The Social Security Scam and your socialist slave number.

Rex Curry

As an attorney, I am asked if it is wise (or constitutional) for the U.S. government to number all youngsters and then steal their savings away for others via the so-called “social security program.” The program would have been struck down as unconstitutional but for the guile of the U.S.’s worst president, the socialist F.D.R., and a craven Supreme Court justice.

On August 14 many Americans mourn a dark day in U.S. history because that is when the social security scheme was imposed in 1935 and the numbering of Americans began. Nationwide, individualists call for an end to the impoverishing system by wearing T-shirts that scornfully announce “My Socialist Slave Number is” -followed by the sickening nine-digit pattern. Some people have gathered and publicly burned their social security cards, just as draft cards used to be burned http://members.ij.net/rex/SSNburning.html

Back in 1935, the Supreme Court had a pattern of striking down F.D.R.’s socialist scams for years. F.D.R. was so angry that he cynically proposed a court packing scheme to seize control of the Supreme Court. Under that threat, Justice Owen Roberts turned his back on liberty and changed the voting pattern of the court to submit to F.D.R.’s bidding. It was “the switch in time that socialized nine.”

It has been downhill ever since. Though all of those justices (and F.D.R.) are long gone, the Court has never reversed it’s humiliating disgrace. The Socialist Security Act cases rank in the top ten for the Supreme Court’s most shameful decisions. It is not too late for the Court to reverse its betrayal of liberty, and end the socialist slave system. It is never too late to stand for freedom.

Even though the Social Security Act was enacted into law on August 14, 1935, the country could still have been saved from the socialist fraud by the Supreme Court. It was inevitable that the legislation would be challenged in the courts. The unconstitutionality of the Social Security Act was clear. Under the "reserve clause" of the Constitution (the 10th Amendment) powers not specifically granted to the federal government are reserved for the States or the people. The federal government cannot expand its influence because federal laws must be based in the Constitution. Obviously, the Constitution did not mention any method for numbering all Americans and stealing their savings for others.

The cynical Committee on Economic Security (CES) schemed to circumvent the Constitution, either by claiming the commerce clause or by claiming broad power to levy taxes and expend funds to "provide for the general welfare," as the basis for the scam. Ultimately, the CES propagandized the taxing power as the basis for the new program, and Congress rubber stamped it. The courts were the last defenders of liberty, and were striking down F.D.R.’s socialist legislation, and the same fate awaited the Socialist Slave System.

The time was during the Depression. The Depression had been caused by the federal government and by socialistic legislation (e.g. the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 and the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act). F.D.R. heaped on more socialism that worsened the Depression, into a disaster that lasted all the while that F.D.R. remained in office. That is why F.D.R.’s depression is called the “Great Depression.”

In 1934 lower courts had begun overturning major parts of F.D.R.’s socialism. The most courageous court opinions came from rulings invalidating the Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA), a soviet-style scheme, which used the same broad power scheme to levy taxes for the so-called “general welfare” as the basis for its program of agricultural socialism, spending and price controls. Lower courts ruled this unconstitutional and the Supreme Court followed in January 1936, ruling that “.... a statutory plan to regulate and control agricultural production, [is] a matter beyond the powers delegated to the federal government...." There was a dark cloud around that silver lining, however, because the same opinion stated that: ".....the power of Congress to authorize expenditure of public moneys for public purposes is not limited by the direct grants of legislative power found in the Constitution" and began do dig the grave of liberty.

The Supreme Court's ruling on the AAA was a major rebuff for F.D.R.’s socialism and it was important for Social Security as well since it seemed to portend what lay ahead for the Social Security Act. The AAA was a cynical attempt to shift blame from the government for the collapse of the farm economy when earlier government acts caused the Depression. The AAA was soviet style “agrarian reform” similar to that tried in openly socialist countries for the government to take control of all agriculture. The actual mechanism by which this control was to be achieved was to levy taxes on the processing of foodstuffs and to use the proceeds from this tax to fund agricultural socialism --in effect, using the subsidies as “incentives” to take control of free farmers. Fearing how the courts would see this new function of government, the socialists who contrived the AAA deliberately placed the tax provisions and the subsidy provisions in separate titles of the act, so they could argue that they were not necessarily connected to each other; that is, so they could argue that the purpose of the tax was not to control production but was merely to raise revenue. This was the same cynical strategy adopted by the socialists who contrived the Social Security Act, as can be seen in the separate Titles II and VIII of the original Social Security Act.

In early 1937 President Roosevelt made what turned out to be the biggest political blunder of his career, and it was a blunder that became a disaster for liberty. F.D.R. was bitter about the Supreme Court striking down his socialism in favor of liberty and F.D.R. would derisively refer to the justices as "those nine old men." It didn’t matter that only four of them consistently opposed his socialism. The Court was split down the middle in political terms. There were three justices sympathetic to the F.D.R.’s socialist programs (Brandeis, Stone and Cardozo); There were four justices who voted against everything the Congress and the Administration tried to do (McReynolds, Butler, Van Devanter and Sutherland). There were two, Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes and Justice Owen Roberts, who were often "swing votes" on many issues. In the spring of 1935 Justice Roberts joined with the four justices to invalidate the Railroad Retirement Act. In May, the Court threw out a leviathan piece of F.D.R.’s socialism, the National Industrial Recovery Act. In January 1936 a passionately split Court ruled the Agricultural Adjustment Act unconstitutional. In another case from 1936 the Court had the good sense to rule New York state's minimum wage law unconstitutional. The upshot was that liberty was being protected from massive statism.

F.D.R.’s response to all of this was to seek even more power. On February 5, 1937 he sent a special message to Congress proposing legislation granting the president new powers to add additional judges to all federal courts whenever there were sitting judges age 70 or older who refused to retire. Fraudulently couching his argument as a reform to help relieve the workload burden on the courts, F.D.R.’s made it clear what he really had in mind. F.D.R. would be able to appoint six new Justices to the Supreme Court (and 44 judges to lower federal courts), rip up the constitutional protections for liberty, and force socialism upon everyone. The debate on this proposal was heated, widespread and over in six months. F.D.R. was rebuffed, his reputation in history tarnished for all time. Even so, the Court cravenly buckled. Beginning with a set of decisions in March, April and May 1937 (including the Social Security Act cases) the Court would sustained a series of socialist legislation.

Despite the intense controversy the court-packing plan provoked, and the divided loyalties it produced even among F.D.R.’s supporters, the legislation appeared headed for passage, when the Court itself made a sudden change. In March 1937, in a pivotal case, Justice Roberts unexpectedly turned his back on liberty, shifting the balance on the Court from 5-4 against to 5-4 in favor of most of F.D.R.’s socialist schemes. In the March case Justice Roberts voted to uphold a minimum wage law in Washington state just like the one he had earlier found to be unconstitutional in New York state. Two weeks later he voted to uphold the National Labor Relations Act, and in May he voted to uphold the Social Security Act. This sudden reversal in the Court meant that the pressure on F.D.R.’s cohorts lessened and they felt free to oppose the craven court-packing plan. This sudden switch by Justice Roberts is referred to as “the switch in time that saved nine” or “the switch in time that socialized nine.” As an attorney, I consider the social security decisions to be in the top ten most shameful decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Social Security is the biggest fraud ever perpetrated, it is a welfare scheme that steals from the neediest, and it has been a path to a police state.

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Rex Curry is published worldwide as a libertarian and a lawyer with a degree in journalism. http://RexCurry.net is the only site on the internet that collects and displays historic photographs of the original Pledge of Allegiance. Rex collects historic photos that show how socialism has harmed the U.S., and his hobby is also photography and graphic art, displayed on the website. His predecessors helped settle Key West back when Florida's government was virtually non-existent. The Curry Mansion (historic home of Florida's first capitalist millionaire) is still on the local tour.

Rexy@ij.net