How to Turn a Free People into Slaves

by Stephen Baskerville

Using instruments of public criminal justice to punish private hurts turns the family into government-occupied territory.

Today, it is becoming equally commonplace that this spirit of liberty is leaving Americans, that we are becoming “a nation of sheep,” as Judge Andrew Napolitano puts it in a new book, who acquiesce in the progressive abrogation of our Constitution and liberty.

The moment either spouse files for divorce, even if the other is legally unimpeachable, the government takes control of the children, who become effectively wards of the state. Unauthorized contact by a parent becomes a crime, and the excluded parent can be arrested and incarcerated without trial through a variety of other means that by-pass constitutional due process protections: domestic violence accusations, child abuse accusations, inability to pay “child support,” even inability to pay attorneys’ fees.

Legal jargon and clichés like “divorce,” “custody battle,” and “child support” have led Americans to acquiesce in this massive intrusion of state power over their freedom. We don’t say that the government arbitrarily took away someone’s children; we say he “lost custody.” We don’t say a legally innocent citizen was interrogated by government agents over how he lives his private life; we say there was a “custody battle.” We don’t say a citizen was incarcerated without trial or charge for debt he could not possibly pay and did nothing to incur; we say he “didn’t pay his child support.” These clichés and jargon inure us to tyranny.

Using instruments of public criminal justice to punish private hurts turns the family into government-occupied territory. The children experience family life not as a place of love, cooperation, compromise, trust, and forgiveness. Instead they receive a firsthand lesson in tyranny...

Something similar may be seen today in the children of the divorce regime. No people can remain free who harbor within themselves a system of dictatorship or raise their children according to its principles.

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