May She Always Be Free

[hounddoghowlie]

I'm not interested in fighting over political tropes. I am interested in discussing ideas and concepts that are central to the preservation of liberty. 

These ideas and concepts are far larger than any person or office held in the Land. If taken to their maximal extent and allowed to be realized they outlast all men whose faces are carved in stone or whose portraits line the halls of our most hallowed political institutions. 

These ideas will outlast the stones of the White House. Mt. Rushmore will crumble. All of our statues will oxidize. But those ideas will always be there. 

The founders did not give us a 'Republic if we could keep it'. They gave us an idea if we could nurture it.

Happy 4th of July. Long Live the United States of America. May she always be free.

here i thought that maybe reading these ideas would benefit this thread. just the first two paragraphs. not trying to step on any toes

In Congress, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, 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, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

Declaration of Independence: A Transcription

it's already lasted longer than anyone thought it would, and is the oldest current national government in the world..