Rick Green [00:00:07] Welcome to the Intersection of Faith and Culture. It's the WallBuilders Show, and it's a Thursday. So that means we're taking your questions. Send those into radio@wallbuilders.com. That's radio@wallbuilders.com. Rick Green here with David Barton and Tim Barton. Guys, let's dive right in. Zachary Wright has the first question. He says this question for the Wall Builders Radio program. The president has come out and said that he would consider military involvement in the nation of Nigeria due to the persecution of Christians. Though, of course, we can agree what's happening in Nigeria is awful and should be spoken out against. I was curious to know what your thoughts would be on whether or not military involvement would be the best option. Of course, guys, this is a great question to answer, even in a broader sense, of America's interest. Like, when do we go in? When do we actually go protect an America first interest and get involved in other nations? So great questions. Let's start with Nigeria. 

David Barton [00:00:55] Well, this is you know, I I see this in several ways. One's a constitutional way, one's a humanitarian way, but the other is in in the way I think it is right now. I I think this is gamesmanship. Because of what Trump has done with Iran, because of what Trump has is doing with terrorists off Venezuela, this may not need anything more than we're gonna send the military after you guys if you don't stop this. That may be all that's needed and and that may be exactly what's behind this. I don't think from a constitutional standpoint that you can authorize offensive war when it's not for your own self defense. I  don't think that from a military standpoint you want to start getting involved in everybody else's fights. From a Christian standpoint, yeah, we want to stop the persecution of Christians in any way we can, but that doesn't mean that that's the role of the US government to do that. So it's I think that he's not planning to do that. I don't think he has the I don't think he's gonna send the military in. I don't think he's gonna try to get Congress to to support that 'cause they're not. I really do think this is more of just as we'll send a message across. And there are other groups out there I think that would be willing to go in with a little bit of help and and authorization and and and I don't mean government authorization. I just mean  we'll fund this this group to go in and take out some bad guys. Kind of third, fourth, fifth party type stuff might be done. The other thing is Nigeria has for a long time, going back to Bill Clinton and before, has received a ton of U.S. Foreign aid money. This is one of the countries, it used to be a very Christian country. It's now a very Muslim country. And under the Clintons, when it was a Christian country, they were pouring money into it to try to promote abortion and other things at that point. And and there were Nigeria, Kenya, lots of countries are pushing back because we're putting all this money into it, but we're having strings tied to the money. And I don't I mean it's just almost impossible to imagine that once we start pouring money into any country, we stop pouring into it. We just don't have examples of that to speak of. I mean there might be a few, but by and large they're they're going to be non existent. So I think this is more you don't want to mess with us because you'll lose your money and you really don't want to mess with us because we might actually do this. And I think that's more of a shot across the bow. Now that that's me. I I don't think there's serious contemplation about it being constitutional or in and the best interest of the United States or anything else. I just think it's a tactical kind of a move and this is the the seventh most dangerous place in the world for Christians to live out of 198 nations right now, 192 are persecuting Christians and this is the number seven offender. So for for folks who do care about Christians, and by the way, it's hard to imagine that we're in one of only six nations that's not persecuting Christians As as just i for Christians who live here, we don't see the the terror that other Christians experience across the world and it's just hard for us to imagine that. But certainly if you're in the President's position to see what's going on, you see the the slaughter of of Christians here simply because of their faith, that is something that would trigger him for sure. 

Rick Green [00:04:12] Yeah, you know, David, that that would be so on point for for President Trump. I mean, he's so good at that, you know, basically through rhetoric, being able to get changes made around the world, whether it's with tariffs sometimes and just a thread of those or whatever else it might be. What would you guys say? I mean, I'm genuinely curious about this for myself and and especially when I teach the Patriot Academy students, like what's the s and it's not simple. Foreign policy's not simple, right? It there are tough calls, but what would you say is maybe the simplest way to do almost a one, two, three when we say American interest, like at what point, or what do we even mean by that? 

Tim Barton [00:04:46] Yeah, that's a great question. And Dad, I know you have thoughts on this as well. Obviously, and I'm saying something we all know, but this is worth adding to the conversation for everybody listening. George Washington in his farewell address, he didn't take an isolationist position, but he said, don't get dragged into foreign entanglements, right? And then this was in the middle of France and England having more of their scuffles and Americans were divided on some of these sentiments. We need to support Great Britain, we need to support France. And for various reasons, he said, guys, let them let them solve their own problems. We need to focus on our internal problems. And you could make an argument, especially early on, that we didn't have the infrastructure, that the America needed more attention, et cetera. But largely, it wasn't until Thomas Jefferson, you see you could argue under John Adams because you have the XYZ affair. There was there was definitely things impacting our nation from other nations that things had to be done. But specifically, Jefferson's the one when he commissions the Navy and he says, Hey, you guys go over these Barbary pirates, they're attacking American ships. They are literally impacting lives and trade. It wasn't until those foreign nations, quote unquote, began doing things that were directly impacting America that America took action. And and so I would think, and Dad, I know that you're gonna have a lot of thoughts, and Rick, obviously you do as well, but I would think certainly the priority ought to be America first. But that can include, if there's something that has impact on American trade, on American business, or even Americans abroad, because that's why Jefferson sent the Navy initially, is to protect Americans when these ships were being attacked and Americans were being taken in as hostages and sold or sold into slavery, et cetera. So part of the part of the foreign position was American interest, Americans in general. And then obviously we could talk about what that means with allies, et cetera. The founding fathers certainly didn't take a position that from a federal government position, we need to be solving all the other nations' problems. But if it was things that impacted America, or we could even go historically when we had alliances, things that impacted some of our allies, then we got engaged either to protect American interest or American allies. Those are the two big things that I think it's easy to point to. Now, we also could even talk about where where is that scale of like right how how much American interest does it need to be, or what level of threat to allies, you know, how does this really work? Because we could even talk about NATO and some of the challenges and problems of NATO and why maybe that's not working very well in a lot of ways these days. Maybe a different conversation. But my first thought would be, it's gotta, it has to interact to some extent with American interest. And then and this is not speaking to the validity of a concern, but only the level of America's engagement and involvement. It it has to, on some level, impact Americans. Impact American interest being trade, business, et cetera, commerce, or do something that is directly impacting one of our allies where they need more assistance. And again, the level of involvement can differ. Those would be some of my first thoughts. Dad, what do you think? 

David Barton [00:07:59] Well, I'm gonna, I totally agree with you and I'm gonna add some other thoughts as well. One is it's not the role of government to have a heart. That's that's not what they exist for. While we do have a heart and American citizens have a heart, that's not the role of government because then mercy would be extended because of all sorts of things and you would treat criminals differently as the progressives try to do. If you'll treat 'em nicer, they'll act nicer. That's not the way even though our heart may be there on all sorts of things, our heart may be broken when we see people getting injured overseas and we want to do something, but that that's not the role of the government is to have a heart, literally. 

Tim Barton [00:08:35] And Dad, to that point, let me add a biblical thought for everybody listening, going, I'm not sure how I feel about that. Well, if you just study the Bible for a little bit, right? Go to the gospels. Jesus never encouraged the government to extend forgiveness or the government to turn the other cheek. That's what he told individuals to do. We were supposed to walk in love, walk in forgiveness. Go to Romans 13 and you read that the government is given a sword and they're not given the sword in vain. The sword is not an instrument of forgiveness, it's an instrument of justice, it's an instrument of war. The government is a different entity than the individual and even then the family than the church. God made different institutions. He gave them all different roles and functions. What Erica Kirk did at the Charlie Kirk Memorial, where she said, "That man, I forgive that man", right? An incredible moment. That was something that as a Christian, we've been called to forgiveness. At the same time, we can applaud and support the government and saying we're going to give justice in this situation to the individual that murdered Charlie Kirk and anybody else that might be involved in this supporting it. We're going to give them justice. Both of those things can be true at once. The government doesn't extend forgiveness to the murderer, the government gives justice to the murderer. Jesus forgives, God forgives, we should forgive. That's not the role that God created the government for. The government was given the sword, Romans 13 says, and they weren't given the sword in vain. Government is supposed to enact justice and show no favoritism, no partiality. And this is where a lot of times in forgiveness it it's motivated by feelings where there could be partiality, right? Where there might not be giving justice. And and obviously we can be grateful for that as individuals, but that's not the role of the federal government. 

David Barton [00:10:16] So what happens is we actually have three institutions that are given us by God. That of the family, that of the government, which is next, and then the third that that appears in scriptures is is that of the the Church, what we'd call the Church, the congregation, the assembly, the temple. But there's four jurisdictions. There individuals have self-jurisdiction or self-government, you have family government, you have you have civil government and you have church government. And while there is some overlap sometimes between those areas, they are very different jurisdictions. And the jurisdiction of government is not to be confused with that of the family or the individual or the church. And Tim, as you pointed out, justice is the objective of government. And then when you go to the Constitution, there's only 17 things that the that the people allow the federal government to do. Those are the enumerated powers of the Constitution. And they don't deal with with you know the the mercy heart element. They are very clear. And now clearly we we had lots of contact with foreign nations, immigration, other things as well, and there were regulations for all of that, but everything is focused on America and Americans more than anything else. And that is the Constitution of the United States of America. And it is for for those who live here in this jurisdiction under the the jurisdiction of this government. And so when you look at at outside things, unless they have a direct impact on America, they're not going to be authorized by the Constitution. Now, there's a lot of indirect impact that becomes direct impact. We saw that in the French Quasi War in 1798. They didn't declare war on us, but they kept interfering with our commerce and our ships and our businesses. And as Tim pointed out, with the Barbary Pirates War, 32 years of Muslims interfering with our private ships and businesses. And yes, it wasn't the government, it was the private ships and businesses, but those are Americans and we're going to protect Americans wherever they are across the world. And that's why Trump has done a good job of getting Americans out of prison, political prisons in in China, in Russia and other places across the world. He he is going to bat for Americans to get them repatriated back to America when nations want to pick on them because they're Americans. So I, you know, my heart is there as a Christian, my heart is there as an individual. My family, you know, we have great sympathy for what's happened with Christians there. The Church has great sympathy, but that's not necessarily the role of government of the United States. That should be the role of the government of Nigeria and and even of the neighbors around Nigeria who are affected by what's going on there. They're the ones that should be be getting involved in that. 

Tim Barton [00:12:51] And Dad, as you said, just because President Trump is posturing doesn't mean necessarily the troops are going in, right? If he sends troops, that's a very different thought. But he definitely can posture. And there are other ways you can apply pressure to other nations, right? We've seen Trump use tariffs many times for these very reasons. So there are definitely things that President Trump might do and can do, and maybe should do some of them. But the idea of sending foreign troops, that is historically and constitutionally not correct and not what he should do, at least not without more proper cause and justification, which to this point we have not seen in that regard. 

Rick Green [00:13:30] Yeah, and there's so much that goes on behind the scenes too in terms of negotiations and pressure and economics,  you know, all kinds of things that of course the White House can do. And sometimes we don't even hear about so many of those things that take place. And so anyway, it's it is, and that's why I say it's you know, foreign policies, like my that's my weakest area when it comes to politics. And and part of it is just having never been involved in that level of negotiation or in that arena. I can't remember if I told you guys we were having this discussion with the institute scholars a week or two ago, and Frank Gaffney was there. And of course, Frank was, you know, worked for Reagan and was involved in a lot of those things. And and we were talking about President Trump's pressure on China and and the meeting with Xi Jinping and and all that stuff, and just randomly in the conversation, he says something about Reykjavik and and Ronald Reagan and Gorbachev and all that, and come to find out he was at Reykjavik. So he was like in the room and in the negotiations when Reagan was negotiating with Gorbachev. And so it was great to have a guy like that that, you know, I I could pick his brain and and talk about some of those things that happened behind the scenes that that you know, where they dealt with that. But I just know our audience, I know the young people, especially, because I'm getting so many questions on this. You know, when should we go? How far should we go? And what kind of level of support should we do? And I don't want to, you know, I I don't think obviously we should be totally isolationist. We can't operate in a vacuum. I remember David you telling me years ago when when we were dealing with the war on radical Islamic terrorism. I mean, there's a lot of the stuff that we say out front and and publicly, but a big part of what we were doing at the time was quite literally taking out terrorists. On their soil before they came to America. So there's there's just a lot of stuff that happens. And I just don't think it's we can be as simple as we want to be and just say, well, we should just be America first and not be involved anywhere else. We have to be sometimes it's just part of protecting our nation. It is America first to go into these areas sometimes. So really good topic, really good question for a Foundations of Freedom Thursday. We got a quick break and we'll come back. We've got more questions from the audience. You're listening to the WallBuilders Show. 

Rick Green [00:16:31] Welcome back to the WallBuilders Show. Thanks for staying with us on this Foundations of Freedom Thursday. Next up is Kurt. And Kurt said, Hello, Wallbuilders. My name is Kurt, and I am a proud Christian conservative constitutionalist from Maine. Do you guys hear that? There's still Christian conservative constitutionalists in Maine, other than our friend Ken Graves and the people of history, or maybe Kurt goes there. I don't know. Anyway, I'm kidding, there's a lot of good people in Maine. All right, my question is in regard to what is going on in the Senate, U.S. Senate, where the shutdown of the government is occurring, as well as the stonewalling of the president's agenda. I personally believe that the 17th Amendment should be repealed. Here, here, I'm with you, Kurt, giving the Senate appointment power back to state legislatures instead of by popular vote. The founders never intended for the upper chamber to be elected by popular vote, and states gave away a very important check and balance to the federal government with the passage of the 17th, another Woodrow Wilson era disgrace. That being said, I think there needs to be safeguards in place because obviously current sitting senators probably won't vote themselves out of a job. If an amendment repealing the 17th allowed for current senators to finish their full terms, providing state legislatures the Articles of Confederation era power to recall their delegates should they not act in the interest of their state and giving the governor governor authority to appoint a senator should the state legislature be deadlocked. Do you think this could be done? I'd love to hear your thoughts. Okay, I think, guys, what he's saying is short of repealing the seventeenth, what if there was a recall provision that was adopted where, okay, you get to vote for your U.S. Senator, but if during that six year term they're doing stuff so bad that they're not in the interest of their state that the legislature could actually recall them instead of doing a statewide ballot for that and then the president appoints someone to replace them for that term and then you go back to another elect okay, it it sounds a little bit complicated, but it's kinda like a middle ground of going back to what we had before the seventeenth was enacted.

David Barton [00:18:14] It would be so hard to do it that way because the seventeenth has been interpreted basically a single way since its inception or since its ratification. And so it is basically the people in the states, they choose the ones they want, and it's the super house of representatives. We're choosing another House of Representatives, but for for longer terms. And it it would be interpreted, and I think the courts would probably go there that no, this is understood to be popular e election kind of stuff. It doesn't give one person the authority. Does the governor have the authority to set aside the vote of the people of the state who voted in a legitimate legal way for a senator and chose their senator and the governor says, I disagree with the people, I'm taking the guy out. No, they they would say you you take him out at the next election. If the people are dissatisfied, they take him out. And so I think it's gonna be really hard to get anything short of that. Now I'm a fan of of repealing the seventeenth amendment. I think the greatest loss we had from the seventeenth amendment was that the you lost federalism. Now the federal government runs everything because you have a House of Representatives and a super house of representatives. There's nothing there to to defend the states anymore. And when those senators were sent by state officials and could be recalled by state officials, be it the governor, the legislature, or whatever commission, they were accountable to the states. And if they didn't stand up for these states and keeping the federal government out of state affairs, then they were called home. So we no longer have anyone to defend the states. It's all about the feds now. And as a result, I think it's it's undermined the Constitution. We no longer have the the seventeen enumerated powers that limit the government. It's the seventeen enumerated powers plus the five billion others that they've given themselves, and there's really no enforcement power to limit federal government. So I would be a huge fan of doing that. Now, you know, to try to get the senators to do that, it's not gonna happen. This is gonna have to be the state legislatures or a convention of states kind of things that that pushes that kind of amendment. But that's gonna be even hard that that because again, you're you're looking at at three fourths of the states would have to say we want to choose our senators differently, and that's a really hard thing to get people to give up their own power to do. 

Tim Barton [00:20:20] Yeah, and Dad, with this, one of the things too that we often hear from people when we go speak different places, people recognize some of the challenges going on and they go, hey, what if we just did this? And one of the things that is hard sometimes for people to understand, just because you have a really good idea, which by the way, that there's some merit to this idea. Just because you have a good idea doesn't mean that it's a realistic idea because you still have to go through the process to make this idea happen. And right, unless you're the king of America for the day and you get to rewrite and redo things, you have to convince the majority of American people to get on board with you. And so one of the one of the things we often point people to, how do we navigate and solve these problems? So much of it goes back to the educational process. If we don't restore some civic education, understand what is the role of the senator, what were they supposed to do? What the state's rights, the people's rights kind of thought between the two houses and this bicameral legislative system, et cetera. We have to work to re educate people because once we finally get enough people educated, then we can work to implement some of the good ideas to correct some of the problems. But you have to have a well educated populace before you can implement most of these ideas.

David Barton [00:21:31] And part of that too goes back to even what is happening right now in the state of Texas, where Texas, they're coming up with their next. 14, 16 years of how they're going to teach government and history and civics and and economics. And this is where you would go back to say, all right, in the textbooks, we're going to go back to explain why the bicameral system was to represent the states in one house and why it was to represent the people in the other house and what the Federalist papers say. And you start teaching original intent again. And then as those young people become citizens, they start having a different understanding and they interpret Washington differently because they they now understand what it's supposed to be and how it's gotten off. So it's a kind of thing you can get done, but it is not going to be a quick fix. It takes a lot of education. And if it's not going to happen in the classroom, it has to happen outside the classroom. And, you know, we we do that with Constitution Alive and other things as well, but it's got to be widespread. And so I think it can be done. But I think it's probably, if you get started in it now, you're you're probably still looking six, eight, ten years before you can get that done. And if it goes through the classroom, it's probably going to be 20 years, but it can be done. And it it ought to be done. And we ought to be pushing people back toward that good constitutional understanding because we have plenty of examples now of how bad it's been since we got away from that original intent. And there's lots of reasons to go back to it. 

Rick Green [00:22:52] Yeah, it's funny you mentioned Constitution Alive because when when we first recorded that and and we talked about the 17th, we we both said, you know, it'd be great to repeal it, but it's not gonna happen because of of those very reasons. And now 10, 12 years later, there's a lot more momentum and there's a desire to do something, and so people are coming up with some of these ideas. So we're moving in the right direction in terms of some of the public opinion. But that education part you guys are talking about is critical. And speaking of that, we had a great question from Biblical Citizenship. And I love the way this is asked. This one comes from Kevin, and he said, in Biblical Citizenship, we learned that the U.S. was the first to pass a ban on the slave trade. I've had a couple of people state that Denmark passed a ban on the slave trade in the late 1790s. What's the deal with Denmark trying to take our claim to fame? I want a proper explanation so I can share it with my classes. So I love the way that's asked. I think I remember Tim you talking about Denmark in the class, but I don't remember when they banned the slave trade or or any of those things. 

Tim Barton [00:23:44] Yeah, so there is going to be an official correction issued on this from us. And there's there is some detail and nuance behind this. So when the the 1619 project came out in 2019, of course, they were claiming that England was number one. And actually, back then, America wasn't even on most people's lists because this is they were going the full America's evil, pro-slavery route. And so we started doing research, and as we're just in investigating America's position, slave trade, slavery, et cetera, we realize not only are the accusations against America incredibly wrong, but America beat England. And I'm I mean, very sincerely, in 2018 and 2019, England was the number one on everybody's list of banning the slave trade. And obviously it's not that there wasn't research on Denmark, but we also know that with technology, more information becomes more accessible a little easier and quicker. And so the background of Denmark, Denmark actually did pass a ban on the slave trade before America. Actually, back in 1792, they passed a ban on the slave trade, but they allowed 10 years for that to continue. So it wasn't until January 1st, 1803 that their ban took effect. However, they did have colonies in West Africa, Danish colonies, and the slave trade did continue in some of those colonies for several more years. However, it is worth acknowledging that by January 1st. Of 1803, it was a crime to continue, even though the slave trade did continue some, it was a crime to continue in Denmark. So Denmark actually is number one. America was number two with full enforcement because England passed her law first, but they gave a year allowance for people to fulfill those contracts. So they didn't fully enact it until after us. So England's number three. So kudos to Denmark. That is definitely a correction we will issue, but it actually has only come to light a little more recently for our research purposes. And again, we're grateful for new information when it comes. And we do want to be as accurate as we can. So Denmark, we're gonna give you the gold on this one, but we still are claiming the silver. 

Rick Green [00:25:56] It sounds like the heavyweight championship of the world when there's five different belts out there and and somebody might have one or two of 'em, but they don't have all five. And so what you're telling me is maybe they had four of the five or or is it a unified title? 

Tim Barton [00:26:09] No, I would I would say theirs went into effect first. They're the winner. 

David Barton [00:26:17] And Rick, by the way, back then there were more than a hundred and twenty nations. So America's still number two. So we're on the podium. We got a medal out of this thing. So we're still up there as a world leader, but kudos to Denmark. 

Rick Green [00:26:28] And of course the point we make in Biblical Citizenship is that we were leading in this area. We were not drug as the last nation across the finish line. We were leading in this area. That's the important thing. All right, guys, out of time. We'll have more questions next week. Don't miss Good News Friday tomorrow. You've been listening to the WallBuilders Show.