1913 Was a Very Bad Year — It Was the Year We Lost Our Liberty

Three things happened in 1913. First, Congress ratified the Sixteenth Amendment. Secondly, it also ratified the Seventeenth Amendment. And thirdly, The Federal Reserve Act was passed. These events set in motion the mechanisms that are now destroying our country, and are devastating our freedoms and our individual abilities to control our own lives and prosperity. - Gwyn Guess, 1913: A Year of Disgrace for America, Associated Content, July 13, 2006

The Tenth Amendment says: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” The Tenth Amendment explicitly underscores the Constitution’s protection of individual liberty—that sovereignty comes from the people up, not from the federal government down. The insurance mandate in the health reform law violates an evident principle in the Constitution, which is that the Federal Government is not supposed to be a government that has all powers; that it's supposed to be a government of limited powers.

An important event occurred a year prior, and that was the Titanic tragedy of April 15, 1912. Here's an excerpt from Asian Secret Societies (the Dragon Family) Want Their Gold Back; the Western Secret Societies Blew Up the World Trade Center So That They Wouldn't Have to Give It Back:

THE TITANIC KILLED 600 TOP OPPONENTS TO THE FEDERAL RESERVE

David Wilcock (DW): You mentioned a mind-blowing piece of information about the Titanic.

Benjamin Fulford (BF): Remember a book came out a year before about a ship called the Titan that sank on its maiden voyage?

DW: That’s right!

DW: Previously, Ben has said this book was deliberately released to “hide it out in the open.” This is a key aspect of the occult science these groups are working with. It helps them feel that we have chosen to be enslaved by them.

Technically, the book came out 14 years before the Titanic sank. You can read more at this link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futility,_or_the_Wreck_of_the_Titan.]

BF: They got rid of, in one fell swoop, about 600 industrialists who were opposed to the taking over of the Fed.

JP Morgan was saying “Hey, let’s all talk about it as we cross the Atlantic.”

Of course, he missed the ship at the last moment.

They were prevented at gunpoint from boarding the lifeboats.

WOODROW WILSON’S FAMOUS QUOTE: INSPIRED BY THE TITANIC?

DW: Fulford has also said they deliberately did not put enough lifeboats on the Titanic. The captain knowingly sabotaged the ship. The “women and children first” principle further insured none of the Fed’s opponents would survive. This is not merely Fulford’s assertion – other researchers have suggested the same thing.

The Titanic tragedy of April 15, 1912 apparently inspired a terrified Woodrow Wilson to print his infamous quote in a book he released the following year.

WAS THE FEDERAL RESERVE PART OF AN APOCALYPTIC PLAN?

DW: The Federal Reserve began operating on December 23, 1913 – with the passing of the Federal Reserve Act.

This is almost 99 years to the day before the Mayan Calendar end-date of December 21, 2012, which may have been intentional.

The Aldritch Plan may have been intended to create the Federal Reserve in 1912, but it received a fatal blow when Democrats swept the White House and Congress that November:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_reserve

Had this stunning political defeat not occurred, the Aldritch Bill may have ultimately created the Federal Reserve on the all-important date of December 21, 1912 – exactly 100 years before “the End of the World” in occult circles.

Given the cabal’s fascination with attempting to fabricate an Armageddon, as Fulford is about to discuss – as well as their love of ritual dates – such an idea is not difficult to comprehend.

Federal Government is Running Roughshod Over State Sovereignty and Rights as a Daily Event

A hundred years running in the wrong direction

By JB Williams, Right Side News
August 5, 2010

Prior to 1913, there was no federal income tax, the states had rights and representation in Washington DC, there was no Federal Reserve Bank, and the federal government lived under the enumerated powers afforded it within the US Constitution. What a difference one year can make...

Almost a hundred years later, it's clear that the policies established in 1913 must be revoked in order to restore power to the people and the states. But can the American people get the Genie back in the bottle?

The History of the US Tax System can be summed up in one paragraph:

"Prior to the enactment of the income tax, most citizens were able to pursue their private economic affairs without the direct knowledge of the government. Individuals earned their wages, businesses earned their profits, and wealth was accumulated and dispensed with little or no interaction with government entities."

Passage of the 16th Amendment to the Constitution would forever change life in America and not for the better.

The 16th Amendment: The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several states, and without regard to any census or enumeration.

It's hard to imagine how this amendment could have been written any broader, or why 36 states would agree to such an open ended federal power to strip citizens of their rightful earnings via taxation without representation, and with literally no boundaries or limits to how far the federal government could and ultimately would go in their effort to buy the votes of some with the assets of others.

Since 1913, the federal tax code has been used as a primary tool of leftist social engineering in which the people have been forced to fund a government they no longer recognize and no longer support. The US Congress has a mere 11% approval rating today and the Executive branch is supported only by the 28% of citizens who benefit personally by the robbing of fellow citizens.

The states are now fiscal dependents of the federal government, and the federal government is a twenty trillion pound ape trampling through the rose garden of American life, and nobody seems to have any clue how to reign it all in.

Further, thanks to the passage of the 17th Amendment, also passed in 1913, the states no longer have representation in Washington DC. Once again, what seemed like a simple sentence and a good idea to some at the time has since been used by the federal government to eliminate state's sovereignty and rights.

The 17th Amendment: "The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each state, elected by the people thereof, for six years."

It is referred to as the "supremacy clause" today, a wholly anti-American notion that the federal government has unlimited "supreme" power over the states and the people. Prior to the passage of the 17th, the U.S. Senate was the legislative body that represented the interests of the states, namely state sovereignty and state's rights. The Senate was elected by each state legislature and obligated to serve each state's interest as a result. Without states representation in Washington, due to the 17th Amendment, the Fed is free to run wild, and it is.

The 17th eliminated the state's representation by reducing the Senate to just an extension of the people's House of Representatives. Unlike the House of Representatives (who are known by local voters and who are elected by their neighbors to represent the will of constituents in their home districts), members of the Senate are not known, are not accessible to most voters in the state, do not represent the will of constituents, and are no longer in touch. This leaves the state itself unrepresented.

As a result, the federal government is now engaged in running roughshod over state sovereignty and rights as a daily event. The recent situation in Arizona, where the Fed sued the state for attempting to enforce existing immigration laws that the Fed refuses to enforce, is but one glaring example of federal tyranny made possible by the 17th Amendment.

The Federal Reserve

On the heels of the banking Panic of 1907, Democrats were elected into full control of both congressional chambers. With full control over the legislative process, they wasted no time shifting the focus of the federal government from the "enumerated powers" to federal power and social engineering.

"Financial panics and bank runs were all too common during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Some were more severe than others, but most followed the same general pattern. The misfortunes of a prominent speculator would undermine public confidence in the financial system. Panic-stricken investors would then scramble to cut their losses. And because it wasn't uncommon for speculators to double as bank officials, worried depositors would rush to withdraw their money from any bank associated with a troubled speculator."

The Federal Reserve System was established to provide a stabilizing factor to occasional extreme volatility in the financial markets, usually caused by over-reaching speculative trading by only a handful of eager investors.

The new system emerged from a private sector investment by then 70 year old J.P. Morgan, which stalled the growing run on banks caused by the financial trouble of the New York Knickerbocker Trust. JD Rockefeller stepped in to help out, along with a few other well-heeled financiers.

Just as Obama and Democrats are doing today, democrats tried to saddle Republican President Teddy Roosevelt with the blame for the banking panic.

"One person who didn't seek advantage in the crisis was William Jennings Bryan, the Democrats' perennial presidential candidate. In an impromptu speech to the assembled crowd" at the Binghamton, New York train station, he came to the defense of President Theodore Roosevelt, a Republican. "I notice," said Bryan, "that one of the officers of the bank that just closed-its doors yesterday attributed it to President Roosevelt. That is not the reason. Don't blame the Sheriff, but the horse thief."

It wasn't the Federal Government that stopped the run on banks, it was private investors. However, the formation of the Federal Reserve System that followed would once again give the federal government power it could not be trusted to hold.

From that moment forward, it would not be private investors who bailed out failing banks, but American taxpayers. Even worse, there would be no end to the printing of money and accumulation of public debt once the federal government via the Federal Reserve had what would be treated as a bottomless well from which to draw cash.

Beginning in 2001, the Bush administration tried for seven years to convince congressional Democrats including Barney Frank and Christopher Dodd that there was impending trouble with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, but to no avail. It was the Federal Reserve and American taxpayers who would be held accountable for the misdeeds of Democrat incompetency and a refusal to address the growing mortgage problem until there were no good options left.

In the end, the Obama administration would drive the nation from $10 trillion in debt to $14 trillion in debt in just their first two years in office, with trillions more in unfunded social spending aimed at propping up the failing labor unions that will keep them in political power.

1913 was one of the worst years in American history as the people thereafter became fiscally responsible for the unethical actions of a few in banking and government, the states lost their representation in the Senate, state sovereignty and rights, the Fed grabbed "supreme powers" and the Federal Reserve became the arm of government that would sink the nation in a mountain of debt.

In 2010, Democrats now control both houses of Congress, the White House, the press and the courts. What happened in 1913 is nothing compared to what Democrats have in store for America now.

Before the people and the states can control this nation again, they will have to undo all the damage done in 1913 which allowed further damage to be done during the via FDR's Raw Socialism Deal.

The 1st, 2nd and 10th Amendment initiatives underway in the states today are necessary due to the events of 1913. Reverse 1913 and most of the problem is easily solved.

Repeal the 17th Amendment. Restore Liberty.

The U.S. Senate was not created to represent us as individuals. The Senate was intended to serve the interest of each state, allowing the people of a state to be represented as a unified body. All law was to be reviewed from both perspectives and only signed by the president after both were satisfied. James Madison explained, “No law or resolution can now be passed without the concurrence, first, of a majority of the people, and then of a majority of the states.” Today the states have no voice in the making of law, resulting in the death of federalism and our freedom proportionally. Today a U.S. Senator can appeal to solely popular perspectives and know nothing of the state legislature’s concerns of an overpowering national government... Without this voice, the National government moves into State areas of power pretty much at will, and no other government entity is powerful enough to stop them. The 17th Amendment undid the benefits of a bicameral legislature by mandating that the people rather than the state legislatures select U.S. Senators. The result, whether intended or not, did great damage to federalism and the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution. One way to get the Tenth Amendment off life support is to rescind the 17thAmendment. Although it may have enhanced democracy, it also removed from the states their voice in the U.S. Senate and, hence, the ever-increasing growth of government at liberty’s expense. - Dr. Harold Pease, How the States Lost Their Voice in Washington, California 10th Amendment Center, June 10, 2010

TenthAmendmentCenter.com
February 18, 2010

Interest in the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution continues to grow as citizens and state and local government officials consider ways to protect their authority from federal intrusion. From Louisiana to New Hampshire to Washington state, 10th Amendment legislation is being crafted and approved to veto federal regulations and orders regarding firearms, medical marijuana, cap and trade, education, the sending of a state’s National Guard to war, health care, and more.

It should be clear from the items on the list above that a federal government of limited powers is not simply a concern peculiar to conservatives; liberals too have reason to resuscitate local governance. And one of the very best ways to help revive decentralization, in addition to nullification, is to repeal the 17th Amendment.

Until 1913, when the 17th Amendment was ratified, the citizens of the states elected U.S. senators indirectly: Voters elected the state legislators, and they in turn selected U.S. senators. From 1913 onward, voters have directly elected U.S. senators in statewide elections.

This change has led to a number of negative results, including:

• Vastly increased federal power and vastly decreased state, local, and personal authority due to the state governments losing their representation in the federal government;


• The domination of Senate elections (and legislation) by forces outside of the particular states wherein elections are being held, e.g., out-of-state donations, political party operatives, and campaign consultants; and


• A decline of the influence of individual voters and small, local associations of voters over who is selected to be a senator from their state.

Under the 17th’s statewide electoral system, the individual voter is small and isolated, only one out of thousands or, in many cases now, millions of voters casting ballots. His influence in the election is marginal.

Now, repeal the 17th, and you amplify this individual’s influence many times over. For instead of one voice attempting to be heard over every other voter’s voice in the state, he is now one voice in the much smaller group of voters who reside in the districts of his state legislators, who would select the U.S. senator.

Individuals and small associations matter little to the statewide candidate but are important to the state representative and state senator who actually lives among them, knows them, and is known by them. The state legislator must take them and their views seriously, regarding Senate elections and other legislative matters, for they hold great electoral power over him. So individuals and small, local groups would grow more influential in U.S. Senate elections if the 17th were repealed, and outside interests less so.

With repeal would come three other benefits.

1. First, a U.S. Senate representing the state governments would likely mean the end of many of the federal mandates and programs that currently stifle policy innovation, mandate uniformity, and strangle budgets in states,parishes, etc.
   
   A crazy quilt of locally devised laws stretching across the United States may nauseate the federal bureaucrat who delights in the efficiency resulting from bland uniformity, but it would be pleasing to the citizens who would live under the aegis of those laws. Repealing the 17th would allow liberal, moderate, libertarian, and conservative communities to live under the laws of their own choosing rather than the choosing of the imperial few (of whatever political philosophy) in D.C.


2. Second, state legislatures endowed with the high responsibility of selecting U.S. senators, not to mention creating policy in fields newly freed from the rule of D.C., would naturally attract the more capable men of society to seek these offices (though unfortunately the more power hungry too), as it is with federal offices now.


3. Third, indirect elections generally result in well qualified candidates filling the positions in question. This is as true of U.S. Supreme Court justices chosen by the president as it was of U.S. senators chosen by state legislatures. It is no accident that the preeminent U.S. senators in our history – e.g., Randolph, Calhoun, Clay, Webster, etc. – all appeared prior to the 17th, while demagogues like Sen. Schumer and hollow men like Sens. Bayh and Frist have filled the Senate after its ratification.

Decentralization is an essential element for restoring self-government (and good government in general) in the United States. And U.S. senators chosen by state legislatures would be a tremendous boon to decentralization. Repeal the 17th Amendment; restore liberty. All citizens would be the beneficiaries.

1913: The Year We Lost Our Liberty

RiseOfReason.com
Originally Published on December 30, 2008

It was February 3, 1913 and an amendment to the United States Constitution had just been ratified that would forever change the course of the nation. It was the Sixteenth Amendment and it still reads,

“The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.”

Prior to 1913 personal income taxes in the United States were deemed by the Supreme Court to be forbidden by the Constitution. The constitution stated, and still states today, that “No capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, unless in Proportion to the Census or Enumeration herein before directed to be taken.” This essentially means, as determined by the Supreme Court, that the federal government shall not tax any single person, including his income, without distributing the revenue from such a tax to each of the States based on their population as determined by the latest census. The Constitution had forbidden an income tax that would be spent by the federal government. The Sixteenth Amendment changed this. The federal government of the United States now had the power to tax each of its citizens for whatever it pleased, most notably those citizens’ income.

The taxation of income in the United States has become the greatest producer of revenue for the government; more money is raised through the income taxes than by all other means combined. Personal income taxes account for 78% of all income taxes; the other 22% is accounted for by corporate income taxes.

In 2008 the federal government collected about $1.22 trillion in personal income taxes. That divides to over $8300 per working person in the United States. Given that the top 50% of income earners pay more than 96% of income taxes, those people earning over $26,800 per year average paying over $16,700 per year in taxes.

The income tax, as horrible as it is, is only the beginning to what the United States government would deploy in 1913 that threatened the liberties of every American.

On April 8, 1913 the United States ratified the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution, which changed the way a Senator was elected from the legislation of each State electing its own Senator to the people of a State electing a Senator by popular vote. Additionally, it changed the way vacancies were handled. The duty now falls on the shoulders of the Governor (executive authority), whereas it used to come to a vote in the State’s legislature. Though less important than the legalization of a personal income tax, changing the rules of election for Senators has transformed the position from one of being a State’s ambassador to the Union to being a political figure seeking popularity among constituents. This has inspired costly campaigns to win voters’ hearts and has led to legislation favoring the largest donors instead of favoring the State’s interests.

The Sixteenth Amendment would be more than enough to call 1913 one of the worst years in the history of the United States, but the federal government was not through extracting power from the people. On December 23, 1913, two days before Christmas, Congress enacted the Federal Reserve Act. The Act effectively transferred the constitutional duty of regulating the money supply from the Congress to the Federal Reserve – which would have its Chairman selected by the President. Control of the money supply had been taken from the Legislative branch and given to the Executive branch. Furthermore it allowed one body of seven men autonomous power over the supply of money in the banking system and thus in the economy. Control over the money supply would lead to the Great Depression and almost every boom and bust cycle in the American economy.

Twenty years subsequent to the Federal Reserve Act, Franklin D. Roosevelt made it one of his first orders of business as president to relieve the Federal Reserve of the gold standard. Prior to 1933 United States currency read something along the lines of, “WILL PAY TO THE BEARER ON DEMAND TWENTY DOLLARS.” This amount of value the government promised to pay the bearer is no longer an option. Now United States currency simply reads, “FEDERAL RESERVE NOTE” and it notes that the bill is legal tender, but nowhere does the government offer to acknowledge the currency’s value. This would not be much of a problem if the government was responsible with the creation and supply of money, but that would be too easy. In 2008 the United States federal government spent over $4.5 trillion and had total revenues of just over $2.5 trillion – you do the math. This money they create is not free; we all pay for it through inflation.

The United States government has grown by leaps and bounds over the last century, and the amendments to the Constitution that transpired in 1913 are largely to blame. Perhaps 2013 can be the year that such growth is reversed.