When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands 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.
Is it possible that we stand here now in 2014 upon the same precipice where the only way out of the morass and psychosis of our times is for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another?
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.
Herein lies the magic of our founders which has been lost, long lost, in this country…that liberty is at the core of the story. You see it in how many people wrongly describe the “American Dream” as something to do with money rather than freedom. Almost every question before us as a nation can be understood as a debate about liberty of a free people, between the concept of a free person, to do as he or she pleases, verses a controlled person who is regulated and dictated to by powers over them.
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
Thus, what is lost for us today is that the governed are largely ignored. All of the people in power will, of course, say all the right things about wanting our voice and concern with our opinion, but in the end, they simply will do things for their own power base, and in particular, do things for the wealthy powers that put them into office. Worse, we as a nation are simply far too large and have lost far too much of our core values that once constrained us.
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. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
This is us…a people who have long been suffering while evils are sufferable. Yet, at the same time, we are our own worse enemy because we have allowed ourselves to be drugged into a stupor. We may not exactly be where Huxley suggested, but we are close. Between those who feel like their voice is simply never heard and those who are too focused on their next fantasy football team (or the next Marvel movie or the next popular game or the next season on TV), we are simply passively taking the evils to suffer.
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.
Our challenge now, though, is that in much of the country, certainly here in Florida, there is no consensus as to who is actually guilty of the long train of abuses. Just today was listening to two peers talk about the their neighborhood, suggesting that they are inundated with all those evil Republicans (their physical shuddering when they mentioned it was what you’d expect if they’d been talking about having to sit in an office with vermin). Yet, as I left the office, I know I could find two conservatives who would have the same disdain in their voice when talking about others on the left. As I wrote much earlier, our deep, deep philosophical divide suggests there will be no coming day when we will just agree with each other. There are sad stories popping up about the squelching of free speech when that speech is Christian. I know I could find many other stories of atheists or homosexuals equally feeling squelched or marginalized. There is no easy way to move past that, especially when we are talking about one’s core, deeply held beliefs. I mean, it does no good to say “your beliefs are wrong, and you are a bad person for holding them.” Yet, both the Christian and the Homosexual, or the environmentalist or the racially concerned person basically says that. So, when you realize we are staring across the gulf at one another, the slow sad dawning realization that emerges is that there is no fixing this. Sure, the Republicans could win the Senate, and then in 2016 win the Presidency…it isn’t going to fix anything. Those who count on having LESS LIBERTY because they want the Government to run everything….they will be furious when the wrong-headed government-run medical plan is repealed or less government regulation is enacted. Or, if the Democrats somehow hold onto the Senate or at least the Presidency….the divided government won’t just easily come together and move forward.
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.
That’s why it feels to me that we are here. The question is how exactly to alter the former system of government. Keep this in mind…in 1776, maybe 40% of the citizens agreed with the Rebels…and by November after a series of big-time military defeats, probably less than 15% agreed. Only Washington’s daring raid into Trenton saved rebellion psychologically. And, thus, that divide came to open warfare, to open acts of aggression against one another. The two sides being changed from a group of citizens who once lived side-by-side peacefully, with one side thinking that most everything done by the government was good (or not bad enough to openly rebel) and the other side having now taken up arms to oppose that same government.
God help us.