Promotion Of Rights Is Part Of Our Duty

January 10 is an extremely important day in the history of the United States, a day which should be recognized as a national holiday far more important than all of our presidents’ birthdays combined: the day, back in 1776, that Thomas Paine published Common Sense. At the time of that publication, the majority of the colonials favored reconciliation with England. Yet, six short months and 500,000 printed copies later, that was all changed forever: by July, the Declaration of Independence had been penned and the war was on. And the difference? Not mere opposition to King George’s tyranny, but the active promotion of American independence and the Rights of Man: Common Sense took colonial rebelliousness and discontent with the policies of King George III and channeled those forces into the positive direction of intellectual, not merely military revolution. Today, after nine generations, we are, with the “Tea Party” movement, witnessing similar circumstances of rebelliousness and discontent — and while this time the tyrannification of the American citizenry is being accomplished by our own government officials, the nature of the process is the same...read more