Crosstalk: September 19, 2017

​​​September 17th marked the 230th year since our founding fathers produced what became known as the U.S. Constitution.

Joining Jim to explain how this important document came into being was William Federer.  William is a nationally known speaker, author and president of Amerisearch, Inc., a publishing company dedicated to researching America's noble heritage.  He's authored numerous books including, 'America's God and Country Encyclopedia of Quotations', 'The Original 13: History of Religion in America's First Thirteen States', 'Who is the King in America?' and 'For God and Country: A Handbook for the Statesman-Citizen'.

The Declaration of Independence communicated the concept of government by the consent of the governed.  This makes the Constitution a way to have the people govern themselves.  In other words, a republic is where the people are king, ruling through representatives.  So when we pledge allegiance to the flag and to the republic for which it stands, we're pledging allegiance to us being in charge of ourselves.  This means that if someone dishonors the flag, they're basically saying they don't want to be the king anymore!

At the time America was being formed, the rest of the world was ruled by kings—Chinese emperors, czars in Russia, Muslims Sultans in the Ottoman Empire and more.  However, the most powerful king on earth was the king of England.  People in America wanted to change that.  To our advantage was the fact that we had 150 years of practicing self-government in the colonies.  

Ancient Israel (which came out of Egypt in 1400 BC) was actually the first nation in recorded history to be ruled without a king and they governed that way for 400 years.  Instead, they were ruled by the Law which says there's no respecter of persons in judgment.  This was the beginning of the concept of equality.

In addition, Israel had no standing army because every man was armed and part of the militia. They were the first nation without prisons and they had a bureaucracy-free welfare system that worked by having people leave gleanings in the fields at harvest time for the poor.     

We look back to Israel because America's founders did.  Samuel Langdon, the president of Harvard, gave an address at the ratification convention for the Constitution.  The address was titled, 'The Republic of the Israelites: An Example to the American States'.

William then moved to the 1500's and 1600's where he mentioned the Christian Hebraists, the Mayflower Compact, the Puritans, the congregational form of church government and much more as we remember the formation and the birthday of our unique Constitution.