(I realize I'm a couple months late sharing this, but I felt it was important to put out there since it is something we should be thinking about throughout the year.)
Today is the two hundred and thirty-second anniversary of the Continental Congress’ adoption of the Declaration of Independence. Rarely do we reflect on the content of the Declaration. We should reflect today, more than on any other Independence Day anniversary, after terrible breaches of trust, breaches of our rights by our government, what was declared so clearly and directly on July 4, 1776.
1. The first sentence of the Declaration states it is a matter of natural law that people have the ability to take on political independence, “to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another” and govern themselves.
2. The next section, the preamble, asserts that people have certain rights. When a government violates these rights, the people have the right to “alter or abolish” that government. This is often called the “right of revolution”. It states clearly “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”
3. The third section lists the charges establishing King George’s violations of the colonists’ rights, proving him unfit to rule. Interestingly, charges included: “He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power”, “For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury”, and “For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences”.
4. The next section states disappointment that attempts by colonists and British citizens to mediate with King George were unsuccessful.
5. The final section is the conclusion that, there being conditions under which people must change their government and that the British have produced these conditions, the American Colonies must absolve allegiance with the British Crown and establish free and independent states.
We’ve already plunged into the Fourth of July weekend, full of nationalistic fervor and, perhaps, a sense of entitlement. Flags are flying and fireworks coloring the night sky as if to shed light on what it means to be a nation sprung from the rights asserted in the Declaration of Independence. These celebrations, however, commemorate the ideals themselves, not whether we reach them. When the fireworks end, we’ll see the darkness of a patriotism made jingoistic through corporate governance, neo-imperialism and harsh immigration policies. We’ll see political representation muted by a (practically) two-party system where the candidates separate themselves through rhetoric, but unite on policy such as corporate-favoring trade (NAFTA), domestic spying (new FISA legislation), and tax-funded religious programs.
Today, now more than ever, we must reflect on the courage of those who declared the unalienable rights of people. We must be prepared to defend those rights and the rights enumerated in the Constitution and it’s amendments - especially the Bill of Rights. We must reject governmental infiltration and surveillance of peace groups, the power of the President and the Secretary of Defense to deem anyone an enemy combatant, the imprisoning of people without charge, the torturing and outsourcing to torturers, and the declarations of the President to be above the law. We must understand that because of these and other egregious assaults on our civil rights, we are marginalized from the political process, that the anti-war mindset held by the majority of Americans is disregarded, that by the stripping of rights we become powerless.
We should see, and act. We can begin with the election. Of these achingly similar presidential candidates, who can be influenced the most? How can we influence them? After the whirlwind romance of the election season, how will we ensure we are not cuckolded by a candidate too ready for corporate smooth-talk? Of candidates for all offices, how do they stand on civil liberties?
Next year, we will celebrate the Fourth of July for the two hundred and thirty-third time. I hope we celebrate the return of our rights.
