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Published: July 03, 2008 11:32 pm    print this story   email this story     

Government for the people, not vice versa

The nation born in the heat of a Philadelphia summer in 1776 turns 232 years old today.

This birthday comes at a particularly difficult time in our nation’s history.

We find ourselves still waging a global war on terror, with troops in harm’s way in Iraq and Afghanistan; our economy is struggling; and high fuel and food prices are putting a burden on the populace.

Add to this mix the heat of a presidential election, and you have a truly volatile concoction.

But we pause today to celebrate the birth of our nation, to celebrate liberty and independence.

How independent are we? We are free of tyranny imposed by a foreign nation, but we often chafe under the constraints of our own government.

Government should not be in the business of infringing on the rights of its citizens to better themselves.

Too often, however, we turn to government to solve our problems, rather than trying to work through them ourselves.

Thomas Jefferson once said, “A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor and bread it has earned — this is the sum of good government.”

Mark Twain once said this about government: “The government is merely a servant — merely a temporary servant; it cannot be its prerogative to determine what is right and what is wrong, and decide who is a patriot and who isn’t. Its function is to obey orders, not originate them.”

Patrick Henry saw the issue this way: “The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government — lest it come to dominate our lives and interests.”

As we pause today to celebrate our independence, we should ponder what independence really means. We should consider just exactly what our forefathers fought for in the months and years after July 4, 1776 — government that would do the will of the people, not vice versa.

We must remember, however, despite its faults, our government remains the world standard for democracy.

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