Intolerable Acts 2008-2009

The Coercive/Intolerable Acts - Then and Now

Prior to the American Revolution, Britain's Parliament enacted sweeping legislation that was intended to not only restore order and function to the Massachusetts colony after the Boston Tea Party, but to also reinforce Britain's jurisdiction and rule of law over the rebellious American colonies. English governance believed that these acts, although criticized by some, would dampen the defiance of the colonies. The actions of these British laws caused the Port of Boston to be closed until payment was rendered to the East India Trading Company. This act was designed to compensate this shipping company for the tea they lost when the Bostonians threw it into the Harbor. The Quartering Act required regular folks to house and feed British soldiers whenever and where-ever the soldiers desired, even by force. The Administration of Justice Act allowed British who were governing or enforcing the law in the Colonies, to be given a change of venue if they were accused of crimes by the colonists (i.e., the regular folks). The Massachusetts Act further enraged the colonists by declaring that government officials would be appointed, rather than elected, by either the governor or by the King. All four of these acts were expected to bring the colonists into submission to the total rule of Great Britain. No longer was England going to leave the riches America had to offer to those who lived there, the colonists, nor were they going to allow the colonists to behave as if the Crown didn't exist. These acts, often called the Intolerable Acts, were the final blow to the colonists and thus, the First Continental Congress was formed and eventually led to the American Revolution. The result of the American Revolution was freedom from taxation without representation, the freedom to govern themselves and liberty for all.

Intolerable Acts 2008-2010

In November 2008, the US Congress passed the following legislation Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 commonly referred to as TARP:

"An Act To provide authority for the Federal Government to purchase and insure certain types of troubled assets for the purposes of providing stability to and preventing disruption in the economy and financial system and protecting taxpayers, to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide incentives for energy production and conservation, to extend certain expiring provisions, to provide individual income tax relief, and for other purposes."

This act is commonly referred to as the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act 2008 and was passed under the Bush Administration. This act led to further implementation of funding into a program designed to slow or halt foreclosures of mortgages. This additional funding is called TARP or Troubled Asset Relief Program.
Citizens were told by their elected officials that this Stimulus Act would ensure that financial institutions that were "too big to fail" would be able to secure their "troubled assets" with a government loan from the US Treasury and that credit would once again begin to flow. Within this act, additional legislation allowed for tax credits for energy and energy improvement. The energy referred to in this division of the TARP act applies only to renewable energy and electric hybrid vehicles. This act basically provides to some consumers an incentive to purchase these types of vehicles, while other consumers receive no benefits from this part of the legislation. This same act also allowed for approximately 20 million middle-class families to be kept from being hit by the Alternative Minimum Tax, a secondary tax code implemented in 1970. The AMT was originally passed in order to tax persons of such higher-income in the 1960's that under the regular tax code they were able to avoid paying any taxes. The secondary program called TARP allowed the US Treasury to purchase troubled or toxic assets (generally defined as any asset that has lost enough monetary value as to be deemed unrecoverable by any accounting principle - i.e., worthless), these assets being held in mortgage loans by banks and other financial institutions, in an effort to prevent these institutions from experiencing huge losses on their balance sheets. Once the trading of these toxic assets begins again, the Treasury expects that profits will be realized not only by these institutions and banks, but also the federal government itself.
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act 2009

This legislation is too vast to break down into a simple statement as to its full purpose. Its expected intention was to flood the economy with money for shovel-ready projects, extend unemployment benefits, reduce COBRA payments for the unemployed, create or save millions of jobs, provide tax credits to name a few of the anticipated and expected results of this legislation. Total funding for this particular bill when enacted was set at 787 billion dollars which has now been calculated to actually cost approx. 80 billion dollars more than original estimates for a total of 860 billion dollars. At the end of fiscal year 2009, approx. 20% of the total amount has been used. Additional claims of success include statements that anywhere from “thousands of jobs created or saved” and “1.5 million jobs created or saved” were made as recently as mid-January 2010. The TARP program is included within this legislative act as well as within the original stimulus act of 2008. This stimulus act provided the federal government with the funds to be able to purchase General Motors as well as Chrysler in order to prevent those manufacturers from losing more money in bankruptcy court. Close to 60 billion dollars was used for this effort with hopes that the 60% stake the federal government now holds in GM will be sold when GM regains profitability.

Cash for Clunkers Bill

This additional stimulus program was intended for car owners to receive 3500 - 4500 in credit towards the purchase of more fuel-efficient vehicles. The 1 billion dollar program was so successful that it was extended and more money was infused for a total cost of 3 billion dollars. The funds for this program were pulled from the Stimulus 2009 legislation. This bill specifically allowed those car-owners who could afford to purchase new automobiles the ability to trade in and purchase these vehicles far below asking price. Those left out of the bill were the first time buyers of these more fuel-efficient vehicles as well as those whose vehicles did not meet the requirements set forth by this legislation to qualify for the credit. In addition, the vehicles that were traded in under this bill could not be recycled for any use in repairing the vehicles still left on the road due to the lack of qualifying under this bill but must be destroyed.
Within the time span of one year, from November 2008 to November 2009, the federal government authorized the use of over 800 billion dollars to fund legislation that was expected to turn the American economy around by increasing employment rolls and creating the financial environment whereby the banks and financial institutions will begin lending again not only to small business, but across the board to perspective home-buyers, small-business owners and entrepreneurs.

Aren't these modern legislative Acts just as intolerable and coercive as those that brought about the revolution that freed us from British rule? Do we no longer live and learn from our mistakes or has history become so irrelevant that we now dismiss it at having no bearing on current events?

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America" was written in direct response to those intolerable and coercive acts the government that was once in power over the colonies and the federal government as the entity it is needs to be reminded that the power belongs to The People.