July 4, 1776 was not the day America was founded. If anything, that honor belongs to Sept. 17, 1787, when the Constitution was introduced to the Constitutional Committee in Philadelphia. Or, perhaps it is Apr. 23, 1789, when George Washington was sworn in as the first president of the new United States of America. But July 4 is a red-letter date in American history only because the Declaration of Independence was introduced to the Second Continental Congress on that day.
The Declaration was authored by a committee consisting of Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, Robert Livingston of New York, Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, John Adams of Massachusetts, and Roger Sherman of Connecticut. The document was authored mostly by Jefferson, with the rest of the committee making changes here and there. The Declaration contains references to God, but that by no means indicates that the official religion of the United States was intended to be Christianity; indeed, the Declaration is not even legally binding. At its heart, it is a persuasive essay that declares, in no uncertain terms, that the American colonies intend to separate from England, and then enumerates the reasons why.
The colonists were unhappy with their treatment by their king, George III. Though technically British citizens, American colonists saw themselves as different from their countrymen on the other side of the Atlantic. The sheer expanse of time and distance that separated London from New York was enough to create in Americans the sense that they were at once Englishmen, but also not Englishmen. Couple this with their sense that they were being treated as second-class citizens: they paid taxes to the crown, and yet had no voice in Parliament. When the king began to punish them for their actions – with legislation like the Townsend Acts (a tax on various manufactured goods), the Tea Act (a tax on tea), and the Quartering Act (a requirement that American colonists house British soldiers in their private homes, and the reason for our Third Amendment) – some of the colonists revolted. Southerners more than Northerners wanted to make peace with England (the former had more economic ties to the mother country due to its huge agricultural economy) and initially refused to support any resolution declaring independence from England.
This essay, though, is about a different George who only acts as though he were a king. Of course, his name is George W. Bush – George II – and he fancies himself the be-all and end-all of government. On this July 4, the day we celebrate our fracture from England, how true do Jefferson’s accusations of abuse of power ring when they are applied to the 21st century King George?
The Declaration begins with a statement that overturns everything an 18th-century Englishman would have believed about the nature of government: first, “that all men are created equal,” and that man, through God – or, more appropriately for Jefferson, et al., by virtue of his being a reasoning being – has inherent or “inalienable” rights. Rather than go with the top-down formulation that had characterized government in the West since the Middle Ages, Jefferson instead starts government at the bottom, with the people themselves. Taking a page from social contract theory, the Declaration posits that it is regular people – not deities or kings – who create governments, and create them for particular ends. If a government no longer fulfills the needs of the people who created it (and herein lies an implicit acknowledgment that even the so-called Divine Right of Kings was a human endeavor), then “it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute new Government.”
None of this is particularly relevant to our analysis; however, it establishes that governments spring from the bottom up, and not the top down. As far as the Declaration of Independence is concerned, governments ought to be created to serve the people, not the other way around. This has been the basis of western political thought for over two hundred years.
And what of Jefferson’s laundry list of complaints? Here they are, in bullet point format:
- He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
- He has forbidden his Governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, has utterly neglected to attend to them.
- He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
- He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
- He had dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
- He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
- He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
- He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
- He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices. And the amount and payment of their salaries.
- He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out of their substance.
This isn’t even the entire list of complaints against King George III. And yet, the list is not unfamiliar. Regarding item 1, George W. Bush has refused to assent to laws. He has repeatedly claimed that his powers as commander in chief allow him to ignore limitations placed upon him by Congress, most notably in the field of warrantless wiretapping, although he has also ignored the law in his signing statements and in his refusal to permit White House officials to testify before Congress.
Bush passes laws that are convenient. Recall last year, when the FISA expansion was about to expire, Bush – who claimed that such an expansion was absolutely necessary for the security of the United States – refused to sign a temporary extension of the law so that Democrats would be forced to either give him the limitless powers he asked for, without expiration; or face his public relations wrath as he berated them for not wanting to keep America safe.
Thankfully, item 3 is not possible in this country. Although, Bush has refused to pass legislation that would benefit large numbers of people, most famously SCHIP, which would have expanded government-sponsored health care for low-income children. Bush would rather that they use the private insurance system, which he thinks does a much better job at keeping people healthy.
Item 4 is also not possible in this country, since Congress is required to meet. However, in the early days of the Bush administration, the Republican-controlled Congress prevented investigations into malfeasance and corruption from going forward. Bush was also initially vehemently against the establishment of a commission to investigate the September 11 attacks. And then there’s the establishment of Camp X-Ray, in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, which was placed there because the administration’s legal eagles believed it was outside the reach of U.S. law. The Supreme Court nixed that notion in 2005.
Item 5 is definitely not within President Bush’s power.
Item 6 is reminiscent of the clamor about Michael Mukasey. Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee, concerned about Mukasey’s evasive comments regarding torture, did not want to confirm him. Bush challeneged them, saying that Mukasey was his nominee, and if the Senate didn’t want to confirm him, then there would be no attorney general. The Democrats did not call his bluff, and Mukasey – who doesn’t think that waterboarding is torture – is now in charge of enforcing the laws of the United States.
Item 7 is familiar to anyone who has tried to gain “legal” access to this country as an immigrant, or even as a vacationer. Homeland Security requires fingerprinting of every tourist or temporary visa-holder who enters this country. They’re currently trying to pass legislation to require fingerprinting when people leave, as well. And, with the latter plan, the administration wants the airlines to pay for it.
To people who say, “Well, why don’t they just come here legally?” it is clear that those people have never tried to come here legally. Without any well-placed business connections (and, yes, it is mostly business or other money-making connections that get you into the fast-track), an immigrant can expect to wait at least ten years before becoming a U.S. citizen. It can take half that time to become a permanent resident. The system is so confusing and bureaucratic as to render it unusable – to say nothing of the increased cost: almost $1000, up from $325 a few years ago. It’s no wonder that people come across the border illegally.
Regarding item 8, see item 1. Bush selectively enforces the laws he wants to enforce. When Harriet Miers and Josh Bolton didn’t respond to their subpoenas to testify before Congress, Congress ordered the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia to prosecute them for contempt. Bush, in turn, in his capacity as the chief executive, ordered the U.S. Attorney not to respond to the contempt request.
Item 9: refer to the U.S. attorney firing scandal. Yes, U.S. attorneys serve at the pleasure of the president, but all evidence points to the attorneys being fired because they were not sufficiently enforcing the political machinations of the president, who has been in a state of “permanent campaign” since his inauguration in 2001.
And, finally, item 10: the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, warrantless wiretapping, the USA PATRIOT Act, the abuse of National Security Letters, and Orwellian projects like Total Information Awareness have eaten away at our right to privacy so much so that Americans no longer possess an expectation of privacy.
Here we are, 232 years after Jefferson penned the Declaration, and we are – where? In the same place! We face tyranny at the hands of a king named George, who believes that he alone has the power of the entire government at his fingertips. We face a government that seeks to erode the principle that governments serve the people. We face an executive who is uninhibited in his protestations that he is above the law. We face a system that, if it had its way, would be able to delve into the minds of all Americans and know what each one is thinking at any given time.
Jefferson’s best axiom is not contained in the Declaration, but around the inside of the rotunda in his monument in Washington, D.C. If I may be nostalgic, the first time I read this line as an eighth-grade student on a field trip, I felt inspiration tingle up my spine: “I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.” Whether you believe in God or not is immaterial: swear on whatever you want, but as Americans, each of us is obligated to declare our hostility against tyranny over one of the most important things that has ever appeared on planet Earth: the mind of man (and woman). The "inalienable rights" Jefferson wrote about are what keep that mind up and running; without them, there is no freedom of the mind, and thus no reason to exist.
This Independence Day, remember that an American’s political loyalty is to the Constitution – not the president, not the military, not a party. For it is that Constitution that keeps our worst dystopian fears from coming true and from rendering the words Jefferson wrote as nothing more than vacant poetry.
