Dear KMAG: 20200713 Open Topic

America, 1776, 2020
Americans, what kind of people do you think you are? What kind of citizens are you? When flags are burned and statues of Abraham Lincoln are desecrated, what is America?
We are exceptional. That is not an ideology of prejudice, but a fact. No other nation had its beginnings in intellectual deliberation by brilliant minds such as Jefferson, Hamilton, Franklin, and others.
We have a Declaration of Independence that places us on the world’s stage before God, who has granted everyone “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” “Happiness means not hedonistic gratification, but a life of virtue lived for the common good. The Declaration is an apologetic for America’s founding. It is one of the most brilliant and consequential documents in political history. Martin Luther King, Jr., appeal to it as authoritative in his “I Have a Dream” Speech. We must live up to its promise, he cried. We still must.
Our Constitution is not divinely-inspired, but states the how of America. Since its writers knew it was not perfect and that America would change over time, they allowed for Amendments, the first of which is another pivotal statement in world history. The First Amendment guarantees five shining freedoms: of religion, of speech (not “expression”), of the press, of assembly (peaceable), of petition. Although it had antecedents, no governmental document ever approached this measure of freedom of conscience within ordered liberty.
Those who burn flags, destroy statues, and appeal to simplistic and analyses of contemporary problems need to learn or return the meaning of the American creed. American has sinned in how it treated native Americans, African Americans, and, of course, more. But no nation under the sun has a flawless track record. One of the factors that makes America unique and exemplary is its ability to self-reform, and to even reform its reforms, as with prohibition.
The wisest reformer has the deepest knowledge of American history and the nature of the American system. Those who destroy according to slogans, those who brandish torches instead of learned arguments, those who tear down with no vision of how to rebuild, these are the ones who set us back, who let loose untutored grievance, and who cannot be trusted to pursue the common good as Americans.
Here is no unguarded and mindless patriotism. Here is no “my country right or wrong” nationalism. American citizenship calls for more. The flag will not atone for our wrongs. But burning the flag will not atone for them either. In fact, only Jesus Christ can atone for sins. But politically, reform and renewal is possible within the American system of civil government. That takes vision, passion, and patience: “a long obedience in the same direction.” America has been given much, in natural resources, in beauty, and in civil liberties. But, as Jesus said, “To whom much is given, much is required.”
Americans, what kind of people do you think you are? What kind of citizens are you? The world is watching. The Creator, –who has endowed us with “certain unalienable rights” of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness–is watching.