Every year on this day we are reminded of the significance of our independence. We are told the timeless story of 56 men who pledged their lives and sacred honor, knowing they would be hung as traitors for daring to believe that they could be free men. The story of American independence is one that for many of us, embodies all that we believe about our nation and about ourselves. It fills us with pride, with hope, with love for our country.
This post is not a retelling of that story.
Instead, I’d like to direct your attention to our present. After two hundred and thirty-eight years, what have we done with our independence? Have we guarded with jealous attention the jewel of liberty, as Patrick Henry admonished us? Have we remembered that “patriotism is as much a virtue as justice,” as Benjamin Rush reminded us? Have we all studied politics and war, as John Adams did, to protect our children’s freedom to study mathematics and philosophy? Above all, have we remained mindful as a collective nation that “those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it,” as Thomas Paine warned us?
Back then only 3% of the colonists took up arms against the tyrannical English government. Now, do we even have that many people willing to stand up?
More @ Patrick Henry Society
Very sobering. Yesterday I was depressed most of the afternoon and evening thinking about all the mindless idiots waving their flags and puffing out their chests yelling Land of the Free Home of the Brave. Ugh....
ReplyDeleteReally. Thanks.
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