When settlers came to this country, what began as a simple escape to perhaps a better life, a chance to expand, to own land and to grow, became a struggle for freedom and independence. It was not the dreams of most who came here that they were in search of freedom but after putting distance between the iron hand of the King and life in America, many settlers began to understand what true freedom was all about.
It certainly was no easy task. It took a great deal of time before Thomas Jefferson and the others could pound out a declaration of independence, especially knowing full well that it meant surely war with England but it meant freedom and the newly experienced freedoms were worth fighting for.
Most don’t realize that from the time the Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776 and the Constitution was passed in 1787, on at least two occasions some of the people wanted to give up on the efforts to secure freedom. They postured for a dictator to take over. Some thought Patrick Henry could do the job. Americans were scared. Even though they liked the freedoms they had in America, it was a different lifestyle and fearing the unknown resorted to the ways of which they knew, those from their past. It took strong leadership and the words and example of someone who believed more strongly than the people that the path America had chosen was the right path.
History has taught us that the people have always needed leadership. Even though the entire concept of being a free American was our strength founded in independence, celebrating the God-given rights as was recognized by our founding fathers, even realizing the ownership of land and property in order to pursue life, liberty and happiness, as human beings we still look for leadership.
The antithesis to liberty and independence is a powerful government bent on controlling every aspect of a person’s life. For those who understand history and have a real appreciation of what constitutes liberty and independence, will push back against the tyranny of a dictator or a government usurping the limited powers granted it by the Constitution.
Jefferson explained to his fellow Americans, who out of fear and confusion sought the strong hand of a dictator, reminding them of their past.
One who entered into this contest from a pure love of liberty and a sense of injured rights, who determined to make every sacrifice, to meet every danger for the re-establishment of those rights on a firm basis, who did not mean to expend his love and substance for the wretched purpose of changing this master for that, but to place the powers of governing him in a plurality of hands of his own choice, so that the corrupt will of no one man might in future oppress him, must stand dumbfounded and dismayed when he is told that a considerable portion of that plurality had meditated the surrender of them into a single hand.
A leader will never impose himself or his rule over the people. A strong leader can direct the people and bring their focus back onto what has and will make them great, make them the free humans God intended. The people are feeling imposed upon and are not comfortable with the direction they are being taken. The time is ripe for a leader, someone who will not make false promises nor seek to destroy American’s liberties but to restore them. A leader, who by example, will bring the focus of the American people back to a strength rooted in independence and freedom.
Tom Remington
