I do have trust in democracy and in the American people. They will eventually overcome and set things right.

That appears to be what a lot of Germans thought ca 1930.

They had the nicely democratic Weimar Constitution adopted in 1919, that was considered by some to be (almost) a "model constitution" for a democratic nation. It gave, a year before women could vote in the US, equality(?) between men and women in voting.

It must remembered that after the German defeat in 1918 there was significant international pressure that may have influenced this original Constitution, and one must question how much was national intent and what may have been "lip service" to the ideals of others.

[quote]
Article 109         All Germans are equal in front of the law. In principle, men and women have the same rights and obligations.
[end quote] (italics added).

It appears that there were "traditional differences" that were almost immediately incorporated in laws that distinguished in significant ways between the rights of men and of women in some areas other than the right to vote. There appear to have been limitations on women's ownership of property and women's right to operate some forms of businesses, although the historical records I've found are vague.

The nation was generally regarded as "a highly religious" people, overwhelmingly Catholic and predominately rather liberal.

The Nazi party was elected as a "return to the good old days" Conservative Religious party. In the early days, ca. 1930 and shortly after, they were considered either "devout supporters of the faith" or "fairly harmless" by the people who "trusted their constitution and the people."

The Germans had a rather serious problem with unemployment, and it was sort of a national tradition to "abhore socialism" as a great threat to the nation. We have some recent problems with full useful employment, and since we lost "Communism" as the great puplic enemy we've launched our own jihad.

One of the first acts of the new German government was to sign a treaty with Vatican Rome. It was, in fact, the first significant international treaty the Nazis were able to obtain. It threw out the Consitutional prohibition against there being a "state church," and effectively made the extremely conservative Vatican doctrine the official religion of the nation. We don't seem to be able to do it with a treaty, so it's a matter at pecking away at our own laws.

It was a good thing for the Vatican, because they got rid of the "liberal Catholics" in Germany.

It was a good thing for the Nazis, because they got rid of the "liberl Catholics," who had been the only semi-organized opposition to their new and planned policies.

One of the first "pogroms" of the new regime was, apparently at Vatican direction, to formally criminalize homosexuality. Any one "suspected" of such tendencies faced loss of all civil rights and deportation to labor camps for "attitude adjustment," without trial. Accurate figures are difficult to find, but it is estimated that as many as 300,000 male homosexuals DIED IN LABOR CAMPS during this "crusade." Female homosexuals were largely ignored, since in Conservative Christian doctrine and tradition "they don't really matter."

We haven't done quite as well here. Only 23 states have passed Amendments to their State Constitutions denying homosexuals the CIVIL RIGHTS granted to "normal good Christians; although all but one of the remaining states have recently enacted laws with the same intent.

As in Germany, one intent of the Amendments to State Constitutions is to establish that the laws can and should "protect religious sacraments." Once this is accomplished, the path is open to impose additional religious doctrine BY LAW.

A next step was a purge of the courts to remove any judges not "sympathetic" to the Nazi philosopy.

We have already installed two new US Supreme Court Justices with dubious loyalty to the law, should it come up against Conservative Religious/Political doctrine. Hopefully they will stick to the law, but the obvious INTENT is to eliminate court interpretations that don't follow the "party line."

The attempted enactment of a Federal Law, already cited above, to prevent the Federal Courts, including and especially the US Supreme Court, from questioning any action taken "in the name of God" by any public official anywhere in the United States"is one of numerous such attempts in both Federal and State Legislatures.

A next step by the Germans was to "purge the beaurocracy" of all who failed to follow the party line. In a disturbing article in my local newspaper yesterday, not yet online that I've found, the report is that the US State Department has been "reorganized to support the war on terrorism" by EXPELLING ALL SENIOR ADVISORS on advanced weapons who have criticised the current administration and its policies. The majority of those removed appear to be those who have advocated "diplomatic approaches" to the control of nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons. Among those expelled is reportedly our most senior and knowledgeable expert on the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

The Germans solved their massive unemployment problem by making "being unimployed" a crime, and shipping people off to labor camps or to prison where they didn't appear on the lists of "unemployed." Again, exact figures apparently weren't even kept; but it is reported that the majority of those sent to the labor camps never returned.

Withdrawal and/or reduction of social welfare support by the US Government may (or may not) be currently less severe than the German actions, but apparently are based on the same "they don't matter - just solve the problem" kind of philosophy. It could easily get worse.

Eventually they got around to the jews.

We'll probably do Arabs.

But we have "freedom of religion" in the US, and that will stop them.(?)(?)(?)(?)(?)(?)(?)

The current State Constitution in Massachusetts states that the state may require public school teachers to be "pious Protestants:"

Prior to 1877, the New Hampshire Constitution required all State Representatives to be Protestant.

The current Maryland Constitution bars atheists (and buddhists?) from testifying in any court of law. It also includes language quite similar to the Federal Law promoted by Sen Brownback and others:

[quote]
Nothing shall prohibit or require the making reference to belief in, reliance upon, or invoking the aid of God or a Supreme Being in any governmental or public document, proceeding, activity, ceremony, school, institution, or place.
[endquote]

Pennsylvania's Constitution expressly excludes atheists and buddhists from the rights of citizenship, demanding a belief in a Supreme being and in Heaven and Hell to "hold any office or place of trust or profit under this Commonwealth." ("trust or profit" appears to include legally operating a business?)

And the above are just from the original 13 States.

The slope is slippery, and we are on it.

John