Friday, September 17, 2010

Plus One : We the People...

Visions of Freedom
On the heels of my 54th birthday yesterday, I had planned to get back to a regular blogging schedule. That is until Jerry Hunt reminded me on Facebook that today is Constitution Day. On this day in 1787, thirty-nine brave men signed what is, arguably, the most important piece of paper (other than biblical documents,etc) in the history of mankind. A document so powerful, that it changed the course of human history. The thirty-nine men who signed the Constitution had, like the signers of the Declaration of Independence, said in essence, "And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor." Read these words and digest them for a moment : " We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.". When strung together, those fifty-one words have been the beacon of freedom, liberty and self-determination for literally billions of people throughout the world, people yearning to experience these most basic, yet most instinctual of human rights. It is ingrained by God in the soul of man that man live his life without government intervention into the minutiae of its citizens' daily lives. In reading the Constitution, I see nothing about the Federal Government being the National Daddy for the American people, yet our elected representatives time and again ram through/or try to ram through legislation that an overwhelming number or a clear majority of Americans oppose (Obama Care or amnesty for illegal aliens, anyone?) The Founding Fathers, I think, would be most unhappy about such things. Thomas Jefferson said, "A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government." But, that's an argument for another day. My whole point here is that we are a damn fine nation founded by some damn fine men, whose vision of their newly created country was, indeed, visionary. To those men, we owe nothing less than our " pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor." God bless our founders and may God continue to bless America.

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