Friday, March 9, 2018

News from the Network, Vol. 11, No. 10



At the top of the Just Third Way news this week is Dr. Norman Kurland’s interview with Dr. Deal Hudson on the “Church and Culture” radio show on the Ave Maria Radio Network, an affiliate of EWTN.  Even if you’re not Catholic or other Christian you will find the interview both entertaining and instructive.  In other news, we take a “legal layman’s” view of President Trump’s tariff proposal:

Dr. Deal Hudson
• Norman Kurland “Church and Culture” Radio Interview.  The Ave Maria Radio Network, an affiliate of EWTN, will broadcast a prerecorded interview with CESJ’s president, Norman G. Kurland, on the “Church and Culture” show with your host Dr. Deal Hudson.  Norm’s subject is the need for fundamental financial reform.  The interview will air Saturday, March 10, 2018 at 4:00 pm EST (the second hour of the show, which starts at 3:00 pm) and Sunday, March 11, 2018 at 8:00 am EDST in the U.S. (note the change from “EST” to “EDST” due to the shift to “Daylight Saving Time”).  To locate a station that carries the show in your area in the United States, follow this link.  If you miss the show or can’t get it in your area, you can listen to it later on the  Church and Culture” link.
Charles I Stuart, convicted of usurping parliament's power.
Trump’s Tariff.  It used to be said that everybody complains about the weather, but nobody does anything about it.  That also seems to be the case with President Trump’s tariff proposals, which people seem to be taking as a fait accompli.  There is a serious constitutional issue involved here, however.  The president — the head of the executive branch of the government — has no power to tax.  As it states in Article 1, Section 7, “All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives.”  Now, if Article 1, Section 7 omitted the word “all,” a case could be made that the executive has the power to impose a tariff . . . a very weak case, admittedly, but still a case.  The word “all,” however, necessarily precludes any such act on the part of the executive.  Article 1, Section 8 is actually redundant to a certain extent, stating under the enumerated powers that “The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises.”  The clear sense is that only Congress shall have these powers.  A “duty” is “a tax or impost due to the government upon the importation or exportation of goods.”  A “tariff”? “[A] list or schedule of articles on which a duty is imposed.”  The only thing that makes sense in this situation is that Congress is giving Mr. Trump enough rope to hang himself by allowing him to make the attempt to usurp the powers of Congress, an unconstitutional act, which would be grounds for impeachment.  Mr. Trump’s only defense in that case is that his advisors failed to warn him (if that is in fact the case), which is not really a defense: Ignorancia iuris non excusat, “Ignorance of the law is no excuse.”  In that, President Trump could actually count himself fortunate.  When Charles I Stuart tried to circumvent the power of the British parliament in 1649, they cut off his head for raising money and spending it without the consent of parliament.
Malta, 1565, defense of Castle St. Elmo.
Ten Battles Every Catholic Should Know.  Going solely by the rankings on Amazon, Ten Battles Every Catholic Should Know has been doing remarkably well for a “first” book (at least from a major publisher).  If you have not already obtained your copy, do so and be sure to post a review.
Shop online and support CESJ’s work! Did you know that by making your purchases through the Amazon Smile program, Amazon will make a contribution to CESJ? Here’s how: First, go to https://smile.amazon.com/.  Next, sign in to your Amazon account.  (If you don’t have an account with Amazon, you can create one by clicking on the tiny little link below the “Sign in using our secure server” button.)  Once you have signed into your account, you need to select CESJ as your charity — and you have to be careful to do it exactly this way: in the space provided for “Or select your own charitable organization” type “Center for Economic and Social Justice Arlington.”  If you type anything else, you will either get no results or more than you want to sift through.  Once you’ve typed (or copied and pasted) “Center for Economic and Social Justice Arlington” into the space provided, hit “Select” — and you will be taken to the Amazon shopping site, all ready to go.
Blog Readership.  We have had visitors from 37 different countries and 48 states and provinces in the United States and Canada to this blog over the past week. Most visitors are from the United States, South Africa, India, the United Kingdom, and Peru.  The most popular postings this past week in descending order were, “News from the Network, Vol. 11, No. 9,” “The Purpose of Production,” “Thomas Hobbes on Private Property,” “Philosophies at War, V: The New Christianity,” and “On Facing Facts, III: ‘It’s Not Our Way.”
Those are the happenings for this week, at least those that we know about.  If you have an accomplishment that you think should be listed, send us a note about it at mgreaney [at] cesj [dot] org, and we’ll see that it gets into the next “issue.”  If you have a short (250-400 word) comment on a specific posting, please enter your comments in the blog — do not send them to us to post for you.  All comments are moderated, so we’ll see it before it goes up.
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