Lets remember the truth

As our new President takes the trail to Washington this weekend, he is doing so in a way to reminisce on the first entry to Washington by Abraham Lincoln. He (Mr Obama) is taking a train, the long way, to remember the entry of our great 16th President. It is impressive and exciting.

As Mr Obama travels the road Lincoln did, it makes a great PR event. It invokes thoughts of the past, but, unfortunately, also overlooks some of the differences of today versus the past.

When Lincoln made this trip, he didn’t do it to wave to adoring crowds, he made the trip necessarily “sneaking” into town to avoid what were certain threats to his safety. The train was a secure way to arrive.

Today thousands of people have had to put themselves on the line to make sure Mr Obama can make this journey safely, from the Coast Guard to every law enforcement institution in the path. The train is not so secure...

When Lincoln made this trip, he did so facing a nation that was tearing its fabric apart. He faced the reality that the union was attached by a thread, and he was holding the thread. Mr Lincoln said “Intelligence, patriotism, Christianity, and a firm reliance on Him who has never yet forsaken this favored land are still competent to adjust in the best way all our present difficulty.

Mr Obama, in an attempt to invoke some memory of this first inaugural speech of Mr Lincoln, said “What is required is the same perseverance and idealism that our founders displayed. What is required is a new declaration of independence, not just in our nation, but in our own lives — from ideology and small thinking, prejudice and bigotry — an appeal not to our easy instincts but to our better angels.”

A new declaration of independence? Independence from ideology? Whose ideology? Our Declaration of Independence itself speaks of an ideology, concluding “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.” Is Mr Obama suggesting we should withdraw from that ideology as well?

The reference to our “better angels” alludes to Mr. Lincoln’s speech, but fails in its context. Mr. Lincoln’s speech was virtually dedicated in its entirety to the issues of the nation’s impending civil war and his duty to preserve the union. He explained his view on slavery “I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.” He explained his view of the job ahead of him after that inauguration day “In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The Government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath registered in heaven to destroy the Government, while I shall have the most solemn one to "preserve, protect, and defend it."

It was only after saying this that he said “The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”

We are most privileged to live in this land of freedom, blessed by the rights given us by the documents which are our foundation. We cannot trample on them, belittle them, or relegate them to the past without condemning our future. We cannot abrogate the ideals that undergird our land and its historic intent by rewriting history to reflect our wrongs as though they outweigh our good. We are still the land of the free, the home of the brave. To say we must dismiss this ideal so that those who reject the freedoms of some idealists for their own, that courage to stand firm is stubborn and unreasonable, that to have an ideology is something needing “our better angels”, or a new declaration of independence is to wish for us as a people to get washed up on the shores with the unfree and unbrave failed states of history.

Faith is unreasonable…for to be faith it must ignore “reason” . Jesus said “I tell you but you do not believe. The miracles I do in my Father’s name speak for me, but you do not believe because you are not my sheep. My sheep listen to my voice; I know them and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish…”

Where are we headed? Should we reconsider the past which has gotten us here for a more “reasonable” present? Why are we looking to the government, the government which is only an agent of “We the People”, who allow the government a place “in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity”. It is "We the People" who must fix the mess we are in, to change our behavior, change our direction, to take on the risks to have the benefits of freedom...risks by which millions have died for in the past.

Should we reconsider? I say no.

We the people must remain firm in love with what Lincoln said on his day “Intelligence, patriotism, Christianity, and a firm reliance on Him who has never yet forsaken this favored land are still competent to adjust in the best way all our present difficulty.”

God Bless America. Land of the Free and Home of the Brave.