Newman
New member
This Independence Day, I invite you to reread the Declaration of Independence (or, if you are like most Americans, read it for the first time (or, if you are one of our country's politicians, read it, memorize it, sleep with it, live with it)). I do this not only for a good measure of celebrating our country's past but for a reexamination of our current state. The “Facts” pasted below stood out to me:
“He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.”
“He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance,”
“He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant”
“He has obstructed the Administration of Justice”
“He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.”
“He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.”
“He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.”
“He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws”
“For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:”
“For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:”
“For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury”
“...establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule”
“He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.”
“He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us”
“We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America” (Notice the lowercase “u”. It's more important than you think.)
This part is great, too:
“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.”
The all-important message here is that, just as Barbie pointed out in Toy Story 3, “Authority should derive from the consent of the governed, not the threat of force!” When a government imposes on its people unfit laws and politics, it is, in fact, imposing on itself its own demise. The problem with the ways things go these days is that the usurpations and unwarranted trespasses come slow, subtly, and in the rhetorical guises of “good for the people”.
This year, I will not celebrate the independence of our country, but the ideas and the attitude that so pervaded the hearts and minds the Colonial population. I won't celebrate our independence because we are not an independent people anymore. I won't celebrate our country because we aren't the same country anymore. I will celebrate and pray and hope for a similar ideological revolution in our country that occurred 234 years ago.
“He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.”
“He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance,”
“He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant”
“He has obstructed the Administration of Justice”
“He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.”
“He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.”
“He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.”
“He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws”
“For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:”
“For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:”
“For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury”
“...establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule”
“He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.”
“He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us”
“We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America” (Notice the lowercase “u”. It's more important than you think.)
This part is great, too:
“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.”
The all-important message here is that, just as Barbie pointed out in Toy Story 3, “Authority should derive from the consent of the governed, not the threat of force!” When a government imposes on its people unfit laws and politics, it is, in fact, imposing on itself its own demise. The problem with the ways things go these days is that the usurpations and unwarranted trespasses come slow, subtly, and in the rhetorical guises of “good for the people”.
This year, I will not celebrate the independence of our country, but the ideas and the attitude that so pervaded the hearts and minds the Colonial population. I won't celebrate our independence because we are not an independent people anymore. I won't celebrate our country because we aren't the same country anymore. I will celebrate and pray and hope for a similar ideological revolution in our country that occurred 234 years ago.
