When you put on the uniform of the United States military, people perceive your public political remarks as representative of our fighting forces. Should we cashier soldiers who shoot off their mouths about public policy?
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12 replies on “Loyalty: What Should We Expect of Our Persons in Uniform?”
One person’s revolutionary is another’s counter revolutionary, … or a patriot, depending on context and perspective. That is buried in the idea that liberty is not license – there are limits, and they have generally been agreed to before hand. And with an understanding that the law and rules can be changed via established legal means if the disconnect and discord are great enough. But we demand loyalty to the Constitution as our foundational law [as ACTS said below], rather than to the human actors identified to implement its dictates .
I suspect, and fear, that if we ever again come to the status of a kinetic CW2.0, then we all drop back to the moral posture that “might makes right”, or maybe only to the other elements defining “just warfare”. More so if the military gets involved, compared to local or state law enforcement. The idea that the military is (getting ever more) woke is the really disturbing thing here, probably for most of us who consider the patriotic intentions of those who join (or joined) the military to be paramount (not joining up just for GI Bill benefits, or transgender surgeries being paid for). Then again, history is full of cases where the loyalty of the military was misjudged, or misplaced, or misused. The role of PTSD and/or the inability to weed out all mentally unsuitable candidates also comes into play, altering the viewpoint or possible actions of military personnel compared to what we hope they hold.
One saving grace on the possible use of the truly devastating military weapons on civilians is that most of them require multiple players on a team to initiate and/or maintain, so potentially that level of support would be withheld and counter someone’s urge to use them to maximum lethal effect.
Bill? The Constitution IS THE LAW. It’s not “guidance” it is The Law in the United States from which all other laws derive their authority. The Constitution is not only The Law, it is the Ultimate Law from a secular standpoint in this country.
The good thing about that is the U.S. Constitution is fairly simple and easy to understand. So a violation of Constitutional Law is generally pretty obvious to everyone.
Zo? Yeah dude, when Bill is talking about “Natural Law” he’s talking about a concept that is different from what you’re talking about. You need to read John Locke to understand what Bill means by “Natural Law”. Natural Law is a thing different from the Law of Nature. You’re using a definition that is different from the one Bill is referring to.
From the Standford Encylopedia of Philosophy article on Natural Law as advocated by John Locke —
Perhaps the most central concept in Locke’s political philosophy is his theory of natural law and natural rights. The natural law concept existed long before Locke as a way of expressing the idea that there were certain moral truths that applied to all people, regardless of the particular place where they lived or the agreements they had made. The most important early contrast was between laws that were by nature, and thus generally applicable, and those that were conventional and operated only in those places where the particular convention had been established. This distinction is sometimes formulated as the difference between natural law and positive law.
The bold font emphasis is mine. That is the concept whereby the Founding Fathers based the claim that —
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
“Natural Law” does not abrogate God’s Law, it amplifies it. It is a Judeo-Christian concept of the practical application of God’s Law to every human being. It is an ideal state of existence which allows human beings to make their own choices and the very most basic and important choice any human being can make is that which addresses salvation.
You did not understand what Bill was saying. He wrongly assumed that everyone would be familiar with the concept of “Natural Law” and clearly you equated that with “The Law of Nature”. The two are not the same thing. They sound similar but that is where all comparison ends.
I’m a Christian myself and I appreciate your dedication to The Word. Most of the time you’re right on target with what you say in that regard because clearly you have studied a great deal along those lines. But …
Not every conversation requires you to circle back to The Word.
Even in the above conversation had you understood the reference Bill was making to “Natural Law” you might have had something relevant and pertinent to add to the discussion from The Word. Had that been the case I would have found it very interesting. You need to broaden your education to such concepts as the Founding Fathers were familiar with in order to correctly apply your knowledge of The Word.
There is more to know than just the Bible if you want to sit in that chair and talk to us out here. Because we are the remnant in America which is endeavoring to bring this Nation back to it’s proper, correct, God founded and blessed principles. That’s a big task that covers a lot of ground. “Natural Law” is a vital part of that ground.
It is not even important if there are those among us who do not believe in God, as long as they believe in the principles that this nation was founded upon. If they will do just that much, then Faith will flourish and they are welcome to answer for themselves when that time comes. As long as they are witness to the righteous results of these principles that is enough, their decisions are their own to make.
I sincerely suggest that you and Bill communicate with each other what you intend to cover in these “The Virtue Signal” posts and that you familiarize yourself with what each other are going to make for points therein.
Great points, ACTS. What I took from Mr. Rachel’s comments was that morality is not universal, and absent consequences exacted for violating it, all law – be it our Constitution, the Pentateuch, or Locke’s Natural Law, is meaningless. This morning I came across this warning from the apostle Paul in 1st Corinthians: “Don’t you know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? Get rid of the old yeast, so that you may be a new unleavened batch—as you really are…I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people—not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world…What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. ‘Expel the wicked person from among you.’”
The object of loyalty is pivotal. Once again, our nation has become a house divided existentially against itself. When our ‘hired help’ (whether they’ve been elected to office, commissioned into the military, or working in the administrative state) swear an oath to uphold our Constitution, which one do they mean? The living, breathing one with its emanations and penumbras empowering government with undefined, unlimited power to regulate every aspect of our lives, liberty, and property down to the very air we inhale? Or, the limited government as designed, dedicated to maximizing our inherent rights and liberty?
If it is ever to return to the latter, we the people will have to be diligent in getting rid of the festering, pervasive yeast. If we fail, that soldier who has accepted her commanders’ current policy that the greatest threat to the nation she serves – the wicked people to be expelled – are her fellow citizens who defy the GOVERNMENT she believes she is obligated to protect, and she will ruthlessly hunt us down, contentedly justified in the righteousness of her actions.
Without consequences any law is no law at all. It doesn’t matter if you’re dealing with an anarchic jungle made of trees or concrete. The very idea of “law” is that there are consequences for breaking it. If law is not enforced then there is no law at all.
There is no case involving human beings where there is no law and no consequences. People can deny that they are subject to the law or that they do not believe in the giver of that law, or any other claim that they want to offer as an excuse to ignore the law. That will do them no good because it’s not on them to choose consequences or not, only to follow the law or not. As a Christian I would think you’d be familiar with this and the fact that there is only one means of avoiding the consequences of the law. Which is of course the Cross.
You cited a Bible passage for me, so I have one for you too — Romans 2:14-16 …
14For when Gentiles who do not have the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having the Law, are a law to themselves, 15in that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them, 16on the day when, according to my gospel, God will judge the secrets of men through Christ Jesus.
I really hate to quote Scripture without full context and Romans Chapter 2 is covering a much broader issue. Still, it is clear from these three verses that God does indeed write the Law on the hearts of human beings. The verse number links go to Bible Hub where you can read several translations of the same original text. “Law unto themselves” means they are subject to the Law manifesting internally, not that they can alter the Law any way they like.
I hardly think thatLlaw is without consequences or meaningless. I know that no one escapes it except by acknowledging their transgression of the Law and accepting the only forgiveness that has been offered. If they sear their consciences and burn away the Voice of the Law, that is something they did in pride and folly but it does not excuse them.
I also hate to preach about these things. I have no gift for that and I’m aware of that fact. I had to think long and hard about whether I would even bring this up.
What I got from Zo’s comments was that he and Bill were talking at cross purposes. Bill meant Natural Law ala John Locke and Romans 2, Zo meant the law of nature. Which is survival of the fittest and has no regard for morality of any sort*.
If Zo meant what you took him to mean then what he was saying was un-Biblical for the reasons I have supplied. I’ve been following Alfonzo Rachel for a long time. It would surprise me A LOT if he were to make that mistake. I haven’t seen him do that yet but perhaps there’s a first time for everything and no one is perfect. If we were perfect we wouldn’t need forgiveness and there’s only one Person who ever fit that parameter.
Thanks for the discussion. I’m not trying to slag on you or put down what you’re saying and I hope I didn’t come across that way. If so that’s not my intention and I appreciate you stating your views on what I had to say above.
(*The “Law of Nature” is the survival and subsequent breeding of the fittest. While it has no regard for morality, this too is a Law of the Creator which prevents His creation from lapsing into entropy and dying out. This Law also has consequences but men are not bears, lions or scorpions and the Laws that apply to such creatures do not apply immutably to the one creature created in God’s own image.)
ACTS, when virtually every single one of the people taking that oath to obey and uphold our US Constitution fail to do so without suffering any negative consequences (and in fact enjoy ample rewards from us for their disobedience), do we still have a US Constitution?
Let me qualify that. A case can be made that military volunteers are a net gain to our nation, so perhaps they are absolved of the generational debt that renders each and every one else of us a violator of the sanctity of life, liberty, and property. Can we escape the consequences? Absolutely not.
It is probably true that most of the readers and commenters here are religious believers, while a small subset of us is not. And we are all fortunate to have (and live under) a Constitution with its 1st Amendment protections for freedom of conscience, such that we can have a civil disagreement about the sensitive topics of religion and morality, and yet not come to the point where we believe we need to slit each other’s throats. Thank goodness!! 🙂
I have probably mentioned this before, but I have come to view morality as a mix of genetic and cultural influences. The absolute character of morality comes (not from revelation, but) from some of our inherent genetically defined psychology and instinctual characteristics (disgust with poop, reservations about incest, self-defense/ preservation, love between mates and among children and parents and siblings, general aspects of empathy and sociality, and up to at least the 20 “evolved human desires” identified by Larry Arnhart [Darwinian Natural Right]. In turn, the relative aspects of morality come from the variety of cultures encompassing the various societies across the globe (Western/ Judeo-Christian, Islamic, Asiatic varieties, etc.). Some of these ideas are further clarified by Nicolas Wade [The Faith Instinct] (and others). Thus, the laws of Nature (and of Nature’s God) and natural law are even more intermixed than Locke or our Founders were yet educated to appreciate, although they had a pretty clear understanding of human nature, history, and political theory. Biology, neuroscience, critical historical studies, and archeology are all now expanding our knowledge compared to what they perceived in their time.
As pointed out by Larry Seidentop [Inventing the Individual] and Tom Holland [Dominion], we are now so immersed in our Western civilization and culture that we do not fully recognize how much of our morality (and law) are evolved or derived from the Judeo-Christian tradition, further impacted by Greco-Roman philosophy and law. So we now have J-C concepts such as man made in the image of God (rather than the other way around?), a (too) slow evolution of women as co-equal to men, eventual incorporation of Roman law into Canon [Church] law (and English common law), followed by Enlightenment and scientific ideas leading to Locke and our Constitutional Convention of 1787. Some people suggest Anglo-Saxon culture also had a significant and unappreciated impact (an area I still need to learn more about). Another aspect of our Christian culture that is not often realized is that the Church’s rules on consanguinity (cousin marriage) dramatically reduced the impact of tribal thinking and allegiance within our Western societies, compared to so many other societies across on the globe.
I won’t bother elaborating here on the historical and archeological work suggesting the OT, NT, and Quran are not at all historically accurate, and are all derived from earlier myths and stories, and promulgated for purposes of more firmly establishing political control by selected kings or caliphs [but see Wade for some of this].
I have struggled for decades to understand how so many intelligent people (such as ACTS and others here, plus our 4 hosts) cannot see what I believe. And conversely, I have asked myself “why don’t I believe as they do?” We can also recognize that conversions back and forth across this divide, and among different faiths/ sects, have occurred with every combination possible. With the guidance provided by the references above, and others, I have come to the conclusion we are all “OK”, but (just as we all have a range of capabilities in art, music, athletics, math, social interaction, etc.) we also have a range in our level of need or desire for “transcendence”. Some need an external divine source, while some can be satisfied with considerations of the complexity of the cosmos, biology and life, the human mind, and a search for truth and reality.
So Andrew Breitbart said politics is downstream from culture. And thus law is downstream from politics. But first morality is also downstream from genetics and culture. If we come to more fully appreciate this, we can also better appreciate just how fragile our cultural collection of ideas about rights, freedoms, rule of law, liberty, etc. really are. We are going to have to fight to retain them, with or without any divine assistance. I am still happy to join you all in this necessary effort to counter the Leftist’s agenda.
I was gone for two weeks and made the above comment before reviewing older posts and then I saw the religion related comment threat from 8/16/21 on Follow the ‘Shut Up’: Pediatrics Academy Yanks Convention Booth from Gender Medicine Group.
Probably just as well I missed it back then. 🙂
First off while the UCMJ requires military personnel to obey the orders of the officers above them and the President of the United State of America, the key word is lawful order. All military personnel are expected to disobey an unlawful order. No exceptions.
While that’s true, there’s more to it than that. No one expects everyone in the military to be a lawyer. If you refuse a direct order on the grounds that the order is unlawful you’ll generally still stand for a Court Martial. There you will have lawyers who are trying to prove that your refusal to obey was justified by the unlawful nature of the order and the prosecution will have lawyers arguing that the order was lawful.
You can’t just say “That order is unlawful” and choose to disobey your superiors. You’d better be right because you’re going to have to prove it and if you’re wrong you’re going to pay for it..
Sometimes, not very often at all because the people who give the orders know what’s lawful and what is not also, but on rare occasions it’s possible to receive an order that is clearly unlawful. It’s a career ending mistake to refuse an order that is later proven to be lawful in court.
It’s even rarer that the person or people who gave the unlawful order will be prosecuted for doing so.
The worst part of this is if you DO obey an unlawful order you can be held responsible for doing so. Even when you have that order in writing from your superiors. One one hand you can go to jail for disobeying a lawful order and on the other hand you can go to jail for obeying an unlawful order. It’s not a trivial thing either way.
I’m picking this particular nit because most of the people here at this forum have not served in the military and are not familiar with the UCMJ at all. Most of them won’t even know that “UCMJ” stands for “Uniform Code of Military Justice”.
I don’t want anyone getting the idea that you can just arbitrarily go around disobeying orders and do so with impunity by saying “That’s an unlawful order and I’m not obeying it.” That’s not an “out” that covers your ass for refusing to do something you don’t want to do.
You can do that, but you sure as hell better be right if you do.
Excellent answer. This was adjudicated after the My Lai massacre during the war in Viet Nam. Do you know if the issuer of that order was ever prosecuted? I don’t recall after all these years.
On a slightly different note, having served in the Corps during that time period, I have extreme respect for former Marine Lt. Col, Stuart Scheller, who sacrificed his career and retirement calling for accountability for the disaster in Afghanistan.
I don’t know that anyone besides Lt. Calley was ever prosecuted for My Lai.
I’ve been following the things Lt. Col Scheller has been saying and saw that he had just resigned his commission. I hope he makes a big splash in the news, probably on Fox, and gets his story out. I hate to see a good Marine lose all that time without achieving his objective.
I hope Bill and Co. will do a feature on Lt. Col. Scheller too. They could help him out a lot by letting everyone know how to financially support him and his family.
One of my very best buddies is also a fellow Marine. He’s a retired Lt. Col. from G2. I haven’t had a chance to discuss Scheller’s situation with him yet but I’m sure it will be interesting as he still works in that field though now in civvies. He might have some insights that are not commonly aired in public …
I’m not completely clear on what all the dope is on Scheller. He’s either Chesty Puller or he’s Smedley Butler, I don’t think there’s room for any middle ground there. If what I’m hearing is so, and it pans out, then Scheller deserves all the respect and help he can get.
Semper Fi, bro.