Okay, boys & girls, now that your heads are clearing from the sulfur haze of bottle-rockets, here’s a Fourth of July Quiz for you:
Question: When Jesus threw the bankers out of the temple and established the US of A, the Pharaoh who let my people go was ruler over which Egyptian country?
Please submit your answers to: www.howcanIbesuchamoron?.com
And don’t worry if you get the answer wrong, you’ll be in the company of just over one-quarter of good, decent, hard-working Americans who don’t know from which country this particular country declared its independence back on Fourth of July, 1776.
That’s right. According to a Marist College poll of 1,004 Americans taken at the end of June, 26 percent of those polled have no idea how this nation was founded.
Some even suggested the Founding Fathers declared independence from Mexico, China, Spain or France.
And here’s the worst part, that 26 percent of Americans may be voting or breeding!
Maybe it’s time to review that precious document, the Declaration of Independence.
It’s a short document, amazing considering its consequence. Its second paragraph is without a doubt the most elegant statement of human rights ever penned.
WE HOLD THESE TRUTHS TO BE SELF-EVIDENT…
That means everything in that paragraph ought to be obvious to everybody.
THAT ALL MEN ARE CREATED EQUAL;
Now, in those days, they meant what they wrote – “all men” – are created equal. They didn’t mean “all men,” as in slaves or Native Americans. They mean all white men, just like themselves.
‘Course, nowadays we know it’s right to include all women, too, and all people, no matter the color of skin or walk of faith or sexual identity or national origin or anything else: all people. It just took us a while and, unfortunately, several wars – including one big one against ourselves – to realize that particular self-evident truth. Some folks still can’t understand it.
THAT THEY ARE ENDOWED BY THEIR CREATOR WITH CERTAIN INALIENABLE RIGHTS;
That word, “inalienable,” means that endowed rights can’t be changed or altered by anybody, for any reason. We forget that sometimes. And notice, too, it says, “by their creator.” Whomever or whatever that may be, according to citizens’ own beliefs.
THAT AMONG THESE (RIGHTS) ARE LIFE, LIBERTY AND THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS;
That passage right there is the cornerstone of these United States of America. It can be a controversial passage today because some folks try to twist it to their own political purposes. But is seems clear to me: ALL FOLKS, ALL PEOPLE have an automatic right to live their lives free and happy. It is the simplest, yet most compelling argument ever given for dignity and human rights.
It does not, however, give us a “right” to pursue our own “happiness” on the backs of others; exploiting them for our own selfish purposes. “Pursuit of happiness” means, just as the ancient Hebrew prophet Micah suggested, we should all have an even chance at sitting contentedly, peacefully under our own fig tree.
It is an idea borne of the Enlightenment, of Locke and Descartes; the notion of the supremacy of the individual above all else. “I think, therefore I am.” “Don’t Tread on Me.”
It is a uniquely Western thought, taken to its limits by the American experiment. There is, alternatively and worthy of serious consideration, the African concept, “Ubuntu,” which suggests supremacy is not found in the individual but, rather, in the community. Perhaps we could better practice that concept through this next part:
THAT TO SECURE THESE RIGHTS, GOVERNMENTS ARE INSTITUTED AMONG MEN, DERIVING THEIR JUST POWERS FROM THE CONSENT OF THE GOVERNED.
Anarchy can’t secure rights. Governments must do that. It is an idea as old as Plato. Beware of so-called leaders who belittle a government’s authority to protect the rights of the otherwise unprotected.
The American experiment added the concept which suggested the only legitimate government is the one that gets its power from the people it governs. That was a radical idea back in 1776, given voice by the likes of Thomas Paine debating Edmund Burke. Given the present state of government in the U.S. of A., it’s almost as radical today – at least to many of the men and women now in Washington.
THAT WHEN ANY GOVERNMENT BECOME DESTRUCTIVE OF THESE ENDS, IT IS THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO ALTER OR TO ABOLISH IT, AND TO INSTITUTED NEW GOVERNMENT, LAYING ITS FOUNDATION ON SUCH PRINCIPLES, AND ORGANIZING ITS POWERS IS SUCH FORM AS TO THEM SHALL SEEM MOST LIKELY TO EFFECT THEIR SAFETY AND HAPPINESS.
If we don’t like the government, we can change it – so long as we continue to hold those to those basic, self-evident truths and irrevocable rights.
That’s it, isn’t it? We have a Creator-given right to revolt if our government is interfering with our rights…to happiness…to privacy…to health?
It’s hard, sometimes, for our elected officials to remember they are in office because we sent them. We may not have contributed thousands of dollars to their campaigns. But we voted for them. They work for us. The small minority who gave them thousands of dollars should not control them. They work for us: the people.
It is hard being an American democrat, sometimes. We tend to get set in our ways; protective of the power that comes with elective office and lazy when it comes to standing up for our rights.
It is We the People who have the inalienable rights. Politicians govern only with our consent.
