Press Action ::: The Declaration of Independence

Friday, August 27, 2004

The Declaration of Independence

By James L. Secor

Franklin, Adams and Jefferson Has anyone read the Declaration of Independence lately? The land of equality? Think again! Those elite who took the colonies into revolution over very much the same thing the administration is doing in Iraq (most recently) were not dumb. They may have been full of Enlightenment learning and had a healthy respect for reason (though this was truly rhetoric) and they may have been romantic in their ideas but they were not fools. They didn’t believe in equality ... for all. What a foolish notion!

Here is the inequality: The British government has “been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity.” Consanguinity is blood, the right blood, blue blood.

These aristocrats and nouveau riche merchants were after justice, yes, but they were also after their rights as superior men, that is men of blood, i.e. consanguinity. This belies the opening gambit of “When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them. ...” This sounds good until you look closely at “separate but equal.” Where is the equality for all in this? Remember, at this time it was believed that “the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God” held that some men were better than others (morally) and therefore were naturally at the top, rulers. Aristocrats. This was at a time preceding Social Darwinism, that perversion of the proposals found in the most unread book in the world, The Origin of the Species. What happened to “all men are created equal ...”?

It was held, by some of these same men, that the better sort of man (aristocrat?) was to be a Senator; the commoners, who were by association less equal, could be Representatives. The Senate could override and amend any decision of the House, that is the commoners, purportedly for the good of the country. Ostensibly the better sort—consanguineous persons—were more capable of determining what was good for people than the people themselves.

All of them maintained there was, as Jefferson wrote, “a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue and talents.” Virtue is something you are born with. “[T]hat form of government is the best, which provides the most effectually for a pure selection of these natural aristoi into the offices of government.” There was, however, an “artificial aristocracy” made up of the plain wealthy who do not want equalization of property and will find their way into “every branch of the legislation, to protect themselves.” These men, it appears, are the ones we should watch for, “we” being both commoner and aristocrat alike.

Although Jefferson overrode John Adams’ push to give the pseudo-aristoi a separate chamber of legislation, he was yet blind himself when he noted that “wealth may corrupt, and birth blind them; but not in sufficient degree to endanger the society.” From above, this aristocrat looked down on the nouveau riche while considering himself and others of his “natural aristocracy” superior to the common man, maintaining that “members of those families happening to possess virtue and talents, have honestly exercised them for the good of the people, and by their services have endeared their names to them.” [all quotes from Jefferson’s letter to John Adams]

As Washington Irving noted in Rip Van Winkle, the only difference between the Georges was that after the Revolution his clothes were a different color. This brings to mind wolves and sheep.

Now ... you tell me ... what America is it we’re fighting to take back? Don’t we already have it? Including the part about the pseudo-aristoi getting into every branch of government and protecting themselves?

People ... what “America” are you talking about?

James Secor can be reached at shikejian@care2.com.

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