Two Forms of Government

I really appreciated the video that Scott shared yesterday. (You can see the full video below.) It reminded me that there are only two distinct forms of government. One is transient as it depends on the life of the ruler(s) while the other is stable because it is based on a foundation of written law. Of course we can make changes to that foundation, but the core is rarely changed, if ever.

Our nation was founded upon the rule of law. That was the whole purpose of most of our founding documents (Magna Carta, Mayflower Compact, Articles of Confederation, Constitution, Bill of Rights). The scariest thing in our modern political system is not the goals and ideals of any of the political parties, it is the almost universal attitude within every party that their ideals supercede the law of the land. A perfect example of that attitude was posted as a comment last month stating:

principles . . . must transcend and over-ride individual provisions of the Constitution

Good government depends on that statement being universally rejected. As I responded then:

principles . . . must not transcend or over-ride individual provisions of the Constitution . . . instead those bedrock principles must be used to guide the amendment of the Constitution