Liberty Matters

The liberties we as Americans enjoy and take for granted because we’ve not, by and large, ever been without them, are endowed to us by our Creator and, as such, are known as natural rights. Liberty is not granted by government, for if it were then that would indicate that government is within its ethical and moral right to withdraw our natural rights at its whim.

That said, governments have exercised the power, as a survey of history shows, to take personal liberties away and make individual citizens subservient via various forms of coercion to the faceless and nameless collective. Our founding fathers acknowledged the fact that each of us, “being endowed with certain unalienable rights,” live our lives before an Audience of One and that this is regardless as to whether we acknowledge this truth or not.

The problem becomes this, however, liberty (and our republican form of government) can only exist within an environment of tension and will cease to exist when the pendulum swings too far one way or the other and tension is either abolished or nearly so.

This tension of which I write is found woven into the fabric of, not only our founding documents, but also the functions of government and the checks-and-balances between various branches of government at a given level (i.e., federal) as well as the tension found between the various levels of government (i.e., federal v. states). We also find this tension within the mechanisms of how elections are conducted at given levels (i.e., federal) and certain branches of government (i.e., the role of the electoral college over the popular vote in the election of our President); all this and more design the functioning of our republican form of government.

Most importantly, the tension which cradles gently and securely our personal liberties as endowed by our Creator are held between Athens (reason) and Jerusalem (faith). The wrestling between these two supply a healthy competition for our societal conclusions and without this natural tension people will trade their liberties for the assurance of tyranny of one brand or another.

This is where we are today and this is where we are in this nation’s history. Will we take the hard road of tension and vote for a republican form or government or will seek something easier and more certain: tyranny, coercion and oppression? The outcomes for the latter are known quantities and we will each sleep assured of the final destination but I do not believe that the American citizen will sleep better in the long term once they come to know what crouches in the darkness waiting to devour them.

Let us vote for the liberty of all American citizens (born and unborn). Let us vote for liberty so members of a household may defend themselves against intruders. Let us vote to restore the constitutional balance of tension as originally and artfully designed by men who had seen and experienced the ill effects of not only a tyrannical individual but the brutish nature of the mob, 50-percent-plus-1 calling for the abolishment of the 50-percent-minus 1.

Let us not say with our votes, at any level during this election cycle, that the cure for our teetering society is more tyranny, more coercion and more oppression. Instead, that we should reclaim the fact that all men are created equal and that each, before their Creator, endowed as such in His image, are to pursue life, liberty and happiness, yes, but not at the expense or the subjugation of his fellow man.