It would be well to remember that the original colonies separated from England for less. It would be well to remember that two words -probable cause -are under attack, if not killed off already. It is also important to remember that those two words stand between us and tyranny.
It is also time to make a "Revolutionary" statement: that whenever a government breaks its contract with the people; that whenever a government abrogates their "inalienable rights", it is the right of those people to abolish that government and replace it.
Thomas Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence between June 11 and June 28, 1776. Since that time, it is the Declaration of Independence that is most often thought of as our nation's most cherished symbol of liberty. Even so the Declaration is too often regarded as mere high sounding words perhaps in the same way that George W. Bush says of our Constitution that it is "...just a goddamned piece of paper"!
John Locke (1632-1704), is among the most influential political philosophers of the modern period. In the Two Treatises of Government, he defended the claim that men are by nature free and equal against claims that God had made all people naturally subject to a monarch. He argued that people have rights, such as the right to life, liberty, and property, that have a foundation independent of the laws of any particular society. Locke used the claim that men are naturally free and equal as part of the justification for understanding legitimate political government as the result of a social contract where people in the state of nature conditionally transfer some of their rights to the government in order to better insure the stable, comfortable enjoyment of their lives, liberty, and property. Since governments exist by the consent of the people in order to protect the rights of the people and promote the public good, governments that fail to do so can be resisted and replaced with new governments.Locke wrote extensively, articulately, persuasively on such topics as the Raison d'Etre of Government, the Separation of Powers, the Ends of Government, and the Extent, indeed, the limits of governmental powers.
Jefferson was also influenced by the Virginia Declaration of Rights drafted by George Mason and adopted by the Virginia Constitutional Convention on June 12, 1776. Later, Mason's Virginia declaration became a major influence on the US Bill of Rights, drafted by James Madison.
I am confident that these men -Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, George Mason, John Locke -would be appalled, perhaps as outraged as am I, that the modern GOP has literally thumbed its nose at these principles.
Section 1. That all men are by nature equally free and independent and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.Both John Locke and Thomas Jefferson wrote about governments that break the social contract with the people. Both Locke and Jefferson considered such a breach to be justification for a break with the offending "government":Section 2. That all power is vested in, and consequently derived from, the people; that magistrates are their trustees and servants and at all times amenable to them.
Section 3. That government is, or ought to be, instituted for the common benefit, protection, and security of the people, nation, or community; of all the various modes and forms of government, that is best which is capable of producing the greatest degree of happiness and safety and is most effectually secured against the danger of maladministration. And that, when any government shall be found inadequate or contrary to these purposes, a majority of the community has an indubitable, inalienable, and indefeasible right to reform, alter, or abolish it, in such manner as shall be judged most conducive to the public weal.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. - That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, - That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.Locke had already come to the same conclusion.-Thomas Jefferson, The Declaration of Independence [emphasis mine]
4(h). Revolution:Many years later, a young revolutionary would reprise the sentiments of Jefferson and Locke:If a government subverts the ends for which it was created then it might be deposed; indeed, Locke asserts, revolution in some circumstances is not only a right but an obligation. Thus, Locke came to the conclusion that the "ruling body if it offends against natural law must be deposed." This was the philosophical stuff which sanctioned the rebellions of both the American colonialists in 1775, and the French in 1789.
When the forces of oppression come to maintain themselves in power against established law; peace is considered already broken.And this Independance Day is also a good day to remember what sacrifices were made for those very freedoms and rights that Bush so cavalierly dismisses with a smirk:-Che Guevara, Guerrilla Warfare
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.-Declaration of Independence
