OWL-DRAGON

My mind today is swirling with thoughts of what it is to be an American. Some of the politically correct would deny us that title – but what other shorthand is so evocative of who we are. For unlike so many other places, in these United States your nationality doesn’t come from race or ethnicity but from your dedication to these principles: that all men are created equally, that they have natural rights not given by the state, but rather they must give their consent to be governed.

Just today I saw a reference to a Lincoln speech that I liked very much. Lincoln speaking of the Fourth said: “but when they look through that old Declaration of Independence they find that those old men say that "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal," and then they feel that the moral sentiment taught in that day evidences their relation to those men, that it is the father of all moral principle in them, and that they have a right to claim it as though they were blood of the blood, and flesh of the flesh of the men who wrote that Declaration, and so they are.”

I don’t for a moment contend that all issues are resolved and that we have all the answers that will allow us to live in harmony without acrimony and conflict. But our core principle that the individual matters informs all our debates. We will continue to strive among ourselves on how to best realize the promise of that founding document and the Constitution that follow, but we will do so as Americans all.

Have a great Fourth.