Both Lincoln and Washington had their own national holiday: Lincoln’s was on Feb. 12; Washington’s on Feb. 22. Washington was honored as the first president of the United States, and Lincoln was honored for holding the nation together and for signing the Emancipation Proclamation that ended slavery in the United States.
Then when Congress decided to honor the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., they faced the question of adding a national holiday without adding a national holiday. Their solution was to combine two holidays — Washington’s and Lincoln’s — into one and then change its name to Presidents’ Day, to honor all presidents on the third Monday of February each year.
On Sunday, the family of President Ronald Wilson Reagan, the nation’s 40th president, will celebrate his 100th birthday. In the minds of growing numbers of American citizens, Reagan continues to grow in stature as one of America’s greatest presidents, certainly the greatest in the 20th century. He was hated by progressives and the liberal press, but loved by a vast majority of Americans who gave him an overwhelming reelection victory in 1984. He was loved by conservatives because he was willing to take on “the Establishment” in Washington, D.C., and begin a restoration of the fundamental principles of freedom embedded in the Constitution, principles progressives had been whittling away at since Presidents Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson proposed the 16th and 17th amendments of the Constitution, amendments that fundamentally changed our federalist government structure — and not for the better.
Reagan was one of only a handful of presidents who really understood that the Constitution was established to implement the freedoms Thomas Jefferson had named in the Declaration of Independence, and later documented as America’s Bill of Rights. Reagan was, in my opinion, one of the few presidents who really understood the damage the 16th Amendment (the income tax amendment) had done to America since its passage in 1913, and continues to do today — an amendment strongly supported, perhaps even initiated by Roosevelt, or of the dividing role he played in the election of President Woodrow Wilson, America’s most socialistic president. Wilson, a Democrat, opened the door for President Hebert Hoover’s progressive policies that opened the door for President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Socialistic New Deal agenda that has lead to America’s financial crisis today.
Reagan is probably the most quoted Republican presidents in recent history because of his determination to cut taxes, a policy that restored America’s economic viability. His policies have become known as Reaganomics or supply- side economics. He was likely one of the few presidents that fully understood that America’s Federal Reserve Bank is not a federal bank, but a coalition of private banks created by J.P. Morgan and other Wall Street Bankers in 1913 soon after Wilson took office, and who today are profiting from its establishment. For a better understanding of this enormous mistake, read “The Naked Capitalist” by Dr. W. Cleon Skousen. This book is a review of “Tragedy and Hope,” a 1,200-page book by Dr. Carroll Quigley who, as an establishment insider spelled out how the Federal Reserve Bank was established and who was behind its creation. An interesting read!
Perhaps Reagan was best known for calling the Russians an evil empire and challenging Mikhail Gorbachev to tear down “this wall” (the Berlin Wall). Gorbachev tore down that wall in 1989 because Russia’s communistic policies failed — all bad economic principles, and destroyed individual incentives’ throughout Russia, policies that destroyed freedom for millions of Russians. Two local friends who recently returned from two years in Siberia told of how communism had reduced the Russians to no more than non-thinking slaves — waiting for someone to tell them what to do — totally afraid of their government and its ruthless governing by “Ruler’s Law,” laws established by the inner governing elite.
Most of Reagan’s strongest supporters today are the Tea Party Patriots, who strongly support Reagan’s core beliefs of less government and taxes with a return to the principles of freedom Jefferson named in the Declaration of Independence and protected by the Constitution of the United States.
If America can build a monument to King for his contributions to mankind, then perhaps it’s time to consider building a Reagan monument to honor the principles of capitalism he strongly supported, a system allowing all Americans, including the poor, to reach their God given potential. If King deserves a monument, perhaps “Ronnie” does, too!
Donald Conkey is a retired agricultural economist living in Woodstock.
Post a Comment