“…Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you
my faith by my works.”
Book of James 2:18
No, this is not the Lost Crusader. You are in the right
place. The scripture text above just serves to highlight what I want to talk
about—the why and the how of America.
Have you ever stopped to wonder about why there is a United
States of America? Most of the time Americans simply take it for granted since
we have not experienced a world without it. People do think about it from time
to time however for I have heard many explanations, dressing Uncle Sam in
everything from halo to horns.
Yet, why America happens to be is not a mystery. The people
who created this country intended the reasons to it to be known to the world
and put it in writing. We call it the Declaration of Independence. It is a
document with some high ideals for the conduct of government exercised among
free people.
Indeed, including ideals that at the writing of the document
were beyond the practical application of the men who signed it. This did not
negate the principles they espoused but rather challenged them in their hopes
for and future practice of those things necessary to their attainment.
The Declaration of Independence is a message to the King of
England and to the entire world about why our rebellion was being executed and
with what we hoped to replace tyranny.
Fourteen and one-half years later after an open revolt, a war,
and some unworkable attempts at self-government, representatives from thirteen
independent countries ratified a single document to be the law of the land for
everyone. That document is our Constitution.
It did not come easily. People were afraid the new
government would quickly become as tyrannical as the king. People living in
small states like Rhode Island feared they would soon be under the thumb of
places like New York or Virginia. Some thought to abolish slavery as evil,
others refused to join if it was abolished. There were debates over words and
phrases and how local issues would be affected by them.
To explain what of the Constitution had in mind as to how
the new government might work and win its ratification by the states, James
Madison, John Jay, and Alexander Hamilton wrote eighty-five essays in an explanation that were circulated throughout the states.
The Declaration of Independence said why we were creating a
unified country, the Constitution told people in simple language and four pages
how it would operate. (Compare to the 2,700 pages of the Affordable Care Act.
Add in its regulations and the total is around 20,000 pages.) Little wonder one
of the Constitution’s writers said:
"It will
be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own
choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent
that they cannot be understood." ~ James Madison
Though the Constitution expressly assigns all legislative
power to Congress, (Article. I. Section. 1.) we have allowed the delegation of
that right to unelected people who cannot be removed by the President. Can be
removed only an act of Congress (Literally. Congress can remove them generally
only by restructuring or ending their agency’s existence.) These people are
also essentially unanswerable to the Courts, including, by their own ruling,
the Supreme Court. If you look at that Declaration of Independence closely,
these people are presently doing everything the English kings were accused of
doing. And we love to have it so, as shown by our devotion to masks and
experimental vaccinations.
Why America? Because we have faith in its principles. How
can we be America? By working within its framework. When we cease to do either
of these things, we should have the courage to refuse America’s benefits and
the name American.
Maranatha
