One of the early lines in the movie Braveheart says: History is written by those who have hung heroes. Mike Church has set about to remedy that problem and he does it with aplomb...and a good bit of humor too. In his most recent production, What Lincoln Killed, Mike explores the all-but-lost concept of federalism.  But unlike many modern productions which start off with an agenda and end with a pre-determined outcome, Mike really does research, speaks with experts and, rarity of rarities, actually proves his points with words from the mouths of our Founding Fathers. His analysis is so fundamental that if asked, What s wrong with America? he would likely respond, America is not a thing. The united States are! This is a different sort of quest, the only right kind, a sincere and thorough search for the truth no matter where it lands. Then he goes even further, taking on the task as a personal crusade, a personal mission, to leave the world a better place than he found it for his family and his countrymen.  Toward the end of What Lincoln Killed, Mike laments that our generation has failed in that mission to pass on something better than what we received. His words ring true and his emotion is plainly not acted. I was moved by his cries of desperation to save this country...and believe that you will be too. This alone was worth the price of the CD. --Debbie Schlussel-Movie CriticThe problem with any discussion of states rights or limitation on the power of the federal government in general is that it is inextricably linked to slavery and racism. Neither advocates nor opponents generally help matters in this respect. Implicit in the arguments of both sides is that either the north was one hundred percent right and the south one hundred percent wrong in the Civil War, or vice versa. Common sense should tell us that after approximately six hundred thousand Americans were killed by their own countrymen, there must have been plenty of wrong to go around on both sides. For what it s worth, I am a Yankee. I was born and lived over eighty percent of my life in New York State. I even pull for the Yankees in baseball (Forgive me, they got to me young). I think Dixie is a catchy little tune but I don t choke up when I hear it. The only positive association I have with the stars and bars is a mildly entertaining 1980 s television series with a very pretty girl in some now-famous shorts. Yet, I still believe that Mike Church is onto something important. Church s story is set within the framework of him helping his daughter with a school assignment. She is working on an essay and tells Church that her teacher said that the states gave up all of their sovereignty when they signed the Declaration [of Independence].  Serious proponents of this position argue that the states gave up their sovereignty upon ratification of the U.S. Constitution. Church sets out to disprove that argument. Episode One does not discuss the Civil War, but rather the nature of the federal government created in the U.S. Constitution. Church s story within a story is a highly entertaining "docudromedy" with dramatizations of many of the founding fathers writings and speeches concerning states rights and the limits on federal power. To keep things lively, Church intersperses them with a heavy dose of anachronistic humor, including characterizing John Lowell, Jr., who wrote under the pseudonym The Refederator, as a modern professional wrestler and James Madison as Bill Murray s character Carl in Caddyshack.  ...revolutionary story, kid from nowhere, about to become the father of the constitution...  Lowell is particularly important because he advocated the New England states seceding from the Union during the War of 1812. New England was especially hurt by Jefferson s Embargo Act, which was ramped up under the Madison administration. Mr. Madison s War, as Lowell called it, only made matters worse. Lowell and others proposed a Northern Confederation, which could only occur after the northern states first seceded from the current union. Apparently, the idea that the states are sovereign and retain the prerogative to withdraw from the union was not held exclusively by slaveholding southerners. Church makes a compelling case that this opinion was held by most Americans at the time. The New England states also advocated state nullification, with Connecticut effectively nullifying the Embargo Act and all of the New England states virtually boycotting the war. Obviously, no one would conflate the northern nullification and secession movements with slavery or racism. To add some scholarly muscle, Church brings in Kevin Gutzman, Ph.D., whose James Madison and the Making of America revolved around precisely this question. Madison and other Federalists had gone into the constitutional convention hoping to construct a national government, with the states reduced to administrative subdivisions. However, none of the states would agree to it, so a federal government was constructed instead, with a few, limited powers delegated & the rest retained by the states. To at least get acquainted with the subject, you won t find a more enjoyable vehicle than Mike Church s What Lincoln Killed --Tom Mullen-Washington Times CommunityI like the way Mike Church told his daughters -- it starts out at the beginning where one of his daughters has to write a report on a country and she was going to write about France. You are telling her she could write about Louisiana because that really was a separate state the way France is now, way back in the day before the government took over. Then you take off from there.  I think it s a very, very interesting debate.  Texas, as Church pointed out, has the 15th largest economy in the world if it was Texas alone as a country. A few other states are like that, too. I think California is much bigger and New York as well. It would be interesting to see what would happen. I think maybe things would be better, maybe things would be a little different. We would still be confederated. We would still have certain national interests. The problem is those national interests have taken over with ObamaCare, with the growth of the entitlement state.  When you look at the federal functions that the government would perform under a confederation like protecting the borders, etc., those things are huge failures. People are getting in. We re not enforcing immigration laws. We re not doing those kinds of things. I wonder if those things would have been much better with the leaner and meaner confederation. It s very, very interesting. That s what I was thinking about the whole time that I listened to this, that I listened to the debates.  I listened to Church's quotes from Jefferson and John Taylor of Caroline and all of the others, the lawsuits that you talked about, all of that. It was very interesting. It provoked a lot of thought in my mind, how things would be today had we gone in another direction. You might have regional alliances between states who had certain crops or economies in common. I think it would have been interesting. I think that could be a movie you could do, where you could look at how the United States would be, had things gone that way.  I was thinking about that the whole time. Church really, to me, related to how things are now. I thought of how they would be now had we gone that way. I give it three and a half Reagans. The only reason I reduced by one Reagan is What Lincoln Killed needs video. People like me, whose attention spans are short -- I actually thought this was kind of great because it was like listening to old-time radio. --David Simpson-Vice President The ReFounding Fathers Scoiety