by Matthew Bransgrove | Dec 20, 2015 | Foreign Policy
Executive Orders 12036 (President Carter), 11905 (President Ford) and 12333 (President Reagan) prohibit United States intelligence agencies from sponsoring or carrying out assassinations. These are absolutely correct; a free people should never be ashamed of anything...
by Matthew Bransgrove | Dec 20, 2015 | Foreign Policy
As to those monsters who, under the title of sovereigns, render themselves the scourges and horror of the human race, they are savage beasts, whom every brave man may justly exterminate from the face of the earth. —Emerich de Vattel. The Law of Nations, 1758....
by Matthew Bransgrove | Dec 20, 2015 | Foreign Policy
Arbitrary power in a single person has made greater havoc in human nature, and thinned mankind more, than all the beasts of prey and all the plagues and earthquakes that ever were … . A bear, a lion, or a tiger, may now and then pick up single men in a wood, or … an...
by Matthew Bransgrove | Dec 20, 2015 | Foreign Policy
We ask only for a process, a direction, a basic code of decency, not for an instant transformation … . While we must be cautious about forcing the pace of change, we must not hesitate to declare our ultimate objectives and to take concrete actions to move toward them....
by Matthew Bransgrove | Dec 20, 2015 | Foreign Policy
An executive officer is appointed to execute the laws; it is therefore illegitimate for him to pretend to speak for the people of his country. Accordingly presidents, chancellors, prime ministers and other executive officers should avoid making foreign policy speeches...
by Matthew Bransgrove | Dec 20, 2015 | Foreign Policy
Since men are naturally equal, and a perfect equality prevails in their rights and obligations, as equally proceeding from nature—Nations composed of men, and considered as so many free persons living together in a state of nature, are naturally equal, and inherit...
