Philosophy

As for the judicial, executive and legislative branches of the government, I will only say that the length of time elected individuals serve in their particular offices should be limited. (This should also include those high level personnel they directly appoint.) That is, no one in an elected office or high level government appointed office should be allowed to remain in office indefinitely or even an extended length of time.

Further, the times they serve in office should be structured so as to have every elected office and those high level government offices held by personnel they appoint renewed approximately every 20 to 25 years. (Low level clerks and office personnel should not be subject to such restrictions.) This way every generation of voters could have the opportunity to have their own high level governmental offices held by representatives they choose.

For example, Supreme Court Justices, appellate judges and other judges should not be appointed for life. Rather, every year (or whatever length is decided upon) an alternate judge should be elected. The services of this alternate judge would only be used in case another judge was sick, died or for some reason could not perform their duties.

This alternate judge would sit in on and listen to all cases and be able to ask questions but his or her opinion would not be officially given. Nor would their decision count in the final verdict unless they were sitting in for another judge.

At the end of their term as an alternate judge they would move up to Supreme Court Associate Justices, appellate judge, etc. The longest served Associate Justice would automatically move up to Chief Justice and the Chief Justice or longest served appellate judge would retire. This way the people would periodically get a new court.

For example, if our present Supreme Court had one Chief Justice, eight Associate Judges and one elected alternate Associate Judge, and if each alternate judge served a two-year term before moving up and the Chief Justice would retire after serving two years then the people would get a new Supreme Court every twenty years.

The people would not have to worry whether or not the court was dominated by liberals or conservatives for an extended length of time. The people would not have to worry about whether or not the President was nominating a particular person for a position on the Supreme Court for the sole purpose of enhancing his or her chances of getting re-elected.

Senators, congressmen, presidents, vice presidents, governors, lieutenant governors, mayors and other elected officials should each serve one extended term, not two or more short terms either consecutively or intermittently. For example, presidents, governors, mayors, etc. should each serve one eight, ten, or twelve year term or whatever length of service the people decide upon.

The various seats in both houses of congress should be renewed alternately, say for example one/third of them every eight years. That is, every four years elect either one/third of the upper house or one/third of lower house, followed four years later by the other house. This should be done in such a fashion so as to have every seat in both the upper and the lower house (House and Senate) renewed approximately every 20 to 25 years or whatever length the people decide upon.

Further, no one should be allowed to serve in two different branches of the government without an extended waiting period between services. For example, someone from the legislative branch should not be allowed to serve in the executive branch or judicial branch without a five year waiting period.

Senators, congressmen and other representative elected personnel should also be required by law to spend an appropriate, minimum amount of time living in the district they serve. Lobbyists, lobbying, Political Action Committees and all similar type activity should be outlawed. All representatives should be required by law to vote on legislation the way the majority of the people they represent desire them to vote.

To help accomplish this latter, representatives should post both the positive and the negative points of view of pending legislation on the Internet. This is so that the people they represent can learn about the various bills before congress.

The people they represent should be allowed to give their opinions to their representative on these bills through the Internet. They should also be allowed to propose alternative legislation through the Internet.

Finally, representatives should be allowed to listen in, give opinions on and vote on legislation through the Internet. Many may claim that legislation and voting through the Internet is impossible. But I do not believe that.

Technology is bringing us to such a point. The Internet is a wonderful tool that can be used to further the law, education and commerce. There is no reason why it cannot be used in this fashion.

Finally, the purpose here is to “divide and conquer.” That is, political power tends to corrupt those in public office and the longer an individual stays in his or her political office the more powerful he or she becomes, and the more likely he or she is to become corrupt. Hence the proverb: Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

The purpose here is to prevent any one politician from obtaining too much power by dividing the amount of time he or she is in office and preventing him or her from rapidly moving from one branch of government to another. I believe that this would help restrict any possible corruption of the government.

Another area where politicians gain enormous political power and become corrupt is through campaign contributions and through gifts from big business, organizations and wealthy individuals. Presently there are laws that attempt to control campaign contributions. But these campaign finance laws are inadequate; there are too many loopholes in them.

It seems to me that ANY and ALL money that any business, organization or individual wants to contribute toward campaign finance (or some similar type of contributions or gifts) should be deposited in one general fund from which all candidates seeking election could draw matching funds.

No business, organization or individual should be allowed to endorse any candidate with television or radio commercials, commercial billboard signs, newspaper or magazine endorsements, Internet sites or anything of this nature. All such campaign advertisements should be paid for by the candidate seeking office.

(There is nothing wrong with individual voters wearing T-shirt endorsements, auto bumper stickers, lawn signs or things of this nature, as long as such is paid for by the candidate seeking elected office.)

Again, the purpose here is to try and prevent the politician from becoming corrupt by limiting the campaign contributions.

As for gifts to politicians, any gift given either directly or indirectly to political officials or their family members should be under strict, scrupulous scrutiny. If they are found to be normal Christmas, anniversary or birthday presents or some similar type of present from family members and friends then there is nothing wrong.

But if these presents should be found to be either directly or indirectly political in nature, no matter who they are from or the purpose of the gift then they should immediately become the property of the government.

If the gift is something that cannot become the property of the government, such as a paid vacation, then the politician should be made to pay the amount of the cost to the government. The purpose here is to help “level the playing field” somewhat between candidates and help prevent any politician from becoming the tool of the rich and politically powerful and then becoming corrupt.

When the people of a nation begin to splinter into various factions this weakens the government. One area of division among a people is in the use of language. Those who speak a similar language will more often than not associate with those of their own language. This is true regardless of their political opinions or persuasion.

This could possibly, eventually lead to divisions among the people of different language backgrounds, which could then possibly lead to the dissolution of the government.

In order to prevent the dissolution of the government, all official government documents and publications should by law be published (orally, electronically or in print) in only one language and all schools should teach this language to their students. (This should not apply to those who speak through ASL or some other type of sign language.)

By having only one official language such would inspire all those who do not speak the official language of the government to learn that language. Eventually everyone would speak only the official government language.

Many individuals may claim that such a law is extreme conservatism, but it is not. The purpose here is to ensure that the government does not splinter into various sections based on language differences.

Often are the times when a person must put aside his or her own civil liberties for the good of the community. Having one official language for the government will aid in the cohesion of the people of the government. One should note that having all official publications in Latin is one of the things that helped the Catholic Church stay together for so many years.

How should this updating of the laws should be accomplished? I believe that each state should send an appropriate number of college professors to the delegation. These college professors should be chosen by the people and from all fields of knowledge. These delegates should then meet behind closed doors under a gag order and no one should be allowed to influence their decisions. Nothing of the deliberations should be revealed until after a new law has been decided upon.

Their deliberations should cover all fields – the government, economics, environment, science, etc. – and whatever they decide should become law upon completion of their deliberations. The point here is to make a new law that is not influenced by outside interests, a law that will look out for the rights of everyone, a law that will ensure that truth and justice will prevail.

Finally, these are only my opinions on how a government ought to be set up. I realize that I have left numerous things out. But I also point out that “A few of these rights are:” meaning that there are other rights and protections that I do not mention.

I also realize that corrupt individuals will try to circumvent the guidelines I have set up here. Therefore, these guidelines should not be taken as “written in stone.” They should be used as stepping stones or building blocks toward peace.

Someone else could come up with a better form of government. If so, then we ought to follow his or her opinion, because we are all here in order to learn how to live together and establish peace on earth. The only way we can do that is to create laws that we can all agree upon.

Government and Prison Reform