Standing Armies: The Basis of Tyranny

March 5, 1770. The Boston Massacre. British regulars fired on a crowd. Five people died.

Tragic, absolutely. Predictable, without a doubt.

This wasn’t hindsight. On the fifth anniversary of the bloodshed, Dr. Joseph Warren laid out exactly why:, it was part of  a formula that was built on standing armies.

“when the people on the one part, considered the army as sent to enslave them, and the army on the other, were taught to look on the people as in a state of rebellion, it was but just to fear the most disagreeable consequences. Our fears, we have seen, were but too well grounded.”

THE LINEAGE

The founders and old revolutionaries didn’t invent an opposition to large, permanent standing armies. They inherited it. It was a core part of their history, their heritage. Thomas Gordon documented a famous British example in his 1722 Discourse of Standing Armies.

“Oliver Cromwell headed an Army which pretended to fight for Liberty, and by that Army became a bloody Tyrant.”

Cromwell wasn’t the exception. Gordon explained he was part of a universal rule.

“Tis certain, that all Parts of Europe which are enslaved, have been enslaved by Armies, and ’tis absolutely impossible, that any Nation which keeps them amongst themselves, can long preserve their Liberties; nor can any Nation perfectly lose their Liberties, who are without such Guests”

Joseph Warren didn’t need to argue the principle. He had a powerful example: under English law, even the mere intent, just drawing up plans for a standing army, was itself grounds for a treason charge.

“Even in the dissolute reign of King Charles II when the House of Commons impeached the Earl of Clarendon of high treason, the first article on which they founded their accusation was, that ‘he had designed a standing army to be raised, and to govern the kingdom thereby.’”

GRAVEYARD OF REPUBLICS

Warren pointed to the graveyard of republics to show that this was a lesson written in the ruins of history.

“The ruinous consequences of standing armies to free communities, may be seen in the histories of SYRACUSE, ROME, and many other once flourishing states; some of which have now scarce a name!”

Take ancient Syracuse, for example. Gordon explained the play by play, which started with a supposed hero: Agathocles.

“Agathocles fought successfully for the city of Syracuse, and as successfully against it; and having defended the citizens against their enemies, he afterwards shewed himself their greatest, by killing in one great massacre all the chief and best of them, and by crowning himself tyrant over all the rest.”

And then there’s Rome, the most famous example of all. James Lovell invoked the classic story: a popular general, a loyal army, and a republic brought to its knees.

“Caesar by the length of his command in Gaul got the affections of his army, marched to Rome, overthrew the state, and made himself perpetual dictator.”

But you don’t have to start with legions to destroy a republic. Lovell gave a timeless reminder:, the original blueprint started with a much smaller step.

“Athens once was free; a citizen, a favorite of the people, by an artful story gained a trifling guard of fifty men; ambition taught him ways to enlarge that number; he destroyed the commonwealth and made himself the tyrant of the Athenians.”

That “artful story” had a name: Pisistratus. As David Hume explained, he staged a false flag, an attack on himself, to build a guard that became a standing army.

“Pisistratus, the Athenian, who cut and wounded his own body; and making the people believe, that his enemies had committed the violence, obtained a guard for his person.”

As Thomas Gordon detailed, it started with a seemingly pathetic force, just fifty men, armed only with wooden clubs.

“Pisistratus, having procured from the city of Athens fifty fellows armed only with cudgels, for the security of his person from false and lying dangers, improved them into an army, and by it enslaved that free state.”

THE BILL COMES DUE

With these lessons from centuries of history, Americans watched with alarm as 1763 brought a familiar danger to their own shores. At the end of the French and Indian War, the British decided to station 10,000 troops for “protection,” and to keep many of the troops from being out of work.

A standing army isn’t cheap. So the British decided the colonies would pay for it. That unleashed a wave of taxes: the Sugar Act, the Stamp Act, the Townshend Acts.

John Adams saw the dangerous cycle: first the army, then the taxes, all based on unconstitutional power.

“We have the mortification to observe one Act of Parliament after another passed for the express purpose of raising a revenue from us; to see our money continually collecting from us without our consent, by an authority in the constitution of which we have no share, and over which we have no kind of influence or controul;”

Adams pushed the indictment further: their money was not only being stolen, but being actively used to pay for the tools of their own oppression.

“to see the little circulating cash that remained among us for the support of our trade, from time to time transmitted to a distant country, never to return, or what in our estimation is worse, if possible, appropriated to the maintenance of swarms of Officers and Pensioners in idleness and luxury, whose example has a tendency to corrupt our morals, and whose arbitrary dispositions will trample on our rights.”

As John Dickinson made clear: this wasn’t paranoia. It was pattern recognition.

“These facts are sufficient to support what I have said. It is true, that all the mischiefs apprehended by our ancestors from a standing army and excise, have not yet happened: But it does not follow from this, that they will not happen. The inside of a house may catch fire, and the most valuable apartments be ruined, before the flames burst out. The question in these cases is not, what evil has actually attended particular measures—but, what evil, in the nature of things, is likely to attend them.”

THE DEADLY CYCLE

The British followed the historical playbook to the letter. More taxes required more force and more power, like the Writs of Assistance. That created more resistance, like the Liberty riot of 3,000 people literally chasing British customs’ agents out of town after John Hancock’s ship was seized. When the British escalated in response by marching Redcoats into Boston in 1768, the final act was already written. No one was surprised when blood was spilled on March 5, 1770.

On the fourth anniversary of the massacre, John Hancock explained that the tragic consequences were predictable and inevitable.

“it was easy to foresee the consequences which so naturally followed upon sending troops into America to enforce obedience to acts of the British Parliament, which neither God nor man ever empowered them to make.”

Hancock didn’t excuse the soldiers’ conduct as the work of a few bad apples. He traced it directly to their orders: men sent to subjugate a population will act like it.

“It was reasonable to expect that troops, who knew the errand they were sent upon, would treat the people whom they were to subjugate, with a cruelty and haughtiness which too often buries the honorable character of a soldier in the disgraceful name of an unfeeling ruffian.”

A CONSTANT THREAT

When you understand this history, from the ancient world to the streets of Boston, you understand their warning. This is why the founding generation so vehemently opposed standing armies. As Gen. Henry Knox explained, the danger was greatest in times of peace.

“whatever may be the efficacy of a standing army in war, it cannot in peace be considered as friendly to the rights of human nature.”

And there’s no special exemption for America. As George Mason made crystal clear, a standing army is a deadly threat to liberty anywhere and everywhere.

“when once a standing army is established in any country, the people lose their liberty.”

The founders saw the formula in the history books, and then they lived it. It’s the oldest playbook for tyranny: war creates armies, armies create debt, debt creates taxes, and the army enforces all of it. No one broke down this vicious cycle better than James Madison.

“Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few.”

Athens fell. Rome fell. Syracuse fell. The British learned the same lesson, more than once. The founders saw a pattern throughout history: people who build a permanent standing army lose their liberty. When Britain marched redcoats into Boston in 1768, the outcome was guaranteed.

“The greatest danger to liberty is from large standing armies.”

James Madison said it. History proved it.

Tags: Founding Principles, Standing Armies