Liberty Shlibetry

This letter is in response to Mr. Michael J Karaffa who wrote Always obey officers.

In his letter the author states, in response to the recent situation in Boston, that, “We live in society of law and order and our responsibility as a citizen is to submit to and obey lose laws and the people who are tasked with upholding them. That submission and obedience is not contingent on how we feel at the time or what mood we’re in. When a policeman tells us to do something, we do it, we don’t argue with him. To do so is to take the first step towards anarchy.”

There is a lot of truth in his statement. We live in a society of law and order; some would say we are a nation of laws. The one thing that sets us apart is our ability as a country to rely on the law to judge fairly and without regard to who our friends and family are, race, culture, social or financial standing. At least most of the time... Okay at least sometimes. And we should obey those laws and the people who uphold them, because they are always right. Oh yeah except for that whole American Revolution generation and those radicals in Alabama in the sixties. Submission and obedience is a must and without a doubt, necessary to keep all citizenry safe. That sounds similar to a recent speech by the Ayatolla. When the police tell us to do something don’t argue just do it. Unless they ask you to jump off of a bridge, or you are black man in Mississippi and the cop in the police car is dangling a noose from the trunk. If we don’t follow these rules anarchy will reign. There is no other possible solution than absolute obedience and conformity. Hmm, now China comes to mind.

The creators of our constitution (men of laws themselves) created 10 amendments that were put into place because, while they believed in government, they also believed in liberty. These amendments were put in place not to defend the men of authority from the people, but to protect the people from men of authority. Our founding fathers came to this determination because they believed that people had the right to speak their mind and protect their property, life and liberty. Due process is an inconvenient truth to those who are looking to protect us from ourselves. However, it is what we rely on to protect those less represented by the government from tyranny and oppression. Yes, we should listen to the authorities, but if we disagree with their actions we have an absolute right as Americans to argue that point until we can speak no more.