Summerville Journal Scene ®
Thoughts for July 4, 2009- In the Founding Era liberty and freedom were two discrete precepts and not at all the interchangeable terms they often are today. The Enlightenment had produced new understandings that individual liberty was a natural state of the “governing laws” being a relationship, or social contract, between individuals and government. A person’s individual liberty was a fact of natural law as Thomas Jefferson said “A free people claim their rights as derived from the laws of Nature (and Nature’s God) and not a gift of their chief magistrate.”
Liberty was understood to mean not only individual liberty, but political liberty or the right for citizens to share in framing and conducting their government. Liberty also included civil liberty, which was the guaranteed protection against the government’s interference with the individual’s enumerated rights and privileges such as life and property. Samuel Adams said it this way, “Among the natural rights of the colonist are these: first a right to life; secondly to liberty; thirdly to property; together with the right to support and defend them.”
The spirit of liberty was indeed written on the hearts of the Patriots in the years leading up to 1776 and the Declaration was simply the recording of that spirit on parchment. The conclusion of Patrick Henry’s speech to the Virginia Delegation in March 1775 clearly makes this point. “Why stand we here idle...Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me give me liberty or give me death!” In the same time frame Benjamin Franklin, before the Pennsylvania Assembly had this to say, “Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” No parsing of words here!
The first home for real liberty was about to be established where a constitutional republic with a Bill of Rights would secure individual freedoms. George Washington, who presided over the Constitutional Convention, had said that, “Liberty, when it begins to take root, is a plant of rapid growth.” The Constitution was critical to secure the goals of the Declaration as John Adams said, “The way to secure liberty is to place it in the people’s hands, that is to give them the power at all times to defend it in the legislature and in the courts of justice.”
James Madison, who was the primary author of the Constitution, knew well that it did not specify any individual freedoms or offer any protections from government. Accordingly, he introduced the first ten amendments or The Bill of Rights during the ratification process. For the first time in history strict limits were set on what the government can and cannot do with regards to individual liberty and established what we know as our freedoms, e.g. religion, speech, press, assembly, etc.
Liberty and freedom are discrete and essential precepts that have enabled America to be the shining light on a hill for these 233 years. It is incumbent on each generation to stand firm in their defense as well as to be articulate in defining them lest we lose their meaning in the fog of life. The patriotic hymn “America” begins with the familiar lines “My country ’tis of thee, sweet land of Liberty.” However, the fourth verse, a prayer really, captures our subject well. “Our father’s God to Thee, Author of liberty, to Thee we sing. Long may our land be bright, with freedom’s holy light, Protect us by Thy hand, Great God our King.” To that I say three crisp huzzas!
Developed by:
John R. “Barney” Barnes
CDR USN ®
29 June 2009
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