Independence Day

This is my 1st new post in awhile, I was busy with school and then transitioned to my gunsmithing projects (see my other blog here: http://tincanbandit.blogspot.com/)

Anyway, on this 4th of July I though I would like to share some personal thoughts on what the holiday means to me.

This morning I took my American made Annin flag from my coat closet and posted it in the holder on my front porch. For those that do not know, Annin is America's oldest and most famous manufacturer of Old Glory.

http://www.annin.com/

It was an Annin flag that draped the coffin of President Lincoln, it was an Annin flag that the Marines hoisted atop Mt Suribachi on Iwo Jima and it was an Annin flag that Neal Armstrong saluted on the moon.

That flag represents some of the feelings I have for my country. We have come a long way from those Puritans who came here to gain religious freedom. In the early 1600s we had little technology, not much more advanced than the Greeks, Romans or Egyptians had. Yet in just a short 350 years we put men on the moon, we made jets that travel faster than a bullet, we created the richest country the world has ever seen.

I believe the reasons for our success lie in three important creeds. The adherence to a free market economy in which those inclined or motivated to make their own destiny are not only free to chase those endeavors but also reap the rewards for their efforts. 

The second creed is the belief in justice, equality and respect for the rights of others. Reagan packaged this sentiment nicely when he described America's creed" ....old-aged dream, the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order" 

That last part is important, we all know what Reagan meant by "consistent with law and order", it means that we live by a law that protects not only our rights, but those of others. We cannot hold rights for ourselves unless we preserve them for everyone.

The last creed is the belief that the government holds NO power except that which is given to them by the governed. The government derives its power by consent, not by force or threat of force.

The Declaration of Independence explained these creeds quite eloquently, many of us have forgotten those words (I remember having to memorize it in 5th grade). So I have posted the Declaration below, please read it and consider our current situation with the government that now rules the land.....

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.