|
i place great weight on the words of our founding fathers because history shows them to be men of brilliance, beautiful articulation, conviction, sound leadership quality and scientific genius. those traits are all part of what i want to be in this world. also, i feel the wisdom that can be gleaned from studying/placing weight in their counsel transcends contextual differences because those areas of the human experience are not subject to much change.
the primary objections to using our founding fathers as our baseline for how we should approach our present-day issues are often rooted in either...
-the unspoken premise that nearly all change is good. therefore, what we did 200 years ago cannot be as good as what we feel to be correct in the present-day. i disagree with this. civilization can progress and regress with equal velocity.
-charges of taking a quote out of context. this is nearly always a claim made by someone who opposes the other's perspective. the power of the founding fathers is so great in the public's imagination that all try to coopt their wisdom to create political capital. you'll rarely hear anyone (no matter how extreme their view or provably false their claim) draw clear lines between them and the founding fathers.
__________________
If you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance for survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves.
~ Winston Churchill
|