In the notes of Dr. James McHenry, one of Maryland’s delegates to the Constitutional Convention, a lady asked Dr. Benjamin Franklin as he left Independence Hall on the final day of deliberation, “Well Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?” Franklin replied, “A republic . . . if you can keep it.” That was in 1787. Two hundred and thirty-three years later, Benjamin Franklin watches through heaven’s veil, his eyes blazing with intensity, as the citizens of America debate over social media.
John Locke lifts the fabric of time to watch how governors, police departments, and citizens respond to domestic terrorism of every kind in the year 2020, and says, “Where law ends, tyranny begins.” William Penn moves next to him as the terrorists, many of them citizens, act in moral aberration, and mutters, “Passion is a sort of fever in the mind, which ever leaves us weaker than it found us.“
Picking up the recent 86 page encyclical of Pope Francis, John Adams reads these words: “The right to private property can only be considered a secondary natural right, derived from the principle of the universal destination of created goods.” Adams moves closer to his fireplace, his irritated voice echoing loudly in the room, “The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.” He pulls out a knife and begins cutting the paper written with the short-sighted words. James Otis sits across from him and holds out his hand to receive the bits; then throws them into the fire. He agrees, “One of the most essential branches of English liberty is the freedom of one’s house. A man’s house is his castle.”
An unknown citizen of days gone by picks up the Boston Gazette. It reads: Let each citizen remember at the moment he is offering his vote that he is not making a present or a compliment to please an individual – or at least that he ought not so to do; but that he is executing one of the most solemn trusts in human society for which he is accountable to God and his country.
Two university students, one from Harvard and one from Yale walk together down the road. “And it is the best part of the day, don’t you agree?” The other nods. “Our universities would be in true error if the requirement to read the Bible twice per day was stripped from our curriculum. All knowledge without God is vain. There’s a reason God was quoted more than any other in the Founding Documents.” They peer into the fog of a distant time with alarm.
George Washington pulls back time’s curtain to observe the current state of the country for which he sacrificed so much. “The time is near at hand which must determine whether Americans are to be free men or slaves.” Nearby, Abraham Lincoln says, “The ballot is stronger than the bullet.” But I hope – hope and pray – that “the government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth“.
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John Adams on Property rights: A Defence of the Constitutions of the Government of the United States of America, 1787; James Otis on Property rights: Writs of Assistance, 1761; Boston Gazette, 1781; Images: Kids Discover; Fair Use; Unsplash Kelly Sikkema; Pexels.com