The American Plutarch

The Answer Is: Power, Love, Self-Control

Posted on October 2, 2016 by theamericanplutarch

I belong to a group of men, the Brotherhood of St. Andrew, most of whom are of the Anglican tradition, who meet weekly to discuss Christianity, and to share a meal as well as Eucharist or Morning Prayer from the Book of Common Prayer. Yesterday was my turn to do the scripture lesson, to present my ideas and interpretation of four readings, two from the Old Testament, and two from the New Testament. I discussed Paul’s Second Letter to Timothy.

During the course of the discussion, one man asked how an older person should respond to a young person who has embraced atheism. The following was my answer:

Atheism is a philosophy that is a figment of the imagination. It derives from a lack of satisfaction, from unhappiness, from feeling unfulfilled, from fear of the many tragedies that befall humans. How can God allow, if he exists, the many disasters that we read about, experience, on a daily basis? How can God allow the random deaths of children, cancer coming to a person who is apparently healthy and happy, tornadoes that sweep through neighborhoods, terrorist attacks, random murders of the innocent, civil wars, fires sweeping through apartment buildings, the attacks of 9/11, and so on, and so on? There are too many disasters and tragedies and chance occurrences that kill and dismember to list them all. Think of the hunger that exists, the poverty, the disease, the drug abuse, the crime. One wonders: where is God in all of this? God, why have you forsaken us?

These questions have been asked for thousands of years by thoughtful and despairing people who question God even as they realize He exists. God is so much a part of our existence that to deny Him is to deny Self, to subject oneself to never-ending anxiety about what was, what is, and what will be. Jesus on the Cross quoted Psalm 22, God why have you forsaken me?, rhetorically, for he knew that God, Self, never forsakes.

We live in times of terror, disaster, crime, racial conflict, economic woes—but of course all times are alike, never has there been a time of peace, happiness, love, plenty, unending fair skies and full stomachs. So, because each moment has sufficient cause for worry, humans, indeed all animals, fear.

Fear, timidity, cowardice, one could say, is the natural state of humankind. For how can we confront each moment of uncertainty with certain courage and faith? It is quite impossible, because the next moment of uncertainty comes, followed by the next, and the next, and the next. It doesn’t end until death. The anxiety of each passing moment convinces some people that there is absolute uncertainty in the world, that is, there is no God.

In Paul of Tarsus’s s second letter to his friend Timothy, Paul, in one sentence, summed the human dilemma, summed Christianity, and summed why atheism is a philosophy that is based on fantasy. He told Timothy that God asks us to be fearless: fearlessness derives from power, love, and self-control. The Greek word for power, dynamis, is the same word used in the Gospels to describe Jesus’s power in healing others. It is the power of love. And a person can only use this power of love by means of self-control, that is, self-awareness, to realize that love is found in oneself. And this love is God, for as John truly said, God is Love.

Love is a universal, a constant throughout time and place, found wherever there is hate, despair, tragedy, suffering. Love is the universal, the transcendent, the eternal, the infinite. The atheist proclaims there is no God, then proclaims that love exists, not realizing the inherent contradiction.

To discipline oneself, to channel love toward others, is a work of great power. It is the means by which love combats hate.

There is much noise in our society: television, movies, videos, cell, tablets, pc, iphones, speakers, headphones—the list goes on and on. Humans are constantly talking and listening, though rarely is the communication relevant. If a person retreats to his or her own room, there he or she might find God. A wonderful example of this is the song by Thousand Foot Krutch, “In My Room,” the lyrics for which can be found at this link: http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/thousandfootkrutch/inmyroom.html

In Defense of Great Books

Posted on September 8, 2016 by theamericanplutarch

Recently Yale University students asked their professors to stop assigning readings from English poets, as there is a preponderance of White male poets, and the White voice has been dominant for too long.

I teach at a college where the White voice is not dominant, indeed where there is incredible diversity in a variety of racial and ethnic backgrounds. Yet I still have assigned the Great Books, and in one class in particular, an Honors First Year Seminar class, I required students to select a Great Book of their own choosing, write a paper, and give a talk.

This assignment was color and gender blind. Students could pick any Great Book, by a woman or man, by a Black, Indian, White, Asian, Jew. My only requirement was that the book be considered by the intellectual community at large, by librarians and scholars and teachers, as a profound work of literature. Why assign such a book?

Reading a Great Book can engender in students the ability to examine a text, ask questions, seek answers, come up with a creative interpretation of what they have read, and write intelligent, critical essays, and make intelligent, critical comments, based on their reading and thinking.

Bacone College over the course of its 137 years has often sought to create the conditions under which students can achieve an excellent liberal arts education stimulating questioning, seeking, discovery, analysis, and rhetoric, which have always been the core of the Liberal Arts, which focuses on human expression and human experience over time in history, philosophy, religion, science, society, culture, government, and institutions.

The Great Books stimulates the traditional philosophy of the Liberal Arts, which was based in the Trivium (grammar, logic, and rhetoric) and the Quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy). These seven objects of inquiry and their modern equivalent form an important foundation for an educated person who pursues lifelong learning, provides an important basis for personal philosophy, and provides tools for success in a variety of careers. Liberal Arts involves the study of those subjects that open the mind and help bring about a free people. The seven objects of inquiry—grammar (English, literature, languages), logic (philosophy, deductive and inductive thinking, theology), rhetoric (history, humanities), arithmetic (numerical reasoning and inductive thinking), geometry (spatial reasoning and deductive thinking), music (arts, studies in culture and human expression), and astronomy (the hard sciences)—form the essence of the liberal arts: to question, to seek, to learn, to know, to accept others and oneself. The medicine wheel, which is the essence of Bacone’s seal, is the orientation of the campus, and has provided a philosophical basis for the college, is reflected in the Trivium and Quadrivium: spiritual seeking, emotional and natural thinking, focus on the intellect and past tradition, finding solutions to the manifold problems of life: in short, self-discovery. Students with such an education are prepared to engage in graduate level work in the humanities, social sciences, arts, and sciences; ready for careers in the public and private sectors; and educated for careers that require thoughtful, analytical, and articulate people.

The Liberal Arts is particularly focused upon a multi-cultural approach, examining cultural expressions, history, religion, society, thought, economics, and politics of Americans and other peoples of the world. Bacone College has a mission to serve American Indians and other historically under-served students in a Christian environment. As a Bacone professor, I reach out to students who are American Indians from dozens of tribes, African-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, Caucasians, and students from around the world, eliciting from them a questioning attitude about their own heritage and those of their classmates, seeking answers amid the cultural variety that helps bring humans together.

The Great Books, an essential component of the Liberal Arts curriculum, helps students to learn to acquire knowledge about the nature of humanity, helping a person to become more reflective about the self, which helps in developing sophisticated forms of thought, such as conceptualizing human experience based on analysis rather than guesswork. Knowing more about humanity over time, students break from human credulity to have a more critical assessment of life’s experiences. Increasingly in the 21^st century, human organizations and institutions—corporate, educational, governmental—seek thoughtful, reflective employees who can conceptualize phenomena, understand patterns, analyze problems, form hypotheses, and suggest and implement solutions. These employees, educated people who are engaged in lifelong learning, are literate and articulate communicators.

I cut my teeth as a High School Senior and College Freshman and Sophomore on the Great Books, especially the ancient Greek, Roman, Hebrew, and Christian classics from the first millennium BC and first millennium AD. I seek to inspire students likewise to begin their pursuit of knowledge by means of a thoughtful examination of the great words of a great mind between the covers of a great book.

Posted in books, General Essays | Tagged books, Great Books, Liberal Arts, Quadrivium, Trivium | Leave a comment

Narrative History Rescues the Past

Posted on July 22, 2016 by theamericanplutarch

“Narrative History Rescues the Past”–You’re not likely to see this headlining the latest news feed, though subtle truth rarely makes the news.

Moreover, narrative history is rarely sensational, rarely fantastic, and is (unfortunately) not imaginary, rather based on real people and real places; reality rarely captivates the way fantasy and the unreal do. Yet fiction is not likely to rescue the past.

Doubtless I appear to be writing nonsense: how can people living in the present, anticipating the future, rescue something that has disappeared, gone, never to be relived? The past can be remembered, recollected, but rescued? Hardly.

Stubbornly, perhaps, I maintain that the past can be rescued, and that narrative history wrought by narrative historians is precisely the means to do it; a good narrative historian is a rescuer of the past.

Take my latest book, The Sea Mark: Captain John Smith’s Voyage to New England. There have been many books written on John Smith, of course, and movies made, and poems written, and caricatures drawn, and monuments dedicated to—and more. Why would he need to be rescued, if by that obscure, if pithy, word rescue I mean to bring to awareness, to make known, in the present?

No, that’s not what I mean by rescue. But I am getting ahead of myself. Let me define terms. First, what is meant by narrative history?

Narrative history is an account of sequence of events over time restricted to actual sources or implied events; it uses the historical imagination to re-create a particular episode (if consistent with sources); it uses quotes from writings as a replacement for dialogue; it does not manufacture or imagine a plot, rather the plot occurs as a matter of course based on what really happened; it re-creates scenes based on actual experiences; events and sources guide the imagination and storytelling (not vice-versa); and it relies on honesty: honest use of sources, honest presentation of past, honest evocation of human experience.

A narrative historian must write about a person or topic for which they wish to re-live, re-create, re-experience. Sources must exist to allow for this mental exercise, as well as the penchant to understand human nature, which is gained by reflection into self. Added to this is a good imagination: to imagine the past, imagine what happened, imagine the people, then conform the imagination to the sources, to what really happened. Empathy unites, organizes, creates the whole portrait of the past: as the historian researches and imagines, visits places, he/she must feel, must sense the past, must empathize with those who once lived.

Empathy is the means by which the past can, as it were, be rescued. Empathy with another, even another long dead, requires a vicarious dialogue to be created in one’s head. This dialogue with the past was perfected by a highly imaginative philosopher of the 14^th century: Francesco Petrarca, who conversed by means of his pen and paper with past people, Cicero and Augustine: he asked them questions, and heard, in his mind, a response.

A dialogue with the past: this is how the historian rescues the past. This dialogue is a mixture of the subjective (feeling based on imagination) with the objective (reason based on sources); it is getting to know the past person: their habits, feelings, thoughts, interests, aims, emotions, accomplishments; it is dealing honestly with the past: the honest appraisal of person by not imposing one’s own point of view, one’s own preconceived notions, on the past, which is anachronistic.

To empathize with the past one must feel the past as well as feel the present. To understand the life of a past person, one must understand his/her own life. The historian’s own life helps to write the story of the past: the historian’s own feelings helps to understand past feelings; the historian’s thoughts helps to understand past thoughts; the historian’s experiences helps to understand past experiences.

In short, narrative history/biography is the story of two lives, one life explicitly told (the past person) and one life implicitly told (the historian or biographer). In studying these two lives, the life of the past person is rescued, comes alive in the present, to live again in the historian’s mind and in the words put on paper.

For an example, see

Posted in American History, Biography, books | Tagged Biography, books, history, John Smith, Narrative history, The Sea Mark | 1 Comment

George Washington and Providence

Posted on July 14, 2016 by theamericanplutarch

Jeremy Belknap, a patriot, scientist, historian, and minister in the late eighteenth century, wrote during the War for Independence to his friend Ebenezer Hazard, praising General George Washington: “A man is never more truly noble than when he is sensible that he is only a secondary instrument of bringing to pass God’s great designs.”

Indeed, one of the characteristics of George Washington was his humility before God, his realization that Divine Providence, the will of God, was the ultimate reason for American success during the American Revolution.

In his farewell address on leaving the Presidency in 1797, he told the American people:

“Of all the dispositions and habits, which lead to political prosperity, Religion and Morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of Men and Citizens. The mere Politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connexions with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked, Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths, which are the instruments of investigation in Courts of Justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect, that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.”

In short, the American Republic, and the supports of morality, peace, order, and tranquility, could only come about through a sense of reliance on God’s Providence.

He said further:

“Observe good faith and justice towards all Nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and Morality enjoin this conduct; and can it be, that good policy does not equally enjoin it? It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and, at no distant period, a great Nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt, that, in the course of time and things, the fruits of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages, which might be lost by a steady adherence to it? Can it be, that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a Nation with its Virtue? The experiment, at least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices?”

Government, therefore, must encourage, enable in its citizenry virtue, which in Washington’s mind was little short than humility before God.

Think of it: a nation, a people, who put God first, who put God’s ways, God’s teachings, God’s will, before all else. Would not such a nation be one of peace rather than conflict, order rather than disorder, love rather than hate?

Posted in American History, Biography, Christianity, God's Providence | Tagged Biography, George Washington, god, history, Providence | 2 Comments

Leadership? If Only Washington was President

Posted on July 10, 2016 by theamericanplutarch

If George Washington was President of the United States today, in 2016, would we have problems with anarchy in the streets, and the lack of leadership in domestic conflicts?

In 1782/1783, the American Revolution was drawing to a close, and the central government, the Confederation, and the thirteen states were practically bankrupt; the soldiers who had fought for the past eight years were unpaid; officers were frustrated by the apathy that citizens and political leaders had toward the men who had sacrificed themselves and suffered privation since 1775.

In this scenario, military coup threatened. Many soldiers and officers believed that if George Washington, the commander of American forces, did not take military control of the United States, all that they had fought for—peace and independence—would be lost.

Today, we hear that the Executive abuses the power of the office, bypassing Congress by issuing Executive Orders. What would it be to have a leader who resisted the temptation of power? In 1783, at Newburgh, New York, officers of the army requested General Washington to take power over Congress, over the States, with the military to back him up, to ensure that order and domestic tranquility would prevail.

Washington, six years before he became President under the Constitution of the United States, as the Commander in Chief of the Continental Army at the end of war, when, history shows, countries are susceptible to military overthrow, refused to consider the coup, the chance to become king or military dictator. His answer was a resounding “no.”

Washington during the war had often come under attack for his evenhandedness. His military approach of outlasting the British was frustrating to some, who wanted to see great victories. It was precisely Washington’s ability to stand above the fray, to exhibit uncommon patience, to calm tempers, to seek the higher, middle ground, that guaranteed his success as Commander during the Revolution and President of the United States from 1789 to 1797.

Washington had many faults of course. He had errors in judgment when it came to his beliefs and actions toward people who really deserved his support and protection. Nevertheless, for the time in which he lived, he had uncommon wisdom, and was truly a father-figure for the American people.

When was the last time we had a father-figure as a President of the United States?

But Washington was such a man. And even though the officers at Newburgh wanted to take military control of the United States, Washington’s wisdom, patriotism, moderation, and superb leadership prevented this from happening. It set a precedent. Unlike so many other countries, never in our history have we had a military coup.

Who else but George Washington could have led America to independence? Who else but Washington could have served successfully as the first President in the experimental situation of the new American government in 1789?

There has never been a military leader, a President, like George Washington. We need such a leader today.

Posted in American History, Biography, Government | Tagged Biography, George Washington, history, Leadership, Presidency | Leave a comment

And God Saw Every Thing that He had made, and Behold, it was Very Good

Posted on July 6, 2016 by theamericanplutarch

The title of this post comes from Genesis, 1:31, the final verse of the first chapter of the Old Testament. This final verse provides commentary on the sixth day of the Creation, in which God had, after the creation of humans, declared that they are masters of creation: “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.”

On this fifth day of Creation, God made humans “in His own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.” The implication is that other forms of life do not reflect the image of God. This is reinforced by God giving dominion over the Creation to humans. Later, in the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Old Testament, the power of humans to classify animals is given greater depth, and different animals are selected and chosen to be clean and unclean—notwithstanding, of course, that what is clean and appealing or beautiful is in the eye of the beholder.

During the course of the different days of Creation, God examined His work—the creation of heaven and earth, of light, of vegetation, of lights in the firmament, of creatures in the water, in the air, and on land—and “saw every thing that he had made, and behold, it was very good.”

The Creation, therefore, is Good. Genesis, speaking for God the Creator, makes a moral, qualitative declaration and judgment that the Creation is good. Humans, as part of the Creation, are therefore good. The Creation is animate and inanimate, is alive as well as dead, but now, in its existential present, it is good. Goodness is something that occurs through time, just as humans occur, and exercise dominion, throughout time.

The implication in Genesis, Chapter One, is that humans have the moral obligation to treat all things, all of existence, as good, to cherish, to embrace, to love, to preserve.

After all, on the Fifth Day of Creation, God created “every living creature that moves” in the air, in the water, and on land, and “God saw that it was good.” The declaration that the creation before humans are created is good indicates that humans themselves are not the sine qua non of goodness in this creation, but just a part of the overall whole of goodness. God wishes not only humans to “be fruitful, and multiply,” but He commands the birds, fish, and crawling land creatures to do the same. All life is to be fruitful and multiply, not just human life.

It is true, as we humans like to point out, that in Genesis 1:28, God gave “dominion” over other forms of life: this dominion includes to “replenish the earth” as well as “to subdue it.” Humans can hardly replenish that which they subdue if by subdue it means to destroy. Rather, subdue means to cultivate, to encourage, to cause to grow and thrive.

The point behind replenishing and subduing is to provide food: “And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for food.” In addition, “and to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creeps upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for food.”

Hence, plant-life is to be cultivated for the sake of providing food for all animals, including humans.

Genesis Chapter One does not inform us that humans can kill at will, kill and destroy whenever the inclination occurs to us, cultivate food to such an extent that we destroy other parts of the goodness of creation—rather, the goodness of creation implies the goodness of life, that life is good, and is not something to destroy, that humans are not, by having dominion, given the right to kill, dismember, torture, pollute, waste, and destroy in all manner in which humans, particularly in the past century, have done.

Does not the world’s philosophy teach us that hubris is the key to self-destruction? Do we not find such teachings reflected in Greek philosophy, Chinese philosophy, and Indian philosophy? Human arrogance, to determine our own destiny, to seek more knowledge than is good for use, consistent with the goodness of Creation, is the moral of the story in Genesis, Chapter Two, where humans arrogantly disobey God, take the fruit from the tree of knowledge, and as a consequence suffer humiliation, pain, and death.

Genesis Chapters One and Two provide us with the essential lesson of how humans should treat each other, other forms of life, and the entire Creation itself.

Posted in Christianity, God's Providence, Reflections on the Psalms | Tagged Adam, Creation, god, Love, psalms | 1 Comment

The “Best Administered” Government

Posted on June 26, 2016 by theamericanplutarch

The Constitution developed a system of government, federalism, that ideally is the best form of government, a combination of republicanism and democracy that balances power between the legislative, executive, and judicial. Federalism means that the Constitution is based on a working relationship between local, state, and federal government.

The first century of the U.S. under the Constitution featured an extensive, often violent, debate about the relationship between local, state, and federal power. At issue was the question: when does federal power trump state and local power, and should it?

The Constitution as written seemed to imply that federal power, the power of the whole, would trump the power of the individual, as represented by state and local government. This is the thrust of the Preamble.

But beginning in 1791 this apparent theme of the Constitution was altered by amendments, most importantly the Bill of Rights, such as:

1^st Amendment: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof”;

5^th Amendment: individuals cannot be “deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law”;

9^th Amendment: “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”

10^th Amendment: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

And later amendments, such as the 14^th: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

But, during the first 70 years of the 19^th century the federal government slowly grew in strength compared to the states. In the aftermath of the Civil War, the balance between state and federal power became more even, as Republicans turned more to a laissez-faire approach to federal power. But during the 20^th century, and continuing to today, the power of the federal government has expanded.

The reason: most politicians, and the two dominant political parties, sensed that federal power was not a problem but a solution. But is this true?

If there was any sort of balance between federal and state/local power, it ended in the 1930s during the New Deal. With Franklin Roosevelt, the President, in addition to those powers constituted (power to execute laws and power of commander-in-chief), becomes:

Economic Leader of the Nation: solutions for unemployment, solutions for prices, solutions for wages, solutions for relationships between workers (labor) and bosses (management), solutions for trade, solutions for production, solutions to banking, solutions to investment problems;
Legislative Leader of the Nation: President will propose programs to address all of the economic/social problems, then Congress will act on them;
Social Leader of the Nation: President is responsible to heal social wounds, to solve problems in society (race relations, labor relations, economic inequality, how to help the poor, education, drug abuse, immigration, and recently, gender and sexuality).

After Roosevelt, our economy/society/government became a mixed economy: some attributes of capitalism and some attributes of socialism.

The 18^th century English poet, Alexander Pope, in Essays on Man, wrote of government:

“For forms of government, let fools contest,

That which is best administered is best.”

It is difficult to debate Pope’s conclusion, especially in light of the history of American government.

The question remains, which expression, which interpretation, of the Constitution, is best administered.

I would argue it is as the Constitution written and amended, without the concerns of party politics and ideology. This is what Madison thought (in Federalist #10) that the Constitution would do, but he certainly did not anticipate the dominance of our two-party system and all of the hidden (and not so hidden) consequences that result from it.

Best administered, to my idealistic mind, is what Aristotle had in mind when he wrote that government should be the means of promoting virtue among the citizenry.

Does government promote virtue among citizens?

The answer to this question will tell us whether or not our government is best administered.

Posted in American History, Government | Tagged Alexander Pope, Constitutional Convention, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Government | Leave a comment

What does the Pledge of Allegiance Mean?

Posted on June 16, 2016 by theamericanplutarch

In America, the education of citizens in government begins at a young age at public school, sports events, church meetings, and other public assemblies. At such places and events people of all ages look to the flag, a piece of cloth made of three colors–red, white, and blue–, with thirteen stripes and fifty stars in a field of blue; we place our hands over our hearts, and we recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

What does it mean to stand before the American flag and say these words?
“I pledge”: to pledge is to commit oneself to an action or ideal–it is a singular act done not under compulsion but voluntarily.
“Allegiance”: allegiance refers to loyalty to a higher authority. Formerly, it implied a personal vow to a lord or king. Today, it means a citizen making a commitment to a state.
“Flag”: a flag is an icon, a symbolic representation of a people or group. It has been used since ancient times to identify people as common adherents to a place, government, king, or idea.
“United States of America”: a unified country with fifty states in a federal system of division of power. The United States of America (USA, or simply, America) is also an idea that represents freedom of choice leading people to stand willingly together under one belief (democratic-republicanism).
“One Nation”: Even in a pluralistic society we have one particular law that we all live under, one law that unites us, and that law is the Constitution of the United States.
“Under God”: Awareness that humans are dependent upon the divine, that a godless society cannot operate on principles of justice, liberty, and equality. Also a commitment to a society where God is recognized and worshiped. Nevertheless, we also have developed a tradition of separation of church and state.
“Indivisible”: that is, under a perpetual union: fifty states will always be equal, will always be a part of the federal republic.
“Liberty”: which derives from a Latin word that originally meant free. Hence to have liberty is to have freedom–of movement, of belief, of action (as long as liberty is consistent with order and the rights of others).
“Justice”: which derives from a Latin word that originally meant law, right. Hence to have justice is to experience a society that operates according to law and according to what is deemed right–a moral good.
“For all”: All is an inclusive word, meaning no one is excluded. All is in contrast to some, few, one. All implies diversity and pluralism, implies every resident in a given region. Over the centuries America has had a problem with the inclusion of all–women, Blacks, Hispanics, gays, Native Americans, Jews, Catholics, atheists, convicts, the poor, and especially, children.

Basic political ideas that are implied in the Pledge of Allegiance include:
1) Rule of Law: No human is above the law, which is based on assumed codes of what is right and good according to God and nature, the product of congresses of equal humans legislating codes and standards of behavior.
2) Democracy: “rule of the people,” a government based on the collective decisions of equals who directly participate in government.
3) Republicanism: “public matters,” a government based on representatives of the people who indirectly participate in government.
4) Freedom: free will of each person to have their own private beliefs, to go where they will, to possess private property, to worship as they choose, to present their petitions, to vote or select representatives.
5) Citizenship: a citizen is a member of a community who has rights of freedom and to vote as well as responsibilities to obey laws, work for the good of the whole, and promote and defend the community.
6) Federalism: a central (federal) government that works in cooperation with fifty individual state governments as well as with the hundreds of local and county governments.

The Pledge of Allegiance is something we memorize as children, often without the least understanding of what it means; and yet, it means everything.

Posted in American History, Government | Tagged Citizens, Constitution, Government, Pledge of Allegiance, United States of America | 2 Comments

Crevecoeur’s Vision of America

Posted on June 13, 2016 by theamericanplutarch

The French writer and philosopher Hector St. John de Crevecoeur, wondered in Letters from an American Farmer, written in 1782, “What, then, is the American, this new man?” Crevecoeur, a European writing for Europeans, believed that the immigrants who crossed the Atlantic Ocean to America were changed by the wide-open wilderness environment, and the social and cultural institutions peculiar to Americans. The European immigrant who had experienced the sameness and degeneration of European peasantry found in America a frontier environment conducive to feelings of liberty and opportunity. Land was available for those with the courage and energy to build farms from the forest. There was a profound sense of equality among the poor and middle class farm immigrants. America was not a land for aristocrats, those with privileges of inherited wealth and power, rather for the poor and downtrodden, the seekers and discoverers. The American in short, according to Crevecoeur, was a new human living in a new society that, like youth, was filled with purity, potential, and energy rather than the Old World society of Europe, stuck in the old ways and prejudices of a traditional society.

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Many of the images and concepts by which we best know America–such as the Statue of Liberty and its proclamation “Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”; the American dream of economic independence; the ideal of American democracy; the words of the Declaration of Independence–“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal”–give weight to the contention that America is still a New World inhabited by Crevecoeur’s New Man who lives according to freedom, liberty, and opportunity. Americans see themselves as the defenders of freedom and the open society throughout the world.

The American is most often identified with the idea of democracy, which promises much, though the reality always falls short. The promise is of wide participation in government, free and open competition among diverse groups, self-determination. Democracy offers the vision of individuals working together to achieve their own particular goals, using similar means to accomplish collectively individual wealth and freedom. History offers few examples of really successful democracies, success being defined as actual structures of government and society that make concrete the image that the word democracy conjures up. Democracy–like liberty, freedom, equality–is elusive, visualized in the mind and a part of one’s dreams yet never quite fulfilled……

Posted in American History, books, Christianity, Government | Tagged Declaration of Independence, Democracy, Hector St. John de Crevecoeur, Letters from an American Farmer, Statute of Liberty | Leave a comment

In Praise of Every[hu]man

Posted on June 7, 2016 by theamericanplutarch

Pre-eminent American historian Carl Becker in 1931 sounded a theme for the 1930s when he pronounced, “Everyman His Own Historian.” The great American composer Aaron Copland in 1942 composed “Fanfare for the Common Man,” a wonderful piece for horns and percussion that announced the greatness of the common person. As I am a very common man, these works have had a profound impact on my own writing. My research interests and my books tend to focus on everyman, every human, on the common man, the common person.

I have written about people in the past who are hardly household names: Jeremy Belknap, a New Hampshire minister; John Evans, a guide, mountaineer, and hunter; Thomas Nuttall, an explorer and botanist; Ebenezer Hazard, an early postal surveyor and businessman; Jean Louis Berlandier, an explorer, apothecary, and artist; and John Smith, a relatively obscure explorer and adventurer who through self-promotion and chance became quite famous.

Passaconaway’s Realm: Captain John Evans and the Exploration of Mount Washington

I have typically eschewed writing about the rich and famous: I suppose I could have added another to the hundreds of biographies on Lincoln, but would I have anything different to say? Rather, I enjoy studying those who have not beem studied, people who are relatively unknown, people who were among the billions of humans who have lived on this earth, most of whom are anonymous, unknown, unremembered. Whenever I research and write about a person who is generally unknown, it is an act of rescue, in my mind, of rescuing from oblivion, and bringing their story to the present from which people can know and learn.

This is what I like about narrative history: the story of a person in the past. I find someone I can identify with, someone whose life intrigues me, a life that I wish to relive, as it were, re-create. I love to read memoirs, diaries, letters, and other personal reflections into a person’s feelings, beliefs, and soul. Often, when these sources are sparing, I rely on empathy, the ability to make sense of a person, of a past time, to use imagination to feel the past, feel what really happened. As I research and imagine, and visit the places where people once lived, I can sense the past, and write what I believe is an accurate portrayal of what once was.

This involves what I call the dialogue with the past, a mixture of the subjective (feeling based on imagination) and objective (reason based on sources), by which to get to know the past person: their habits, feelings, thoughts, interests, aims, emotions, accomplishments. I feel compelled to deal honestly with the past: to have an honest appraisal of a person by not imposing my point of view, my preconceived notions, on the past (which would be anachronistic). To feel the past, I must feel the present. To understand the life of a past person, I must understand my own life. History is autobiography. Reflection on my life helps me write the story of the past: my feelings help me understand past feelings; my thoughts help me understand past thoughts; my experiences help me understand past experiences.

In short, narrative history (and biography) is the story of two lives, one life explicitly told (the past person) and one life implicitly told (the life of the author).

Posted in American History, Biography, books | Tagged Biography, books, Jean Louis Berlandier, Narrative history, Passaconaway's Realm | 2 Comments