It’s easy to forget how blessed we are to live in a nation whose values have shaped the best times and places in human history. The American experiment was unprecedented, improbable, and sometimes insane, but it created a system that has pushed human progress forward by decades or even centuries. At its core lie the two foundational documents: the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. These have stood the test of a quarter millennium, through wars, unrest, and famine, but also through times of unprecedented prosperity and progress. The United States of America wouldn’t exist without the principles found in those two documents.
No one knows this more than the nine justices of the Supreme Court, whose lifetime duty is to protect the Constitution and interpret cases through its values and principles. Recently, three justices, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, spoke about how America has persisted for all of these years, and how it can flourish for many more to come.
Gorsuch focused on how abnormal the American system is and how it represents a radical ideological shift from the European monarchies of the 18th century. He noted that this nation has survived because each generation has taken those American values and carried them into a new age.
“The reason why our Constitution and Declaration have survived is that people choose it anew in every generation,” Gorsuch said. “You need to know its history. You need to know what you’re preserving. Daniel Webster said it took 6,000 years for us to generate a system of government like this. Don’t expect that to happen easily or again.”
He’s correct on that last point; functioning governments don’t grow on trees.
Kavanaugh focused on education. American history, civics, government, and why we are who we are must be taught in every school nationwide and instilled in every young American
“I think all of us should be constantly striving to ensure civics education,” Kavanaugh said, “not only for our youth, but for all of us, and that we constantly are learning and participating in our system of government.” The root of every worldview is the education you grew up with, whether from parents, friends, mentors, or teachers. If everyone learned from the start about the good this nation has done, we’d be a much more patriotic people.
Lastly, Barrett noted that the founding documents of the United States ought to inspire current Americans into civic participation.
“We’re not passive observers in the American project,” she said. “We’re participants in it. It is our project. I might suggest that people look at the last line of the Declaration of Independence. It ends with a mutual pledge in which the signatories to the document pledge their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor to the success of the American project. And they made good on that promise. They pledged with their honor not to deviate from the commitments that they had made in signing the Declaration of Independence.”
In other words, representative government doesn’t work if we the people don’t use our voice.
Any citizen passionate about this great Republic must be ready to support it and fight for it. Too often, we take our ecosystem for granted and allow those who hate America to seize power. Freedoms isn’t free. Brave Americans have fought and died to bequeath it to us, and many more have dedicated their lives and careers to ensuring that those freedoms stay in our hands.
In America, ordinary citizens like you and me can freely voice our opinions. But we only have Liberty so long as we preserve it.
