"What Has Made America Unique, What Has Made It Great?"
I have returned to my newspaper column, but it
is only monthly now instead of weekly (not by my choice), yet still the same
length. Sometimes that just isn’t enough. This is one of those times -so I am
posting this to substack and to my blog, without putting it in the paper. Here goes.
On my birthday (July 6), a Facebook friend
asked me this question -or series of questions:
“When you get
a minute, I’m on this mission to try to understand the USA’s value. As I grew
up in the UK there’s A LOT about USA history I don’t know. I began googling,
and Google suggested the USA is special because it inspired the revolution of
several countries and because of the idea of a country running without a
monarch or leader in place until death. What do you think? I find that when I
ask the question, people are either fiercely in love with the USA or hate it. I’d
love your opinion.”
Here is the response I gave her, edited somewhat
and expanded on a little.
You are absolutely correct. Although the
concept of democracy was not new -ancient Greek city states were democracies,
as was the Roman Republic for centuries before the Caesars made it an empire,
something all of the founding fathers knew about -it had not been tried in
almost 2,000 years... and it had never been tried under the philosophy of the
Enlightenment, whose philosophers -in England, most notably John Locke
-introduced the idea of government as a social contract between the governors
and the governed. Before that, for a millennium, Europe had operated under the
concept of "the divine right of kings", that is, if a guy is king,
God must want him to be king, or he wouldn't be king, and to disobey him in the
slightest was treason against God. The Enlightenment was a move away from
religious thought, after all the terrible wars it had caused in Europe, and a
return to the logic proposed by Aristotle and other Greeks. So with God not
directly in the equation, the government is actually an AGREEMENT. You have a
group of people, and someone has to make the decisions. The people agree to
participate in a democracy and elect their leaders, and agree to live with the
results if their person loses. The people agree to willingly give up SOME of
their rights to a government, via its laws, but NOT their "natural
rights" (rights we are all born with) which are "unalienable
rights" (that is, we cannot be separated from them)... freedoms of speech,
press, commerce, religion, assembly and so on. In other words, we agree to give
up our right to drive whatever speed we want to, or to be as drunk in public as
we want to, or to keep all of our money and not pay any taxes... because these
are sacrifices we make to live in a safe society. But we do NOT give up our
natural rights -what today we would call our civil rights. In return for the
people making that concession, the government agrees to provide for a military
to prevent invasion, and to enact laws to keep everybody safe. HOWEVER. If that
government becomes a tyranny -if it begins to violate people's civil rights
-the government has broken their part of the agreement. They have broken the
contract. And, according to Locke (who was a huge influence on the Founding
Fathers), the people then have the right to get rid of that government and
choose another one. SO Lockean social contract- that's ONE part of what made
the U.S. special.
Part TWO... is "republicanism". This
does NOT just mean a government without a king, not as the founding fathers
understood it. To them, republicanism meant that both the government and the
people had certain responsibilities... the people have to have "civic
virtue". That means that each member of the public must set aside their
own best interests in the interest of the community, and be willing to step up
and serve if something needed done that they were qualified to do, even if it
was dangerous or impacted their pocketbook. This is why George Washington was
willing to serve as president twice when all he really wanted was to go home.
The nation needed him, because he was the only person everybody trusted to get
this new country off the ground.
So PART TWO=Republicanism. PART THREE....
...PART THREE was liberalism. Which meant "freedom (and rights) of the
individual". THIS was the tension of the Constitutional Convention, and of
the early days of the country, all the way up to now. Which is more important,
the rights of the community or the rights of the individual? The answer, of
course, is BOTH. BOTH must be protected... but it is a delicate balancing act.
The first ten amendments, AKA the Bill of Rights, are all about the rights of
the individual. So PART THREE=LIBERALISM. For a long time now, many Americans
have framed the rights of the individual primarily if not solely as the right
of rich people to have money, and any effort to provide for the rights of the
community they have called communism… and still do. But that’s just not true.
Triangulating between the rights of the individual and the rights of the
community is something that has ALWAYS been done in America.
And NOW we come to the BIG Part.
Part Four: Thomas Paine and COMMON SENSE. Paine
had just moved to the colonies from England one year before the Revolution
broke out... but he was intensely patriotic to his new home. The Revolution
began in April 1775- but for the first 15 months, it was a rebellion of
colonies. People like John Adams and Thomas Jefferson -both lawyers -made
arguments about why the colonies should declare Independence and be their own
country, but most of their writing on the subject was.... lawyerly. Very hard
to read, and kind of dull. And was mostly about taxes. And that's where Thomas
Paine came in, and shined. He was a brilliant writer. In January 1776 he
published a 47-page pamphlet called COMMON SENSE, in which he laid out the
reasons America should be its own country -and most of them were "common
sense", something the average citizen could read and understand. As long
as we're part of England we're part of all of England's wars.... and England is
ALWAYS at war. As long as we are part of England we do not have free trade...
we are only allowed to buy things from England, we are not allowed to shop
around with other countries. As long as we are part of England, all the big
decisions will be made by people on the other side of the ocean who know
nothing whatsoever about what our lives are like. He also pointed out that
monarchies are inherently evil. Sure, maybe there's a good king every now and
then -but that's a fluke. We are stuck with whoever inherits the throne, and
they are usually spoiled, selfish idiots. But then.... THEN... Paine turned on
the emotion, the passion. Then he said the things that summed up WHY this new
country was worth fighting and maybe dying for. Because we will be an
inspiration to the world. If we stand up to a tyrant and prove it can be done
successfully, and that we can set up a government WITHOUT a monarch, but ruled
by the PEOPLE... then everywhere, all around the world, where people are being
crushed by a tyrant they will look at our example and know IT CAN BE DONE, and
they will try to do it. And if they try and fail... then they are welcome to
come join US in our great experiment, for we are not a country of a certain
tribe or race or religion, we are a country of people bound by the idea of
liberty. In Paine's words, “We have it within our power to begin the world
again." And THAT... not a bunch of rich people not wanting to pay their
taxes.... THAT affected the common people and made them want to join this mission
and fight for this vision. This is why, even though he was neither a politician
nor a general, Thomas Paine is called "The Father of the Revolution."
And ...we DID inspire other countries. First
France in 1787. Then Haiti in the 1790s. Then, from 1810 to 1830, virtually
every country in Latin America. And then in other parts of the world. So that
by the end of WWII, even countries that still had kings retained them mostly as
ritual figureheads, and the real governments were parliaments elected by the
people. So knowing all that, think once more about the Preamble to the
Constitution:
"We, the people of the United States, in
order to form a more perfect union, establish justice and ensure domestic
tranquility, provide for the common defense, and promote the general welfare
for ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this constitution of
the United States of America."
And think, too, about the Civil War.... when 11
states, seeking to protect slavery, wanted to break away from the U.S. and form
a new country. Knowing what you know about the words of Thomas Paine, realize
why some in the north said that surrendering would be "treason to the
world". You see, if our great experiment was not able to stand longer than
fourscore-and-seven years (or 87 years, from 1776 to 1863), everything Thomas
Paine had said would be proven a lie. Because it all fell apart. And then
countries all around the world groaning under tyranny would perhaps NOT take
the chance to oppose it, knowing that America did and fell anyway. And knowing
all that, think again on Abraham Lincoln's speech after the Union victory at
Gettysburg in early July of 1863:
"Four score and seven years ago our
fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and
dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged
in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived
and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that
war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place
for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is
altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But in a larger sense we
cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave
men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our
poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember,
what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the
living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought
here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated
to the great task remaining before us,that from these honored dead we take
increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of
devotion, that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in
vain, that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that
government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from
the earth."
A truly patriotic person must take stock of
their country’s history, the good and the bad. Remember, the Constitution was
written “in order to from a more perfect union.” It was not born perfect. A lot
of people, over a lot of time, have had to work to make it better. In the
beginning, “We the People” did not include poor people, women, people of color or
indigenous people. But it should have. And that is the trajectory we should
continue -greatness lies in the future, not in turning back to the mistakes of
the past. Every one of us, every day, should strive to make a more perfect
union.
America is not great because it is powerful.
America’s power is that IT CAN BE GREAT. That greatness is not due to military
strength, or white superiority, or a single religion. It is great because, of
all nations in the history of the world, it is based on an idea and a set of
principles. The principles of liberty… and of diversity, equality, and
inclusion. I am a liberal progressive Democrat, and I am the most patriotic
person you will ever meet... and the biggest hater of nationalism, which is the
belief one’s country is the best in the world because it is strongest, or
simply just “because.” I am a lover of history -true history -because knowing
and understanding it enables us to better prepare the future. I am a hater of
fake, cheerleading history which pretends nothing bad has ever happened,
because it dulls the minds and senses of America, and makes us more susceptible
to autocratic control… the very thing our nation formed to oppose.
Most liberals feel the way I do. If you are
conservative…. Stop and think for a moment, and you will realize we are not as
different as you have been taught over the past couple of generations to
believe.
--Troy D. Smith is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech University. His words do not necessarily represent TTU, nor are they connected in any way with his job- they are his own opinions on matters of public concern, and an expression of his First Amendment freedom of speech.
He is a candidate for District #15 committeeman in the TNDP- you can see his qualifications HERE
You can find all previous entries in this column HERE
A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE
Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com
