So on July 4, 1776, the United States of America declared itself independent from the Kingdom of Great Britain. And then it was July 5, and there was work to be done. Britain was a superpower, but through war and diplomacy our small nation wrested sovereignty from the king’s hands, and on September 3, 1783, the king’s representatives acknowledged it in the Treaty of Paris. Communication being what it was in those days, the copies of the treaty weren’t ratified and copies given to all parties until May of next year.
Our hard-won independence was itself only a means to an end, however. Our true goal was freedom, for which independence was necessary—and had to be defended—but not sufficient. Foreign despots were not the only threat to our freedom. As our country grew large and strong, our independence was assured by our own military power, but we began to have more to fear from within.
Abraham Lincoln was by no means a libertarian, but the start of his address to the Young Men’s Lyceum speaks well to this point. (I’ve added paragraph breaks for readability, and, like most speeches with ornate language, it’s easier to get the meaning if you read it out loud.)
We find ourselves in the peaceful possession, of the fairest portion of the earth, as regards extent of territory, fertility of soil, and salubrity of climate. We find ourselves under the government of a system of political institutions, conducing more essentially to the ends of civil and religious liberty, than any of which the history of former times tells us. We, when mounting the stage of existence, found ourselves the legal inheritors of these fundamental blessings.
We toiled not in the acquirement or establishment of them–they are a legacy bequeathed us, by a once hardy, brave, and patriotic, but now lamented and departed race of ancestors. Their’s was the task (and nobly they performed it) to possess themselves, and through themselves, us, of this goodly land; and to uprear upon its hills and its valleys, a political edifice of liberty and equal rights; ’tis ours only, to transmit these, the former, unprofaned by the foot of an invader; the latter, undecayed by the lapse of time and untorn by usurpation, to the latest generation that fate shall permit the world to know. This task of gratitude to our fathers, justice to ourselves, duty to posterity, and love for our species in general, all imperatively require us faithfully to perform.
How then shall we perform it?–At what point shall we expect the approach of danger? By what means shall we fortify against it?– Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant, to step the Ocean, and crush us at a blow?
Never!–All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest; with a Buonaparte for a commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a thousand years.
At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.
I’m guessing that Lincoln was exaggerating our military might when he said this in 1838, but that’s pretty much the state of things now. There are nations that can launch large numbers of nuclear weapons in ballistic missiles—truly a way to “step the Ocean, and crush us at a blow”—but they would not survive such a war either. The United States, at least on this continent, is invulnerable to invasion. If the whole world came at us at once, we could sink their fleets, sweep their aircraft from the sky, and then kill them by the billions where they live. We face no external threats to our national freedom.
I think a failure to understand this is why so many people have argued that we need to sacrifice our freedoms to protect ourselves from Islamist threats. They failed to realize that although many jihadis want to destroy the United States, not even all of them together could do actually do so. The attacks on 9/11 were a trick, a stunt, a sucker-punch to bloody our nose. However, to paraphrase Leonard Pitts, while they can make us bleed, they can’t make us fall. Only we can do that.
Lincoln then went on to stress the importance of maintaining our political institutions and the rule of law, especially when the alternative was mob violence. (He was responding to a recent series of lynchings.)
Then he discusses another threat:
It is to deny, what the history of the world tells us is true, to suppose that men of ambition and talents will not continue to spring up amongst us. And, when they do, they will as naturally seek the gratification of their ruling passion, as others have so done before them. The question then, is, can that gratification be found in supporting and maintaining an edifice that has been erected by others?
Most certainly it cannot. Many great and good men sufficiently qualified for any task they should undertake, may ever be found, whose ambition would inspire to nothing beyond a seat in Congress, a gubernatorial or a presidential chair; but such belong not to the family of the lion, or the tribe of the eagle.
What! think you these places would satisfy an Alexander, a Caesar, or a Napoleon?
Never! Towering genius distains a beaten path. It seeks regions hitherto unexplored.–It sees no distinction in adding story to story, upon the monuments of fame, erected to the memory of others. It denies that it is glory enough to serve under any chief. It scorns to tread in the footsteps of any predecessor, however illustrious. It thirsts and burns for distinction; and, if possible, it will have it, whether at the expense of emancipating slaves, or enslaving freemen.
Is it unreasonable then to expect, that some man possessed of the loftiest genius, coupled with ambition sufficient to push it to its utmost stretch, will at some time, spring up among us? And when such a one does, it will require the people to be united with each other, attached to the government and laws, and generally intelligent, to successfully frustrate his designs.
Distinction will be his paramount object, and although he would as willingly, perhaps more so, acquire it by doing good as harm; yet, that opportunity being past, and nothing left to be done in the way of building up, he would set boldly to the task of pulling down.
If the first part of Lincoln’s speech reminded me of what I feared from Bush and the Republicans, this part of the speech addresses what I fear from Obama and the Democrats with all their talk of change.
I think Lincoln erred in assuming this threat could only arise from “an Alexander, a Caesar, or a Napoleon.” The modern push for needless and destructive change seems to come from every president, every congressman, and every governor, legislator, mayor, or town councilman. With our recent economic difficulties—the worst in many decades but not too bad by global standards—many politicians have been claiming that our entire way of life has failed and must be torn down and rebuilt according to their plan.
Independence day was an important start to our freedom, but the next 85,101 days were important too. As are all the days ahead.
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