July 4th, 2009 • 1:52 amWe Hold These Truths To Be Self-Evident
Perhaps because Independence Day is my birthday, I’ve always been inspired by the founding principles upon which this great nation is built upon. Of the founding documents, the Declaration of Independence necessarily plays an indispensible role in declaring what the United States of America held most dear. For that reason, this paragraph is especially powerful to me:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Hubert Humphrey frequently reminded people during his Independence Day speeches that our’s is the only nation in human history that declares happiness as a national goal. Hubert Humphrey’s statement is as fitting today as it was when he said it. As important as that is, it’s more important that we know why that’s an inalienable right.
Throughout history, the model of governance was top-down. It’s as if nations said that God gives authority to the government, which then loans parcels of it to the people. Our Founding Fathers rejected that theory. It wasn’t just that they disagreed with this or that part of the European theory. It’s that they saw nothing worthwhile about it.
Their belief was that liberty was the most important quality to be strived for. They believed this because they knew that oppressed people couldn’t be happy for anything more than a fleeting interval of time.
The only proof I need for believing that liberty was the most important thing to these men was the final paragraph of the Declaration:
We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
This wasn’t a pledge from one peasant to another. Many of the men who signed the Declaration were men of stature and wealth. They knew that if they were captured, they likely would be dead a short while later. Despite that possibility, they pledged their their lives to creating a new nation founded on the principle that liberty was worth giving their lives for.
Put another way, longterm liberty for our nation was infinitely more important to our Founding Fathers than was their fortunes or even life itself. They counted it as privilege to pledge their sacred honor for this goal.
Though it’s important to remember the lessons of the past, it’s equally important that we live out those lessons in the present. If we believe that liberty is a principle worth fighting for, then we must ask whether it’s something that we passionately believe in. The test of that is whether liberty is worth fighting for or if it’s just a quaint notion. If we believe that the pursuit of happiness is the right goal for this nation and its people, what are we doing to fight against the things that stand in the way of that pursuit?
A few object lessons are in order.
When five justices ruled (in Kelo v. New London) that private property rights were transient and conditional, didn’t that inhibit this nation’s pursuit of happiness?
When our government said that it was taking control of the car manufacturers, didn’t it say that they objected to the concept of us giving power, in limited amounts for limited periods of time, to the government?
When all of governments say that they’ll give us something as long as we’ll do what they tell us to do, isn’t that a way of buying off our liberty?
The answer to all three questions is a resounding yes.
During the past quarter century, new countries have learned about, and embraced, liberty. In 1989, the Berlin Wall fell. In 2004, the Orange Revolution in Ukraine was one of the first things I blogged about. A little more than a month after the election do over had ousted Viktor Yanukovych, Putin’s hand-picked successor to Leonid Kuchma, Iraqis went to the polls despite threats from terrorists. That, in turn, ignited the Cedar Revolution in Lebanon. That’s without talking about the liberation of Afghanistan.
The liberty we hold dear is attempting to break out across the world. Only time will tell if it’s successful.
If ever there was a time when we need to return to this nation’s founding principles, it’s now. In fact, it’s important that we remain vigilant and steadfast in standing for these important principles. It’s important because we need to protect our freedoms just as we need to teach future generations that freedom is never more than a generation away from disappearing.
The best birthday present I could get this year would be the rekindling of passion for the foundational principles of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. In fact, if we return to passionately defending these principles, it would be the gift we give to future generations.
What an awesome gift that would be to give and to receive.
Technorati: Liberty, Pursuit of Happiness, Life, Declaration of Independence, 1776, Founding Fathers, Sacred Honor
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As usual, well-written and accurate. Since the 1960’s, the “right of free speech” and protest have been the only side of the freedom equation people have used. The other side, responsibility, has been ignored - to our detriment and that of the planet. We now have a president who appears to not understand this “freedom” thing. His appeasement of thuggish dictators works against free people everywhere.
Reading Gary’s post should remind all that freedom isn’t free. I believe it is our duty as Americans to make sure we do all we can to help people attain that inalienable right of liberty. Properly taught, the pursuit of happiness and life will follow.
Comment by Janet • 04Jul2009 @ 7:36 am
Most countries in the world had a perspective of some sort of destruction to get where they are now. We the people of the U.S. should never take for granted what preceding generations have gifted us and never take for granted what we need to do to remain a beacon of freedom to good citizens.
Comment by Lars • 04Jul2009 @ 10:41 am
The last several months under BHO have seen violation after violation of the principles of our Declaration of Independence.
Please, Americans, wake up! Something critical is on the line!
Comment by Always On Watch • 04Jul2009 @ 8:40 pm
Hope you had a wonderful 4th of July!
Comment by Americaneocon • 04Jul2009 @ 11:26 pm
The foundation of this country is Christianity. Freedom is only transient unless it is sustained by moral laws and biblical principles, on which this liberty rests. “…only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.”-Benjamin Franklin. “To preserve the government we must also preserve morals. Morality rests on religion; if you destroy the foundation, the superstructure must fall. When the public mind becomes vitiated and corrupt, laws are a nullity and constitutions are waste paper.”-Daniel Webster
Comment by Suanne • 27Aug2009 @ 1:21 am
“Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports… In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens…” George Washington, 1796
“The great pillars of all government and of social life are virtue, morality, and religion. This is the armor…and this alone, that renders us invincible.”- Patrick Henry,1799
“…if the study of the Bible is to be excluded from all state schools; if the inculcation of the principles of Christianity is to have no place in the daily program; if the worship of God is to form no part of the general exercises of these public elementary schools; then the good of the state would be better served by restoring all schools to church control.” -National Education Association (NEA) ,1892
“Let every student be plainly instructed, and earnestly pressed to consider well, the main end of his life and studies is to know God and Jesus Christ which is eternal life (John 17:3) and therefore lay Christ at the bottom, as the only foundation of all sound knowledge and learning.” -Harvard’s Rules & Precepts, 1636 and Motto- “Veritas Christo et Ecclesiae”(Truth for Christ and the Church)
“Cursed is all learning that is contrary to the Cross of Christ” -Princeton’s founding statement 1746
“Yahweh (in Hebrew), Psalm 36:9 in Latin (in thy light we see light), Psalm 37:1 (God is my Light), 1 Peter 2:1-2 (desire the pure milk of God’s Word)- Columbia University Seal, present today
“Religion is the only solid basis of good morals; therefore education should teach the precepts of religion, and the duties of man towards God.” Gouverneur Morris,1832
“In contemplating the political institutions of the United States, I lament that we waste so much time and money in punishing crimes, and take so little pains to prevent them. We profess to be republicans and yet we neglect the only means of establishing and perpetuating our republican forms of government. That is, the universal education of our youth in the principles of Christianity by the means of the Bible.”- Benjamin Rush, 1798
“Let divines and philosophers, statesmen and patriots, unite their endeavors to renovate the age, by impressing the minds of men with the importance of educating their little boys and girls, of inculcating in the minds of youth the fear and love of the Deity… in short of leading them in the study and practice of the exalted virtues of the Christian system.”-Samuel Adams,1790
“In my view, the Christian Religion is the most important and one of the first things in which all children, under a free government, ought to be instructed…no truth is more evident to my mind than that the Christian Religion must be the basis of any government intended to secure the rights and privileges of a free people.”-Noah Webster 1836
Remember the height from which you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place. Revelation 2:5
“Statesmen, my dear Sir, may plan and speculate for liberty, but it is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand.”-John Adams 1776
“The only foundation for… a republic is to be laid in Religion. Without this there can be no virtue, and without virtue there can be no liberty, and liberty is the object and life of all republican government.”-Benjamin Rush, 1798
“…And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion…reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.”-George Washington, 1796
“The only foundation for…a republic is to be laid in Religion.” and “…Christianity is the only true and perfect religion; and that in proportion as mankind adopt its principles and obey its precepts they will be wise and happy.”-Benjamin Rush, 1798
“Without morals, a republic cannot subsist any length of time; they therefore who are decrying the Christian religion…are undermining the solid foundation of morals, the best security for the duration of free governments.”-Charles Carroll,1800 (signer of Declaration of Indep.)
“Religion and good morals are the only solid foundations of public liberty and happiness.”
-Samuel Adams, 1778
“The Americans combine the notions of Christianity and liberty so intimately in their minds that it is impossible to make them conceive one without the other. The religious atmosphere of the country was the first thing that struck me upon my arrival in the U.S. In France, I had seen the spirits of religion and freedom almost always marching in opposite directions, in America, I found them intimately linked together and joined and reigned over the same land…Religion should therefore be considered as the first of their political institutions. From the start, politics and religion have agreed and have not since ceased to do so.”- Alexis De Tocqueville, 1835
“…the moral principles and precepts contained in the Scriptures ought to form the basis of all our civil constitutions and laws… All the miseries and evils which men suffer from vice, crime, ambition, injustice, oppression, slavery, and war, proceed from their despising or neglecting the precepts contained in the Bible.”-Noah Webster, 1833
“We have no government armed in power capable of contending in human passions unbridled by morality and religion… Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”-John Adams, 1798
“…We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights…”
Comment by Suanne • 27Aug2009 @ 1:26 am
The car makers were bankrupt!
This is not a chritian nation, it is a nation where you are free to practice your religion`!
BHO has held up the consittuion better than the bush.
Comments like the one from Suanne scare me.
Yes I must be vigilent or else I will being living under the Taliban, only it will have a different name.
Comment by dan • 04Sep2009 @ 8:29 pm