all our base are belong to us

An early nineteenth century conception of federal power that just made me throw up in my mouth a little, with emphasis added:

The idea that the United States cannot raise a regular army in any other mode than by accepting the voluntary service of individuals, is believed to be repugnant to the uniform construction of all grants of power, and equally so to the first principles and leading objects of the Federal compact. An unqualified grant of power gives the means necessary to carry it into effect. This is an universal maxim, which admits of no exception. Equally true it is, that the conservation of the State is a duty paramount to all others. The commonwealth has a right to the service of all its citizens; or, rather, the citizens composing the commonwealth have a right, collectively and individually, to the service of each other, to repel any danger which may be menaced. The manner in which the service is to be apportioned among the citizens, and rendered by them, are objects of legislation...

In support of this right in Congress, the militia service affords a conclusive proof and striking example. The organization of the militia is an act of public authority, not a voluntary association.

-- James Monroe (Acting Secretary of War), Message to the Senate Committee on Military Affairs, October 17, 1814.

Monroe goes on to add that, hey, no worries, the government mostly means to take the "unmarried and youthful, who can best defend it, and best be spared." The whole message is a fabulous muddle, puddled with curious reasoning and contradictory arguments about power and compulsion: We're all in it together, and responsible to one another as equal participants in a social contract, so we totally own your ass and you better knuckle the fuck under.

My favorite part is the great "or, rather..." We own your ass, or, rather, you own your ass, so we own your ass, because we're you. Monroe's vision of the militia went over poorly, and was a distinctly minority view, but it was nevertheless what an important policymaker thought of the militia in the early republic: He thought it wasn't a voluntary public institution, but rather a way for the state to capture the service of its citizens for the purpose of its own preservation -- not theirs, but its. It seems to me that we don't hear that part of the story very often in our histories of the early republic.

I also thought that Monroe's claim about ends and means -- "An unqualified grant of power gives the means necessary to carry it into effect. This is an universal maxim, which admits of no exception." -- sounded a lot like, say for example, David Addington. Recent theories of power seem to me to not be all that recent.

housekeeping and random stuff

1.) Reader contest! Win a prize!* Come up with a name for this blog that doesn't make me wince every time I see it! The winning name will cleverly refer to state and paramilitary violence, suggesting the slippery boundaries between the two, while suggesting that the blog is meant to blend history and current affairs. If I ever become less lazy, this blog may actually even do some of that.

2.) If you make pancakes for your wife, keep an eye on the fucking things until she eats them. Otherwise, your elderly cat will lick off the butter and syrup. And then, because he's licked off the butter and syrup, he'll vomit. He'll vomit directly onto the pancakes. He'll do this precisely as your wife rounds the corner and comes into visual contact with the said pancakes.

And then? Cereal for breakfast.

3.) Jeff Huber is a retired U.S. Navy type, and says that the Navy offers precisely the thing to solve the Somalian pirate problem.

(*Prize is an authentic, fully certified "nothing." Win yours today!)

convicted, condemned, commanding

John Fries, a Pennsylvania militia captain sentenced to death as a traitor after freeing tax resisters from federal captivity in 1799, survived his death sentence when President John Adams decided to pardon him. But his treason conviction did have a serious consequence: Fries lost his position as a militia captain. Removing him from that office, the militiamen of Montgomery County instead elected him [added later: in 1800] to the rank of lieutenant colonel. So, you know, militia officers had to be very careful not to commit any capital crimes in the early republic, because it might get them promoted.

Also elected to field grade in Pennsylvania that year: Thomas Cooper, a republican newspaper editor convicted under the sedition act. He became the colonel of the Northampton County militia while still confined in a Philadelphia jail.

The standard history of military force in the early republic has Americans opposed to a professional army and preferring to rely on the militia. But it's difficult to overstate how little the people in political power believed they could rely on the militia -- and not just because they regarded the militia as an ineffective military force. Presidents and governors didn't trust the militia because they couldn't trust the militia. My sentiments are entirely with Fries and Cooper, who were on the right side against a gang of High Federalist assholes, but the point is that government officials preferred professional forces precisely because they could separated from the people at large. They could be held to the political will of their leaders in a way that the ordinary men of the militia could not.

See also the January, 1799 address of Georgia Governor James Jackson to the state legislature: "And here I have to remark that lieut. col. Watkins, of the Richmond county regiment, has also made declarations in the public prints, that he will never consider himself bound by certain parts of the constitution. This, as a public officer, is going to great lengths indeed. Will never feel himself bound by certain parts of the constitution, and those parts not specified!"

Despite their many flowery speeches about the glorious militia of the republic, early American political leaders never much wanted to turn their backs on the thing. It was a problem that they never solved, but also a problem they never stopped trying to solve. They did not prefer the militia to professional military forces.

what the fuck?

Comments?

that's, like, real mature

Third paragraph of an AP story on an attack that killed 45 people at an engagement party in Turkey:

"Citing Ozen, NTV said the motive could be an old feud between rival groups of pro-government village guards who fight alongside Turkish troops against Kurdish rebels in the region. If that is the case, the government would come under renewed pressure to rein in the militiamen, some of whom have been linked to drug smuggling and other crimes."

The usual argument about state violence is that new, still-developing states try to leverage private violence for state purposes, then cement a true monopoly on violence over time. But here's a well-established state that uses "village guards" to fight against Kurdish nationalists. States are usually happy to find a little extra violence that they can put to use. And the "drug smuggling and other crimes" usually come with it.

"basketball was batch"

This is really a great pleasure to read. Keep reading -- it's about war, too.

Famous Oxymorons

In September of 2006, while I was parked in the headquarters of an infantry battalion in Kuwait,  the U.S. embassy in Damascus was attacked. Purely for the sake of curiosity, we spent our excruciatingly dull shift in the TOC trying to figure out who did it, why they did it, how they did it, and how successful they were. The guy sitting next to me that night worked in the S-2 shop, so he fired up the super secret squirrel computer and started reading through the classified intel reporting.

We also turned on the radio and listened to the BBC World Service. Throughout the night, we compared what we were getting from classified sources to the information we were getting from radio and cable TV. The "secret" stuff -- I didn't have a "top secret" clearance, 'cause I was just an E-5 and nobody loved me -- was well behind the open sources; we'd learn X fact from the radio, then get X fact an hour later on the magic secret box. (The running joke: "But don't tell anyone that, because it's classified." While the dude on the TV was saying it for the the fifth time.)

So this new column from William Lind made immediate sense to me.