In the first line of the Declaration of Independence of July 4, 1776, Thomas Jefferson speaks of “one people.” The Constitution, agreed upon by the Founding Fathers in Philadelphia in 1789, begins, “We the people…”
And who were these “people”?
In Federalist No. 2, John Jay writes of them as “one united people … descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion, attached to the same principles of government, very similar in their manners and customs…”
If such are the elements of nationhood and peoplehood, can we still speak of Americans as one nation and one people?
We no longer have the same ancestors. They are of every color and from every country. We do not speak one language, but rather English, Spanish and a host of others. We long ago ceased to profess the same religion. We are Evangelical Christians, mainstream Protestants, Catholics, Jews, Mormons, Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists, agnostics and atheists.
Federalist No. 2 celebrated our unity. Today’s elites proclaim that our diversity is our strength. But is this true or a tenet of trendy ideology?
After the attempted massacre of Republican Congressmen at that ball field in Alexandria, Fareed Zakaria wrote: “The political polarization that is ripping this country apart” is about “identity … gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation (and) social class.” He might have added — religion, morality, culture and history.
Zakaria seems to be tracing the disintegration of our society to that very diversity that its elites proclaim to be its greatest attribute: “If the core issues are about identity, culture and religion … then compromise seems immoral. American politics is becoming more like Middle Eastern politics, where there is no middle ground between being Sunni or Shiite.”
Among the issues on which we Americans are at war with one another — abortion, homosexuality, same-sex marriage, white cops, black crime, Confederate monuments, LGBT rights, affirmative action.
Was the discovery of America and conquest of this continent from 1492 to the 20th century among the most glorious chapters in the history of man? Or was it a half-millennium marked by mankind’s most scarlet of sins: the genocide of native peoples, the enslavement of Africans, the annihilation of indigenous cultures, the spoliation of a virgin land?
Is America really “God’s Country”? Or was Barack Obama’s pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, justified when, after 9/11, he denounced calls of “God Bless America!” with the curse “God Damn America!”?
With its silence, the congregation seemed to assent.
In 1954, the Pledge of Allegiance many of us recited daily at the end of noon recess in the schoolyard was amended to read, “one nation, under God, indivisible.”
Are we still one nation under God? At the Democratic Convention in Charlotte to renominate Barack Obama, a motion to put “God” back into the platform was hooted and booed by half the assembly.
With this July 4 long weekend, many writers have bewailed the animus Americans exhibit toward one another and urged new efforts to reunite us. Yet, recall again those first words of Jefferson in 1776:
“When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them…”
Are we approaching such a point? Could the Constitution, as currently interpreted, win the approval of two-thirds of our citizens and three-fourth of our states, if it were not already the supreme law of the land? How would a national referendum on the Constitution turn out, when many Americans are already seeking a new constitutional convention?
All of which invites the question: Are we still a nation? And what is a nation? French writer Ernest Renan gave us the answer in the 19th century:
“A nation is a soul, a spiritual principle. Two things … constitute this soul, this spiritual principle. One is the past, the other is the present. One is the possession in common of a rich legacy of memories; the other is present consent, the desire to live together, the desire to continue to invest in the heritage that we have jointly received.
“Of all cults, that of the ancestors is the most legitimate: our ancestors have made us what we are. A heroic past with great men and glory … is the social capital upon which the national idea rests. These are the essential conditions of being a people: having common glories in the past and a will to continue them in the present; having made great things together and wishing to make them again.”
Does this sound at all like us today?
Watching our Lilliputians tearing down statues and monuments, renaming buildings and streets, rewriting history books to replace heroes and historical truths with the doings of ciphers, are we disassembling the nation we once were?
“One loves in proportion to the sacrifices that one has committed and the troubles that one has suffered,” writes Renan, “One loves the house that one has built and that one passes on.”
Are we passing on the house we inherited — or observing its demolition?
Happy Fourth. And God bless the USA.
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of a new book, “Nixon’s White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever.” To find out more about Patrick Buchanan and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators website at www.creators.com.
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I have never seen such division in America other than the protest against the Nam War. It deeply saddens me.
And that’s when liberalism should have been nipped in the bud.
And we can all lay these divisions at the feet of the DEMOCRAT party.. Were not for THEM pushing our officials to ignore immigration laws for decades, importing rapefugees by the hundreds of thousands (and other allsorted mudslimes who have NEVER adapted to the culture of their adopted country, but lie in wait till their numbers are sufficient then PUSH that culture to adapt to islam, more often than not by force/threats)… Were it not for them consistently race baiting, and pushing minorities are special and we should give THEM more weight than the majority, IMO we wouldn’t be in this mess..
Well maybe we need to get back to the basics of our morals, values, traditions and stop with the “progressive” game of going along to get along. There are still many millions of us who understand and appreciate what this country was built upon and hold true to her traditions, values, faith and morals. We The People can take our country back to where She belongs and it has already started with an AWESOME representative of the PEOPLE PRESIDENT TRUMP!
Right now AHC is doing a series on the American Revolution, it is amazing what they went through but they must be turning over in their graves to see what has happened to this country.
There are times i wonder.. If someone had a time machine, went back to just before we started the American Revolution, and SHOWED Washington and co, what would become of this country that they would have fought and sacrificed so many lives to create.. Would they still do so?
In the past we were able to come together as one nation–though we came from MANY diverse cultures and countries–because America was a “melting pot” where all those diverse elements ASSIMILATED into a people with a common language, culture, and love of the freedom and opportunity this country’s heritage and history represented.
The CURRENT division and strife was borne of the Leftist Loons and their passion for creating “victim classes” and enclaves of foreign cultures and loyalties that REFUSE to assimilate and insist that the REST OF US accept their “apartness” and grant them special privileges and benefits based on their “victim class” status. This is the corrosive and destructive HEART of identity politics as practiced by Barrack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and OTHER COMMUCRAT leftist LOONS who have INFESTED our government and taken over our educational system–the better to turn our public schools and colleges into one VAST leftist indoctrination agency–during the past several decades. Students are no longer taught America’s history and heritage–or WORSE, are taught a revisionist, leftist view of same.
I pray that we can overcome the DIVISION sown by Obama and his fellow sociopaths and leftist LOONS and once again, become “one country, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all” before their divisive tactics DESTROY the greatest country on earth!
You left out “under God”, and that is what our country is now lacking. Godless people are taking over our religious institutions, including universities, and unless this is reversed we, as a republic, are doomed.
My bad, snattlerake! I would never deliberately leave God out of the equation–because he has blessed this nation beyond measure, and made us the most free, prosperous nation on earth, and certainly deserves the credit for doing so!
Unfortunately Teabag, i don’t think we CAN overcome all this division the lefists have sown, ESPECIALLy while they control so MUCH of our education system (sorry indoctrination system)…
And even if we do get them out, its going to take at least 3 generations imo to get that bred OUT of our system..
OTB:
I’d like to raise a question: can a State BE seceded? If they refuse to abide by concepts and values and rights and laws enumerated in the Declaration of Independence and our Constitution can they be ejected by the remaining States for going rogue?
Imagine: hack off the west coast (or just western edge of WA, OR, and CA) and the NE.
It would take a 2/3rds vote…33 States….37 States voted for Trump.
If the Demmunists want a communist country, they can have one!
No more Pelosi or Schumer…no more Hollywood…no more “celebrites”….no more Matthews or Maddow…no more Waters or Whoopi.
Businesses would be deserting like rats off a sinking ship.
Because I don’t see us surviving any other way.
Dean Larson, I don’t think there is any provision for kicking states out of the union, but maybe there SHOULD be! And you could well be right–if the COMMUCRATS don’t take their Party back from the COMMUNISTS and become LOYAL Americans, again, instead of America-hating leftist LOONS, we may NOT survive. As it is, they are refusing to accept our legally elected President and seem hellbent on tearing the country apart with their DIVISIVE “identity politics.”
TO my knowledge. No there is not any rules for doing that. BUT like Teabag said, there bloody well should be.
BUT IF WE Had a DoJ which has some balls, there wouldn’t need to get that far, as we would be sending in Fed Marshals, to ARREST all those comucrats for continually and willfully violating FEDERAL law..
there are too many generations of americans that have been brainwashed into liberaism and the love of socialist or communist life.yes the snowflakes are good little soldiers for there professors who teach hatred for america and hatred for all who oppose there agenda.
the only way to fix america is to fight for her the tree of freedom sometimes needs to be nourished by the blood of tyrants and patriots,not saying we are there yet but its as close as i have ever seen it in my 54yts.
god help us and bless us and protect us.