The Declaration of Dependence

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This article’s title presents a foreboding and pejorative opening to its purpose with full intention.  What is underway today in our governments at various levels, in our education systems, and more wholly in a leftist-leaning media is the attempted reversal of the founding principles of our country.  This inversion of the precepts of our liberties, independence, and freedoms can be thwarted.  However, reclaiming those principles which underpin all that holds promise in America will require both prevalent and sustained vigilance.

Our Declaration of Independence, the very foundation upon which our nation was established, set forth the principles upon which our Founders drew when drafting the Constitution of the United States.  “We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all men (people) 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 …”

Those Rights of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness are at the very core of the American Dream.  Those rights require independence unhindered by government.  The urgent concern that all should have is each of those rights is presently under siege.

The Right of Life

The right of life means, among other things, public safety and the right to live your life with your own beliefs and convictions.

The right of life is undermined when the liberal left demand the defunding of the police.  No one of sound mind and moral character supports rogue police officers or police brutality.  But, the people have the right to safety in life; and that requires better police not fewer.

The right to life is further threatened when liberal prosecutors and politicians suspend bail requirements and reduce prison sentences for violent criminals.  Here the far left politicos believe the Government knows better than the people when they control the levers of power.  Acceptance of this philosophy constitutes a declaration of dependence on government when the polls clearly reveal a lack of consent by the governed.  As a society, this assault on our Right of Life cannot be tolerated.

Liberty

Our inalienable rights are enshrined in Liberty.  The vigilance implored above must countermand the burgeoning dependence of our people on a statist government for all needs.

Liberty is our right to freedom from oppression, tyranny, or the domination of government.  Further, liberty represents the freedom of thought and actions provided such beliefs and undertakings do not infringe on those same rights of other people.  That Liberty is under attack in America today as Federal and State government overreach intrudes further and further into our lives, choices, and business endeavors.  Examples include Biden Executive Orders for vaccination mandates, the shutdown of the Keystone XL Pipeline Project, and the promotion of people in civil service jobs based on race throughout the federal departments and agencies.

The vaccination mandates are unconstitutional undermining individual liberty.  The President used executive fiat on the pipeline project to take the property of people and companies without remuneration.  The Taking Clause of the Fifth Amendment was violated by this executive order. And the result of these anti-fossil fuel policies have left America energy dependent on enemies like Russia rather than being an energy exporter. On the job promotion front, race-based discrimination is a clear violation of the equal protection clauses in the Fifth and 14th Amendments.  Those clauses are rightfully color blind. All sensible Americans stand behind equality of opportunity for people of color. But , discrimination can not be sanctioned because people are white or Jewish or…. God and the world know that has never gone well over time. In my own businesses which I started or grew, ten percent of my work force is black and 30 percent are women. Not one person was hired for their skin color or their gender. All employees are paid  equally for doing the same job. These exemplars of government actions without “the consent of the Governed” reveal the arrogance of power, full throated attacks on liberty and the rule of law.  These assaults on Liberty further expose the declaration of dependence of the far-left on government fiat rather than legislation upheld by the consent of the people.

In addition, the Biden Administration and the Democrats in Congress want to pass sweeping legislation that provides for paid free community college for 2 years for all, and numerous other programs having exorbitant costs to taxpayers and small businesses. Each of these social programs would further increase people’s dependence on the government dole and add unsustainable costs to business owners. Socialist policies are not really progressive. These policies are regressive because they are disincentives to entrepreneurial enterprise and job creation while deepening the debt for future generations of Americans.

The Pursuit of Happiness

The opposition to this coordinated undoing of our rights is crucial.  It must be centered on resisting those misguided intellectual efforts to conflate equality of opportunity with equity of assets or earnings.  Our collective push-back must therefore forestall the movement to confuse the freedom to thrive or excel based on one’s own ingenuity, sweat, and sacrifice with universal entitlement of prosperity irrespective of level of effort. The pursuit of happiness belongs innately to all people.  The achievement of happiness or financial success cannot be guaranteed by society or government.  Personal responsibility cannot be replaced with dependence on society or government largesse.  The Declaration of Dependence in our society must be arrested or the principles that buttress the American Dream for all of our people will be rendered obsolete.  In the coming elections, it is time to alter the direction our government is taking because that direction is destructive to our sacred rights of independence.

It is the right of the people to alter that government which is destructive to those ends so appropriately delineated in 1776.