The duties of the people to be educated, moral, and to understand and control their government imbue a personal responsibility in governing their personal lives, and the state. Modern notions of rights dictate that the government should actually provide the methods and means of happiness instead of simply protecting the people to pursue happiness. Some of the “rights” of today completely conflict with the morality of national character George Washington hoped to instill into citizens such as many “gay rights” and “abortion rights.” But as Abraham Lincoln said, one “cannot logically say that anybody has a right to do wrong.”
Washington believed that adherence to religious principles and the belief in God’s Natural Law provided strong foundations for moral character. “Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, Religion and morality are indispensable supports,” Washington writes in his Farewell Address. “In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labour [sic] to subvert these great Pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of Men and citizens.” Clearly Washington would not see those citizens and politicians involved in the secular-progressive movement as American patriots.
Just as Aristotle wrote, a good man and good citizen requires moral character. The early American experience was indebted to religion for its existence and subsistence. Early settlers fled England for religious freedom. The Colonial education system was based around Biblical instruction and the
New England Primer, a book also laced with religious and moral lessons. Early American colleges and universities also had religious missions in administering education.
While the Constitution did provide a separation of church and state in the First Amendment, the understanding and application of that separation was far different than in today’s America. Where Washington believed in the instruction of religious and moral principles by schools
and politicians, the modern government would find such instruction unconstitutional.
Freedom of religion has come to be understood as freedom from religion. For any government agent to stress the importance of the duty of religious morality would be to show an intolerance and insensitivity to non-religious Americans. Such a system where the American people would punish teachers who strive to teach religious morality is uncharacteristic of Washington’s virtuous citizenry.
Washington viewed education as a necessity for the responsible citizen. Article three of the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 embodies Washington’s views on education as a means toward proper government reading, “Religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.”
Not only should the people have instruction in morality, but receive instruction in the principles and methods of a just republican government in order to be good citizens. The Declaration of Independence established that the American system of government and justice would be based on Natural Law principles with the power to govern relying solely on a free people. As Thomas Jefferson would write in a letter to Henry Lee, the writings of Aristotle, Cicero, Locke, and Sidney influenced public sentiment at the time when writing the doc-ument. Studying these writers, and other works on republican government, would be essential for the good citizen to fully understand the American model.
As a republican government, the people are in charge in facilitating their governance. Without personal sacrifice and duty of the citizenry, they would leave themselves to be ruled by oligarchs. They would be ruled instead of ruling themselves and their government. Such has become the case today.
People ask for their government’s permission instead of telling their government what to do. The people invite the government to run and regulate their lives instead of running their government, and taking personal responsibility for themselves. Politicians subscribe to socialist ideologies and reject traditional American values. Hedonism and irresponsibility have replaced virtue and duty as “values” of the American people. The Natural Law principles which gave birth to America have given way to secularism and relativism in a perversion of “freedom and equality.”
Instead of a people defined by a particular culture and values, our national identity now only revolves around a set of political principles, and misunderstood ones at that. Another powerful modern nation that relied solely on political principles in the unity of the people was the Soviet Union. As American ideology becomes more in tune with its former Soviet enemy’s, the good citizen and the good man can never be one in the same. America must then contend with the moral decay which caused the collapse of the great and powerful Roman Empire which began the traditions of Western Civilization that America inherited.
Washington’s embodiment of the dutiful citizen and his lessons for virtue and the obligation of all citizens to protect and defend the American way of life has fallen on deaf ears in the present age. The American government has not had to change to keep up with modern times and temperaments, it has changed due to lack of understanding the foundational principles of America by the people themselves. A just republican government cannot survive without a just people presiding over its governance.
Adam Cassandra is the founder of TruthOfANation.com. He is a native of Greenville, SC and is currently a graduate student at the Institute of World Politics. Mr. Cassandra's work focuses on the promotion of traditional conservative American values. He can be reached at adamcassandra@truthofanation.com
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