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Peace at any cost is a Prelude to War!
Sorry, Our Founding Fathers Aren't P.C.
Oliver North
June 30, 2000
WASHINGTON - On the Fourth of July, only a handful of Americans
will pause to
commemorate the anniversary of our nation's independence. I used
to think it
was a shame, how little attention was paid to our national
birthday. But on
reflection, I've decided it's good that we not dwell on the
people and events
that gave rise to this little holiday.
First, it's not politically correct. The "founders" as they are
sometimes
called, were all men - white men - and crediting white men with
anything
today just doesn't wash. Second, a careful examination of that
handful of
patriots who gathered 224 years ago this week to sign that
Declaration of
Independence invites too many discomfiting comparisons with
today's political
leaders.
Few Americans know that the Declaration was actually drafted by
a committee
of five: Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Philip Livingston, Roger
Sherman, and
of course, Thomas Jefferson. Fewer still know that most of the
work on the
document was done between June 10 and July 2 (when the
Continental Congress
actually resolved to declare independence from Great Britain) in
a boarding
house at the intersection of Market and 7th Streets in
Philadelphia.
The draft document was so good that when debate ended late on
July 4, the
larger body made but 86 changes, eliminating 480 words, and
leaving 1,337 of
the most dramatic words in any political manifesto.
The Declaration is far more than an assertion of freedom or a
bill of
particulars levied at a tyrant. No other founding document for
any nation
reflects on "the laws of nature and of nature's God." No other
proclamation
declares that all people are "endowed by their Creator with
certain
unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the
Pursuit of
Happiness." No other national manuscript appeals to "the Supreme
Judge of the
World for the Rectitude of our Intentions." And no other
mechanism of
national design or intent places the fate of its founders in the
hand of God
with words like this: "And 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."
Good thing they weren't writing this stuff in a public school!
In an era when Fidel Castro and Che Guevara are revered
revolutionaries, the
56 who signed the Declaration just don't cut the mustard. They
were all men
of means, well educated and wealthy by the standards of the day.
Twenty-four
were lawyers and jurists; 11 were successful merchants and
traders; 9, like
Jefferson, were prosperous farmers. Nine of them would die
before the war was
over; 5 were captured and tortured by the British and 12 had
their homes
looted and destroyed.
Neither John Morton of Pennsylvania nor Button Gwinnett, the
signer from
Georgia, would live to see the first anniversary of their
signatures. Philip
Livingston, the merchant from Albany, New York who served on
Jefferson's
drafting committee, was dead before the second anniversary.
Thomas Lynch, a
farmer from South Carolina died of wounds received in a 1179
naval engagement.
Carter Braxton, a wealthy trader from Virginia saw his armada of
trading
vessels swept from the seas in battle. To pay his debts, he sold
all that he
owned and died in rags in 1797.
Thomas McKean, a lawyer from Delaware, served without pay as a
member of the
Continental Congress. The British forced him to flee with his
impoverished
family five times during the war. When he died in 1817, his sons
had to take
up a collection from their neighbors to pay for his funeral.
Thomas Nelson of Yorktown, Virginia borrowed 2 million dollars
to provision
the French Fleet that would eventually come to our aid. After
the war he
liquidated his entire estate to pay back the money he borrowed
because the
Congress refused to reimburse him. He died penniless in 1789.
John Hart, a New Jersey farmer was driven from his wife's
sickbed by a
British patrol and lived on the run for more than a year. Upon
learning that
his beloved wife was failing, he took the terrible chance of
returning home
to find her dead and his children gone. When he died a few weeks
later, on
May 11, 1779, his friends said it was of a broken heart.
John Hancock, the merchant from Quincy, Massachusetts, claimed
that his bold
signature would allow King George to read it without spectacles.
When the
British burned the port that made him rich, Hancock was reported
to have
said: "Burn, Boston, though it makes John Hancock a beggar,
burn!"
All 56 signers were hunted, hounded and declared criminals. All
were
indicted, tried in absentia for treason, and all were convicted
and
condemned. Yet, despite all they endured, not one man broke his
pledge. They
were the definition of the word, "courage" and a far cry from
today's
political leaders who ask us to define "is," and "sexual
relations," and
"fund raising."
COPYRIGHT 2000 CREATORS SYNDICATE INC
*COPYRIGHT NOTICE** In accordance with Title 17 U. S. C. Section
107,
any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair
use
without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior
interest
in receiving the included information for nonprofit research and
educational
purposes only.[Ref.
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml ]
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A vote for Bush or Gore is a vote to continue Clinton policies!
A vote for Buchanan is a vote to continue America!
Therefore a vote for Gore or Bush is a wasted vote for America!
Don't waste your vote! Vote for Patrick Buchanan!
Today, candor compels us to admit that our vaunted two-party
system is a
snare and a delusion, a fraud upon the nation. Our two parties
have become
nothing but two wings of the same bird of prey...
Patrick Buchanan
