The Foundry

Archive for the ‘First Principles’ Category

• It Will Be as if the American Founding Never Happened

  Posted February 5th, 2010 at 3:59pm in First Principles with 66 comments

  Forget George Washington, James Madison, Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln—nothing meaningful happened in America before 1877. That’s the lesson North Carolina public high schools may start teaching. Under proposed changes in their high school history curriculum, the U.S. History course (which seniors take) will cover events from 1877 forward only. It will be as if the American Founding [...] More

• Can U.S. Senators Be Recalled?

  Posted February 2nd, 2010 at 11:05pm in First Principles, Ongoing Priorities with 33 comments

  In Arizona, Louisiana and a few other states, well-meaning citizens would like to recall their U.S senators. Fair enough. But while this opinion represents a commendable movement to make Congress more accountable for its actions, it tramples on the U.S. Constitution and undermines the rule of law. Contrary to popular Web sites, the recall of [...] More

• A History to Be Proud Of

  Posted January 21st, 2010 at 11:21am in Education, First Principles with 0 comments

  In his new book, We Still Hold These Truths, Heritage’s Dr. Matthew Spalding explains that American students lack a fundamental understanding U.S. history. Dr. Spalding writes: The Department of Education reports that more than half of high school seniors lack even a basic knowledge of American history. Many college students, another study finds, can’t identify the [...] More

• Morning Bell: Martin Luther King Jr. Held These Truths. Do You?

  Posted January 18th, 2010 at 8:56am in First Principles with 48 comments

  On August 28, 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. stood at the Lincoln Memorial and admonished America to return to its First Principles. In his I Have a Dream Speech, he announced his dream that “one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to [...] More

• Heritage President Dr. Edwin Feulner Makes “Top 100″ Conservative List

  Posted January 14th, 2010 at 11:18am in First Principles, Ongoing Priorities with 7 comments

  Telegraph.co.uk has named The Heritage Foundation’s President, Edwin J. Feulner, Ph.D, to its list of America’s Most Influential conservatives for the second year in a row: 35. Edwin Feulner (41) President, Heritage Foundation Founded by Feulner, Heritage has grown in Washington from a nine-member staff working out of a rented office on Capitol Hill in 1977 to a [...] More

• Filibusters and Our Founders

  Posted January 12th, 2010 at 2:46pm in First Principles, Ongoing Priorities with 8 comments

  Yesterday Thomas Geoghegan argued in The New York Times that the Senate filibuster is “at worst, unconstitutional and, at best, at odds with the founders’ intent.” However, the most rudimentary reading of the Constitution suggests that the Founders wanted the passage of legislation to be exceedingly difficult in order to prevent a slim majority [...] More

• Christmas with the Presidents

  Posted December 25th, 2009 at 2:00pm in First Principles with 10 comments

  Christmas in the nation’s capital has evolved through the years. President George Washington held a Christmas party for Congress, starting with an early morning fox hunt. First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln raised money to provide Christmas dinners for wounded Civil War soldiers. Benjamin Harrison set up the first Christmas tree in the White House in 1889. Teddy Roosevelt played [...] More

• Utopian New Left Just Like Old Left

  Posted December 25th, 2009 at 11:30am in American Leadership, First Principles with 15 comments

  How did the European left rationalize communism’s crimes and transform itself into a viable political force after the fall of the Soviet Union? It’s all explained in “Last Exit to Utopia: The Survival of Socialism in a Post-Soviet Era.” First published in 2000, the book by the late French intellectual Jean-Francois Revel is only now available [...] More

• Morning Bell: Remembering the Providential Gift of America

  Posted December 25th, 2009 at 9:00am in First Principles with 13 comments

  Christmas, 1776. Summer had begun with strong declarations of noble ideals, but by winter the cause of liberty seemed to be at low ebb. Having suffered defeat after defeat, many had all but given up hope. It looked like freedom would succumb yet again, as it had throughout history, to the forces of authoritarianism and tyranny. Then, [...] More

• Guest Blogger: LSU Law Professor John Baker on Congress’ Reading Problem

  Posted December 18th, 2009 at 10:58am in First Principles with 12 comments

  Just the other day, Senator Richard Durbin (D-IL) objected to Senator Tom Coburn’s (R-OK) move to force the reading of Bernie Sander’s (I–VT) 767-page amendment (thankfully defeated) to create a single-payer, Medicare-for-all health care system. Republicans plan to force a reading of the final (as yet un-released) Reid health care legislation currently being debated [...] More