Celebrating our Founding Ideals

Today marks two anniversaries, one profound, one incidental. The latter one is the 5th anniversary of this blog. A lot has happened in the five years since I wrote that first post.

The more important anniversary is the founding of our country, the United States of America, on July 4, 1776. I want to share a couple quotes that I find characterize much of what our country stands for. The first is from the beginning of the Declaration of Independence and the second is Emma Lazarus' poem The New Colossus that adorns the base of the Statue of Liberty in New York harbor.

From the Declaration of Independence (1776):

When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

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 to 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. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. --Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states.

Emma Lazarus' The New Colossus (1883)

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame,
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Both these statements share an idea about America that today is much less clear. The idea is that the United States is a place where people are free from political despotism and free for "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

The idea of freedom as our founders understood it is much less clear today. What has replaced the notion of the freedom for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness is an entitlement to receive it based categories of qualification that the founders would have a difficult time rationalizing with their document of rebellion.

When Emma Lazarus wrote her words at the end of the 19th century, the world was far different. Democracy was in short supply and tyranny was not. People left their countries to come here to begin a new life of freedom. Today, this still takes place but in a global context that is far different from either 126 or 233 years ago.

As we spend our Fourth celebrating the idea of freedom, let's remember that freedom was not an entitlement, but rather an asset which provided to those who were willing, the opportunity to create their life anew. Today, it is still true, and the choice remains between freedom and tyranny.

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/77516834@N00/3672252063/

Comments

[Shawn Alladio]

The Maternal side of my family came to America to avoid the onslaught of Communism. Leaving everything behind as it was confiscated by the Communists, my great-grandfather came here so he could simply 'vote'. That ability alone fed his ambition and his ideal of freedom. I am the fourth generation removed from that example. I shall be thinking about your post today as I celebrate the US Constitution as it was written and how life is applied today with the massive government intervention I see enroaching on freedoms that are now managed. Quite a lot to discover..thanks Ed.
Love and Rockets