ideas? Quiz yourself and see if you can figure out the name of the author.

The quotes assembled in this essay illustrate that government officials and agencies would put the critic on a terrorist watch list. Read each and compare if the thought behind the passage agrees with your value system or if the attitude is too extreme for mainstream politics in today’s America. If left up to the national security apparatus, the author would be on a wanted poster, labeled as the Number One Enemy of the State.

Imagine the government’s response for advocating a society that promotes Liberty. Tolerating grievous radical expressions like these examples is dangerous. Consider the outlooks.

"I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it."

"What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance?"

"It is better to tolerate that rare instance of a parent’s refusing to let his child be educated, than to shock the common feelings by a forcible transportation and education of the infant against the will of his father."

"It is strangely absurd to suppose that a million of human beings, collected together, are not under the same moral laws which bind each of them separately."

Many people complain about government but most consent to the dictates of authority as a required acceptance of citizen obedience. How many times have you heard the viewpoint it is your duty to act in compliance with the law as the price of a civilized society? The vast majority obeys whatever regulation or edict comes their way. This fact keeps the system functioning. The standards set forth for your submission often evolve, but people learn to adjust.

Pushing the envelope of the acceptance quotient varies in intensity, but seldom does government retreat. The state is the final judge of acceptability, because force is the ultimate weapon of threat for disobedience. Ruling regents restrain, ignore or discard eternal indivisible rights if a conflict exists with the interests of the state. Freedom can be a very treacherous opponent for a municipal establishment.

You can just hear the opposition to the next series of quotes. The idea that natural law permits all legitimate authority is downright radical and inhibits the living Constitution.

"No man has a natural right to commit aggression on the equal rights of another, and this is all from which the laws ought to restrain him."

"The majority, oppressing an individual, is guilty of a crime, abuses its strength, and by acting on the law of the strongest breaks up the foundations of society."

"To compel a man to furnish funds for the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical."

"The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the Constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first."

"I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep forever."

Governments pursue greater influence and range of regulating behavior. As the state grows the tentacles of reach expands. Challenging this trend risks acceptance and imposes penalties. Torturing the meaning of fairness, the state uses all the muscle of intimidation and brute coercion, to justify public acceptance of the methods used to gain conformity.

Testing the limits of government forbearance is an act of courage that most shy away from undertaking. Open confrontation is chastised as behavior of a delinquent subject. Confiscation of individual wealth for the greater good champions the supreme sacrifice that transforms into the shared cost of being part of the great government governance.

Conferring legitimacy and respect for government programs and policies is the criterion of a loyal national. Deviating from symbolic recognition and deference must signify that the person is hostile to the good works of public sector. Advocates that express dissent are tabbed as agitators and threats, calculated to challenge the survival of the state.

The role of government amplifies as the drumbeat of the welfare clause vibrates to the inner soul of the nation. This group of citations adds fuel to the fire that the writer is an enemy of the state.

"Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms (of government) those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny"

"I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them."

"I think myself that we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious."

"The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not."

"A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor and bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government."

Resistance to government abusive authority qualifies the opponents of the regime as outlaws. Envision claiming that government can become a tyrant and implying that revolt is justified. Advocating acts of rebellion and equating an ethical mandate surely qualifies the essayist as a foe of the government.

Self-defense and individual autonomy disturbs the state. The all-encompassing scope of government involvements and intrusions claim that such practices, warranted for the public good, are valid. Challenging this omniscient authority qualifies one as an antagonist of the sovereign master.

Disputing the entrenched submission to the state as an instrument of rule is perilous to the magistrates. Punitive prosecution of indignant protestors must be a prime directive of the state. Granting access to the corridors of power and rule to the generator of the next thoughts is unthinkable. Allowing these words to influence the population is dangerous. Such ideas desecrate the purity of government genuineness.

"The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive. It will often be exercised when wrong, but better so than not to be exercised at all."

"The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government."

"When wrongs are pressed because it is believed they will be borne, resistance becomes morality."

By now, you should have a good idea who wrote all these quotations. Many complacent Americans are uncomfortable with the spirit and intent of this wisdom. The ageless insights apply as succinctly as when they were first uttered. These words disturb many cowardly peons, who abdicate their self-dignity by willingly pronouncing their allegiance for the state, especially when the conduct based upon coercion and dependency is the norm.

The state is the enemy, when authorities assault individual liberty and embrace collectivism. The sage of these quotes would be demonized as a rebel and unelectable in today’s "PC" environment. Secure in his place is history, the current political class often rejected the origins and truth in the ideas.