The Eastern NC Tea Party of Pitt County
The Eastern NC Tea Party of Pitt County is part of the larger group, Eastern NC Tea Party, which encompasses several counties. As a Tea Party group, we embrace certain core values that our country was founded upon: limited government, fiscal conservatism, personal responsibility, freedom of religious (not freedom "from" religion), the right of individuals to bear arms, state sovereignty, and the rule of law (as set forth in the US Constitution which was drafted and defined by our Founders and debated by the States in their ratification conventions before they signed it to form our Union).
The Pitt County group meets at least once each month at the Warehouse Restaurant where we have a speaker event. We also meet at least once each month at the Coffee Shack for a "Movie Night."
The Eastern NC Tea Party of Pitt County is an education group. Knowledge will set us free, or in our particular case, keep us free. And the knowledge that the overwhelming number of citizens lack is that of our founding history, our founding values, and of our founding documents - including the US Constitution. The Constitution is, like the great Magna Carta, the Petition of Right of 1628, the Habeas Corpus Act of 1679, and the English Bill of Rights of 1689 before it, our defining legal document. Like those other great English documents (which came to America with our settlers), it recognizes the inherent rights of man and sets boundaries on government.
If the public schools were mandated to teach the Constitution like they do the multiplication table, we might never have gotten in the mess we are today. Who among us read the Constitution (other than a few amendments or key phrases) or the Federalist Papers or studied the debates in the state ratification conventions as part of our education? Who among us knows who our Founders are and what contributions they made? What about our founding principles and foundational government theories? Ask a 6th grader if 8 x 8 equals 56, and he'll quickly tell you that the answer is 64. Why? Because he has been forced to memorize the mulitiplication table and so that important information is readily summoned. But if you ask the average person if the President can order a certain class of persons to be exempt from the application of immigration laws, they'll answer "Yes." They'll answer that the President can do almost anything. What they don't understand is that our Founders never intended to substitute one tyrant for another. They never intended for a President to assume any and all powers he wants, as King George did.
When you don’t have a proper educational foundation, you easily accept the explanations of others, including a liberal university and the campaign promises of a disingenuous candidate.
It is said we are in a constitutional crisis, and it's true. We have strayed so far from a constitutional government that we can't even begin to imagine it's depths. Consider the first provision of the Constitution - Article I, Section 1: "All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives." It then goes on, in Sections 2 and 3, to explain how each State will provide representatives to the legislative process. We don't even have to read farther than Article I, Section 1 to already see where our elected officials have violated the authority granted in the Constitution. Today, instead of Congress making our laws, we have laws being promulgated by executive orders, administrative agencies, executive agreements with other countries, and activist judges. And yet we are bound by all of these "unconstitutional" laws.
Why is it so important to be re-acquainted with our founding documents and founding principles? First of all, it’s important because it makes us all better citizens. It is ultimately our duty to make sure we hold the government to its constitutional limits. We can’t trust our elected officials to do that (as we’ve learned) and we can’t trust the government to police itself.
And second, and just as important, the Constitution is OUR document. It protects us from the reaches of government. It is our shield.
It protects not only our Bill of Rights but it’s supposed to (was supposed to) prevent the federal government from getting large enough to regulate us into submission. Unfortunately, as we are learning, when laws become too numerous and detailed, they can destroy liberty just as surely and effectively as having no law. What good is life and liberty when the government holds the power over the extent and value and usefulness of your property or the enjoyment of your life. Time spent working to pay for unconstitutional government programs is time away from the ones you love. Taxes for these programs amount to confiscation of property. The government doesn’t tell you this. But your constitution does.
We feel the effects of a country that is no longer ruled by a government that abides by constitutionally limited authority. We feel it personally, in areas we hold dear such as privacy, the right to manage our own healthcare, the right of religious conscience, the right to be safe from the harmful effects of uncontrolled immigration, the right to keep the fruits of our education and labor, and the right to be secure from unwarranted government surveillance programs. The thought of drones patrolling our nation’s skies is something we could have never imagined.
Up until recently, America has been called “the Land of Opportunity,” “the Land of Milk and Honey,” and “a Shining City on a Hill.” What
we have here in this country has been characterized as “the American Dream,” “the Great American experiment,” and “American Exceptionalism.” It seems incomprehensible that a people so endowed by Providence, so blessed with constitutionally-protected liberties, and so unconstrained in their Pursuit of Happiness would choose or tolerate a course that ensures their own decline and enslavement and choose a government that pursues policies that destroy the verynature of man. If America's soul becomes totally poisoned, part of its death certificate must read 'apathy' and 'willful neglect.' "
And so the Eastern NC Tea Party of Pitt County believes in educating the community in those history lessons that our current leaders and our public school system have ignored for too long. The promises in the Declaration of Independence and in the Constitution are entitlements not just for us but for future generations of Americans - for our children and grandchildren. It is the goal of the Tea Party to preserve this last best hope for mankind on Earth.
The Pitt County group meets at least once each month at the Warehouse Restaurant where we have a speaker event. We also meet at least once each month at the Coffee Shack for a "Movie Night."
The Eastern NC Tea Party of Pitt County is an education group. Knowledge will set us free, or in our particular case, keep us free. And the knowledge that the overwhelming number of citizens lack is that of our founding history, our founding values, and of our founding documents - including the US Constitution. The Constitution is, like the great Magna Carta, the Petition of Right of 1628, the Habeas Corpus Act of 1679, and the English Bill of Rights of 1689 before it, our defining legal document. Like those other great English documents (which came to America with our settlers), it recognizes the inherent rights of man and sets boundaries on government.
If the public schools were mandated to teach the Constitution like they do the multiplication table, we might never have gotten in the mess we are today. Who among us read the Constitution (other than a few amendments or key phrases) or the Federalist Papers or studied the debates in the state ratification conventions as part of our education? Who among us knows who our Founders are and what contributions they made? What about our founding principles and foundational government theories? Ask a 6th grader if 8 x 8 equals 56, and he'll quickly tell you that the answer is 64. Why? Because he has been forced to memorize the mulitiplication table and so that important information is readily summoned. But if you ask the average person if the President can order a certain class of persons to be exempt from the application of immigration laws, they'll answer "Yes." They'll answer that the President can do almost anything. What they don't understand is that our Founders never intended to substitute one tyrant for another. They never intended for a President to assume any and all powers he wants, as King George did.
When you don’t have a proper educational foundation, you easily accept the explanations of others, including a liberal university and the campaign promises of a disingenuous candidate.
It is said we are in a constitutional crisis, and it's true. We have strayed so far from a constitutional government that we can't even begin to imagine it's depths. Consider the first provision of the Constitution - Article I, Section 1: "All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives." It then goes on, in Sections 2 and 3, to explain how each State will provide representatives to the legislative process. We don't even have to read farther than Article I, Section 1 to already see where our elected officials have violated the authority granted in the Constitution. Today, instead of Congress making our laws, we have laws being promulgated by executive orders, administrative agencies, executive agreements with other countries, and activist judges. And yet we are bound by all of these "unconstitutional" laws.
Why is it so important to be re-acquainted with our founding documents and founding principles? First of all, it’s important because it makes us all better citizens. It is ultimately our duty to make sure we hold the government to its constitutional limits. We can’t trust our elected officials to do that (as we’ve learned) and we can’t trust the government to police itself.
And second, and just as important, the Constitution is OUR document. It protects us from the reaches of government. It is our shield.
It protects not only our Bill of Rights but it’s supposed to (was supposed to) prevent the federal government from getting large enough to regulate us into submission. Unfortunately, as we are learning, when laws become too numerous and detailed, they can destroy liberty just as surely and effectively as having no law. What good is life and liberty when the government holds the power over the extent and value and usefulness of your property or the enjoyment of your life. Time spent working to pay for unconstitutional government programs is time away from the ones you love. Taxes for these programs amount to confiscation of property. The government doesn’t tell you this. But your constitution does.
We feel the effects of a country that is no longer ruled by a government that abides by constitutionally limited authority. We feel it personally, in areas we hold dear such as privacy, the right to manage our own healthcare, the right of religious conscience, the right to be safe from the harmful effects of uncontrolled immigration, the right to keep the fruits of our education and labor, and the right to be secure from unwarranted government surveillance programs. The thought of drones patrolling our nation’s skies is something we could have never imagined.
Up until recently, America has been called “the Land of Opportunity,” “the Land of Milk and Honey,” and “a Shining City on a Hill.” What
we have here in this country has been characterized as “the American Dream,” “the Great American experiment,” and “American Exceptionalism.” It seems incomprehensible that a people so endowed by Providence, so blessed with constitutionally-protected liberties, and so unconstrained in their Pursuit of Happiness would choose or tolerate a course that ensures their own decline and enslavement and choose a government that pursues policies that destroy the verynature of man. If America's soul becomes totally poisoned, part of its death certificate must read 'apathy' and 'willful neglect.' "
And so the Eastern NC Tea Party of Pitt County believes in educating the community in those history lessons that our current leaders and our public school system have ignored for too long. The promises in the Declaration of Independence and in the Constitution are entitlements not just for us but for future generations of Americans - for our children and grandchildren. It is the goal of the Tea Party to preserve this last best hope for mankind on Earth.