A blog link from Uncle Mike.
One of my favorite authors.
December 16, 1775: Jane Austen Is Born
Last edition:
Showing posts with label 1770s. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1770s. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 16, 2025
Monday, November 10, 2025
Friday, November 10, 1775: Founding of the Marine Corps.
November 10, 1775: The Birth of the U.S. Marine Corps
This was done by a resolution of Congress, stating:
Resolved, That two Battalions of marines be raised, consisting of one Colonel, two Lieutenant Colonels, two Majors, and other officers as usual in other regiments; and that they consist of an equal number of privates with other battalions; that particular care be taken, that no persons be appointed to office, or enlisted into said Battalions, but such as are good seamen, or so acquainted with maritime affairs as to be able to serve to advantage by sea when required...
These heraldry dates are subject to some challenge. It is true that a Marine corps was founded on this day in 1775, but along with the Navy, it was disbanded in 1783. It was brought back in 1798 due to the need to build up the Navy due to tensions with republican France, the first undeclared war in the nation's history.
There's a collection of lessons here, one being that the founders of the republican feared and detested the idea of a standing military. They regarded a standing military as a threat to democracy, which in fact it is. That's the reason that the nation's entire defense was based on state militias. However, as a second lesson, it proved impossible to do, and as a result both a standing Navy and a standing Army had to be created, although the size of the Army was tiny.
A second lesson in this story is that Presidents have, right from the onset, crept up on war, and then later on outright engaged in it, without the required declaration.
Given the climate of the times, all of this should be absolutely frightening.
Last edition:
Wednesday, September 10, 2025
Mike Johnson, Tory.
I cannot for the life of me understand how the Democrats think this is some kind of winning political message. Yield man! Let the troops come into your city…
Mike declaring for King George.
Mike Johnson.
Sunday, August 3, 2025
Tuesday, June 17, 2025
June 17, 1775. The Battle of Bunker Hill.
The British took Bunker HIll in Massachusetts in the first really notable largescale battle of the American Revolution.
While they prevailed, they took twice the casualties of the defending American forces.
250 Years Ago Today: The Bloodiest Day of the Revolutionary War
Related threads:
Saturday, April 4, 1925. Recalling Lexington and Concord.
Labels: 1770s, 1775, 1920s, 1925, Adolf Hitler, American Revolution, Art, Easter, German SS, Mail, Post Office, The Battle of Lexington and Concord, Weimar Germany
Last edition:
Thursday, March 30, 1775. King George III gave Royal Assent to the New England Restraining Act, which provided. . .
Sunday, June 15, 2025
Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 90th Edition. Parade and Protests.
Yesterday the much discussed extremely expensive Washington D.C. parade occured.
I had not intended to watch any of it, but when I came home from work, after fixing the exhaust on my Jeep, I came in from the 90F weather and there wasn't anything on as I drank a beer. Being fasciated, obviously, with things military, I turned it on until the nightly local news came on.
I don't know how much of the spectacle I saw. When I turned it on there were troops marching in World War Two combat uniforms. They looked pretty sharp. There was a collection of World War Two rolling stock, and it looked good, although based on the passengers, I'm dead certain that the equipment, from Jeeps to tanks, were the property of private parties, not the Army. The Army keeps old armor on display, but their vehicles are just that, on display. A working Sherman tank is probably pretty difficult to turn up in the Army.
I watched through the Korean War, which was interesting, and again, at least while I was watching, mostly rolling stock. When the Vietnam War era was depicted, some wag programmed in Fortunate Son for the background music. The protest song famously is aimed at people like Donald Trump.
It ain't me, it ain't me
I ain't no millionaire's son, no, no
It ain't me, it ain't me
I ain't no fortunate one, no
I wonder if he recognized the tune?
I concluded at some point after they reached the modern Army. Troops were marching in their BDUs. Some were out of step pretty badly. A few were overweight. A small contingent carrying the latest small arms looked grossly overburdened by the weight of their arms.
I thought it was probably just me, as I'm not a Trump fan whatsoever, but it isn't. Net comments, including some from Europeans where armies fairly routinely put on large parades, noted the same thing.
And what they really noticed is how empty the stands were. People didn't turn out. That's a real indictment of Trump.
They did, however, turn out across the country for No Kings protests.
That really says something as well.
Last edition:
Lex Anteinternet: Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 88th Edition Postscript. Adding to what we already noted in a predictive issue and other ramblings. Order coming on women in combat roles.
Labels: Military, Pete Hegseth, Predictions, The relationship between men and women, The roles of men and women, Zeitgeist
Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 89th Edition. Sidewalks and flags.
Saturday, June 14, 2025
An interesting day.
Lex Anteinternet: :
Donald Trump, who hasn't served a day in the military, will preside over the largest military parade in the United States since the end of the First Gulf War.
This should be an interesting day.
Donald Trump, who hasn't served a day in the military, will preside over the largest military parade in the United States since the end of the First Gulf War.
Trump, who has made disparaging comments about members of the military, didn't serve during the Vietnam War due to a medical exemption for shin splints.
The parade is ostensibly for the 250th anniversary of the establishment of the U.S. Army, which came into existence on June 14, 1775.
The Army is not as old as the National Guard, which dates its existence, due to colonial militia lineage, to December 13, 1636.
Also today,. Pope Leo XIV will make a virtual appearance at an event in Chicago.
Tuesday, June 10, 2025
Tuesday, June 10, 1975. Refugees.
Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass held a concert at Camp Talega, Camp Pendleton, to entertain Vietnamese refugees.
President Ford reported that 3,341 refugees had been relocated to third countries, with a majority going to Canada.
An artillery salute at Shea stadium for the Army's 200th anniversary went wrong.
Last edition:
Sunday, June 8, 1978. Võ Văn Ba.
Saturday, April 19, 2025
NO KINGS
This is the 250th anniversary of the Battle of Lexington and Concord.
A big cause of the American Revolution, as everyone knows, was Parliament's (not the King's) imposition of taxes on the colonies, which was done to help pay for the French and Indian (Seven Years) War. They were, in modern parlance, value added taxes, which the colonist had no say in, and they were specifically directed, on tea.
"No taxation without representation" was the cry.
When, the following year, the Continental Congress got around to declaring independence the following year, they listed twenty five grievances they accused King George III of, those being:
- Grievance 1 "He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good."
I think this charge can be levied against King Donald, but it is complicated by the fact that Congress is pretty much completely dysfunctional and has been for some time.
- Grievance 2 "He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them."
- Grievance 3 "He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only."
- Grievance 4 "He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, and also uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures."
- Grievance 5 "He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people."
- Grievance 6 "He has refused for a long time, after such Dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining, in the meantime, exposed to all the Dangers of Invasion from without, and convulsions within."
- Grievance 7 "He has endeavored to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands."
The Trump administration's outright hostility to the foreign born is at a level not seen since the 19th Century, and which exceeds any level in any prior administration in the country's history. Included in this is an assault on birth right citizenship, which is featured in the Constitution.
- Grievance 8 "He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers."
- Grievance 9 "He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries."
Trump's attacks on the judiciary are certainly evidence of this. Right now, the Administration is ignoring an order to return a wrongfully deported prisoner.
- Grievance 10 "He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance."
DOGE.
- Grievance 11 "He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures."
Just last week came the news that the Trump administration has basically martialized the public lands along the Mexican border.
- Grievance 12 "He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power."
See above and the use of the military for what the Border Patrol should properly be doing.
- Grievance 13 "He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:"
- Grievance 14 "For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us.
Again, see above.
- Grievance 15 "For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:"
- Grievance 16 "For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world".
Tariffs are accomplishing this.
- Grievance 17 "For imposing taxes on us without our consent:"
Tariffs again.
- Grievance 18 "For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Jury trial:
- Grievance 19 "For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offenses:"
El Salvador prisons and Laotian deportation?
- Grievance 20 "For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighboring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries to render it at once an example and fit instrument
This was directed at Quebec, but it could now pretty ably describe what Trump is doing in general.
- Grievance 21 "For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:"
Again, see it above.
King Donald is repeating many of those same offenses, albeit in new forms, those being the ones emboldened. Explanations, for the doubters, are provided above, but like British conservatives in the 1770s, they will not be able to see their own violations.
Perhaps nearly as distressing is a new development that I'm seeing in some Conservative quarters.
New York Times conservative columnists David Brooks called just recently for a "National Civil Uprising".
That's essentially a call for a massive act of civil disobedience, and frankly I think it has a good chance of happening.
And some are hinting at even more than that.
For decades, the Wayne LaPierre National Rifle Association fueled the belief in the firearms community that the Second Amendment exists in order to allow civilians to fight Federal tyranny, if it came to that. That's really completely incorrect, as the text of the amendment clearly demonstrates:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
Posted on Twitter with the words "It won’t be long until the proletariat remembers why we have the second amendment". This is suddenly a place where some on the left and some on the right are frighteningly meeting.
The founders of the Republic didn't want to keep a large standing Army, which they regarded, rightly, as a threat to democracy. The early land defense of the country, therefore, relied on state militias, which had the added ability to take on local problems without the necessity of a Federal army having to intervene. After all, keep in mind that one of the cited reasons for the Revolution is that the English had kept large bodies of armed troops in the colonies.
Posted on Blue Sky with "The 2nd Amendment exists for a reason. It was put in place to protect us against tyranny, even from our own elected officials. We have the right to stand up."
Standing armies are always a problem and the current era might very well be starting to demonstrate that. Throughout the nation's history it usually didn't have large armies save in times of war, or leading up to war. But since the onset of the Cold War it has. Even now, in the post Cold War era, the Army is enormous compared to what it had been before World War Two.
Anyhow, the Second Amendment doesn't exist so that average people can take on a tyrannical government. It exists so that states can take on the British, basically. That hasn't stopped at least three decades of firearms owners being schooled in the thought that they might have take up arms against the government, with those claims uniformly coming from the right, although in the 1960s, there were those on the left who argued with some justification that oppressed minorities should arm to protect themselves.
Malcom X, who was a big proponent of the Second Amendment, looking out a window while holding a M1 Carbine.
Now, all of a sudden, I'm seeing anti Trump Conservatives suggest that the Second Amendment's clauses have what I've already noted as a mistaken view. And some on the left are goading the far right on this very topic, ie., now that we have an authoritarian, they're quiet. That shows, I think, how far down the road of chaos we've gotten. We haven't seen anything like that since the Civil War.
An example of the goading, but there's a point to it. Trump is rapidly evolving into a full blown authoritarian, just the kind of people that the NRA warned about for years. This is why, quite frankly, I think the Trump administration will be the death knell of the Second Amendment. Either Trump himself will ban entire classes of weapons as he'll conceive of them as a threat, or a successor President, if we get through this will, as the "we need these. . ." because argument will have shown to be baloney or worthless.
Moreover, there's some discussion going on in the military right now over what the duties are of military officers if they are ordered to take an illegal action. To some extent I think you can argue they already have been, with the Trump administration declaring the public lands along the Mexican border to be military reservations, but that actually has a long history. At any rate, Angry Staff Officer, whose blog we link in here, has put up two items recently on the military duties to disobey illegal orders. The Space Force has had one commanding officer relieved for criticizing J. D. Vance's territorially aggressive statements, something I'm sure she knew would occur when she made them. While we'd have to see what would actually happen, I suspect there's a lot of back barracks discussions going on amongst officers about the point at which they refuse to obey an illegal order from Trump.
Anticipating the worst, from Twitter.
Trump is a disaster, bringing the worse instincts in people to the top, and excusing them. This will get worse, and worse, if the 25th Amendment doesn't come into play. The man is an stupid, ancient, narcissist who may very well be bordering on insane. If Congress acted now, and truth be known a near majority likely grasp it and are too chicken to do anything, the situation could be salvaged.
Friday, April 4, 2025
Saturday, April 4, 1925. Recalling Lexington and Concord.
It was Saturday.
Issued on this day in 1925.
Retired Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg agreed to run in the second round of the German presidential election in the place of Karl Jarres, who had won the first round. He was 77, and would be enfeebled by the time Hitler was ready to push him aside a few years later.
Western Australia rejected prohibition at the polls.
The Nazi Party founded the SS as a bodyguard for Hitler.
Sunday, March 30, 2025
Thursday, March 30, 1775. King George III gave Royal Assent to the New England Restraining Act, which provided. . .
that New England's trade be limited to Britain and the British West Indies.
Last edition:
Monday, March 27, 1775. Choosing Jefferson as an alternate.
Thursday, March 27, 2025
Monday, March 27, 1775. Choosing Jefferson as an alternate.
The Second Virginia Convention named Thomas Jefferson as an alternate delegate to the Second Continental Congress, replacing Peyton Randolph, who was then presiding over the Virginia House of Burgesses.
Last edition:
Friday, March 24, 1775. Rushing toward war.
Monday, March 24, 2025
Sunday, March 23, 2025
Thursday, March 23, 1775. Give me liberty. . .
Patrick Henry delivered his famous speech in favor of independence at the Second Virginian Convention. He stated:
No man thinks more highly than I do of the patriotism, as well as abilities, of the very worthy gentlemen who have just addressed the House. But different men often see the same subject in different lights; and, therefore, I hope it will not be thought disrespectful to those gentlemen if, entertaining as I do opinions of a character very opposite to theirs, I shall speak forth my sentiments freely and without reserve. This is no time for ceremony. The question before the House is one of awful moment to this country. For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery; and in proportion to the magnitude of the subject ought to be the freedom of the debate. It is only in this way that we can hope to arrive at truth, and fulfill the great responsibility which we hold to God and our country. Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should consider myself as guilty of treason towards my country, and of an act of disloyalty toward the Majesty of Heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings.
Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part of wise men, engaged in a great and arduous struggle for liberty? Are we disposed to be of the number of those who, having eyes, see not, and, having ears, hear not, the things which so nearly concern their temporal salvation? For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst, and to provide for it.
I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past. And judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the conduct of the British ministry for the last ten years to justify those hopes with which gentlemen have been pleased to solace themselves and the House. Is it that insidious smile with which our petition has been lately received? Trust it not, sir; it will prove a snare to your feet. Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss. Ask yourselves how this gracious reception of our petition comports with those warlike preparations which cover our waters and darken our land. Are fleets and armies necessary to a work of love and reconciliation? Have we shown ourselves so unwilling to be reconciled that force must be called in to win back our love? Let us not deceive ourselves, sir. These are the implements of war and subjugation; the last arguments to which kings resort. I ask gentlemen, sir, what means this martial array, if its purpose be not to force us to submission? Can gentlemen assign any other possible motive for it? Has Great Britain any enemy, in this quarter of the world, to call for all this accumulation of navies and armies? No, sir, she has none. They are meant for us: they can be meant for no other. They are sent over to bind and rivet upon us those chains which the British ministry have been so long forging. And what have we to oppose to them? Shall we try argument? Sir, we have been trying that for the last ten years. Have we anything new to offer upon the subject? Nothing. We have held the subject up in every light of which it is capable; but it has been all in vain. Shall we resort to entreaty and humble supplication? What terms shall we find which have not been already exhausted? Let us not, I beseech you, sir, deceive ourselves. Sir, we have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne! In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free-- if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending--if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained--we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to the God of hosts is all that is left us!
They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? Sir, we are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power. The millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable--and let it come! I repeat it, sir, let it come.
It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace-- but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!
This stands in stark contrast, of course, with Edmund Burke's speech delivered in parliament the day prior.
Of note, Donald Trump has proclaimed this day "as a day in celebration of the 250th anniversary of Patrick Henry’s speech to the Second Virginia Convention", and many of his supporters naively believe that they stand for the same propositions those who took the American Colonies into Revolution do, when in fact, they stand for the opposite. You can find just such an example on the Campus issues blog that we link in here. Today's MAGA populists are direct heirs to Cromwell's Roundheads of the English Civil War, right down to following a radical Calvinist ideology, and even adopted the color, red, worn by what evolved out of the New Model Army.
Not that this is surprising. Retrograde reactionary forces in American public life have long attempted to claim the Revolution as their own, from the Southern traitors of 1860 to 1865, to modern Dixiecrats.
Last edition:
Wednesday, March 22, 1775. Speech on Conciliation with America
Saturday, March 22, 2025
Wednesday, March 22, 1775. Speech on Conciliation with America
To restore order and repose to an empire so great and so distracted as ours is, merely in the attempt, an undertaking that would ennoble the flights of the highest genius, and obtain pardon for the efforts of the meanest understanding. Struggling a good while with these thoughts, by degrees I felt myself more firm. I derived, at length, some confidence from what in other circumstances usually produces timidity. I grew less anxious, even from the idea of my own insignificance. For, judging of what you are by what you ought to be, I persuaded myself that you would not reject a reasonable proposition because it had nothing but its reason to recommend it.
The proposition is peace. Not peace through the medium of war; not peace to be hunted through the labyrinth of intricate and endless negotiations; not peace to arise out of universal discord, fomented from principle, in all parts of the empire; not peace to depend on the juridical determination of perplexing questions, or the precise marking the shadowy boundaries of a complex government. It is simple peace, sought in its natural course and in its ordinary haunts.
Let the colonies always keep the idea of their civil rights associated with your government-they will cling and grapple to you, and no force under heaven will be of power to tear them from their allegiance. But let it be once understood that your government may be one thing and their privileges another, that these two things may exist without any mutual relation – the cement is gone, the cohesion is loosened, and everything hastens to decay and dissolution. As long as you have the wisdom to keep the sovereign authority of this country as the sanctuary of liberty, the sacred temple consecrated to our common faith, wherever the chosen race and sons of England worship freedom, they will turn their faces towards you. The more they multiply, the more friends you will have, the more ardently they love liberty, the more perfect will be their obedience. Slavery they can have anywhere. It is a weed that grows in every soil. They may have it from Spain, they may have it from Prussia. But until you become lost to all feeling of your true interest and your natural dignity, freedom they can have from none but you. This is the commodity of price, of which you have the monopoly. This is the true Act of Navigation, which binds to you the commerce of the -colonies, and through them secures to you the wealth of the world. Deny them this participation of freedom, and you break that sole bond which originally made, and must still preserve, the unity of the empire. Do not entertain so weak an imagination as that your registers and your bonds, your affidavits and your sufferances, your cockets and your clearances, are what form the great securities of your commerce. Do not dream that your Letters of office, and your instructions, and your suspending clauses are the things that hold together the great contexture of this mysterious whole. These things do not make your government. Dead instruments, passive tools as they are, it is the spirit of the English communion that gives all their life and efficacy to them. It is the spirit of the English constitution which, infused through the mighty mass, pervades, feeds, unites, invigorates, vivffles every part of the empire, even down to the minutest member.
Is it not the same virtue which does every thing for us here in England? Do you imagine, then, that-it is the Land-Tax Act which raises your revenue? that it is the annual vote in the Committee of Supply, which gives you your army? or that it is the Mutiny Bill which inspires it with bravery and discipline? No! surely, no! It is the love of the people; it is their attachment to their government, from the sense of the deep stake they have in such a glorious institution, which gives you your army and your navy, and infuses into both that liberal obedience without which your army would be a base rabble and your navy nothing but rotten timber.
All this, I know well enough, will sound wild and chimerical to the profane herd of those vulgar and mechanical politicians who have no place among us: a sort of people who think that nothing exists but what is gross and material, and who, therefore, far from being qualified to be directors of the great movement of empire, are not fit to turn a wheel in the machine. But to men truly initiated and rightly taught, these ruling and master principles, which in the opinion of such men as I have mentioned have no substantial existence, are in truth everything, and all in all. Magnanimity in politics is not seldom the truest wisdom; and a great empire and little minds go ill together. If we are conscious of our situation, and glow with zeal to fill our places as becomes our station and ourselves, we ought to auspicate all our public proceedings on America with the old warning of the Church, Sursum corda! We ought to elevate our minds to the greatness of that trust to which the order of Providence has called us. By adverting to the dignity of this high calling, our ancestors have turned a savage wilderness into a glorious empire, and have made the most extensive and the only honorable conquests, not by destroying, but by promoting the wealth, the number, the happiness of the human race. Let us get an American revenue as we have got an American empire. English privileges have made it all that it is; English privileges alone will make it all it can be.
Edmund Burke
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