cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/54239937
During the Great Depression, when banks foreclosed on farms, neighbors often showed up at the auctions together.
They’d bid only a few cents, and return the land to the family that lost it. Sometimes a noose hung nearby as a warning to outsiders not to profit from someone else’s ruin.
It was rough, but it worked, communities protected each other when the system wouldn’t.
If a collapse like that happened today, do you think people would still stand together or has that kind of solidarity disappeared? Could it happen again?
You’re right that the wording in the constitution requires re-appropriating the army every two years. The obviously short time period along with the words written outside of the constitution by the people who wrote it made it very clear what a disastrous mistake having a federal standing army would be. Those guys were right.
Is there anything that would reasonably mean “you may not have a standing army”?
I agree you won’t find those literal words in that order. There are plenty of other parts of the constitution that have been interpreted more holistically, but not the section limiting federal armies to 2 year stints. Funny how that works.