‘Ancient Principles’ Birthed the Greatest Nation the World Has Ever Known

By Trevor Thomas

From the article,

in order to persuade his fellow delegates to vote in favor of the Constitution, Samuel Langdon, a distinguished theologian and scholar, delivered an “election sermon” entitled, The Republic of the Israelites an Example to the American States.

After beginning by quoting Deuteronomy 4:5-8 in his sermon, Langdon noted,

[T]he Israelites may be considered as a pattern to the world in all ages; and from them we may learn what will exalt our character, and what will depress and bring us to ruin. Let us therefore look over their constitution and laws, enquire into their practice, and observe how their prosperity and fame depended on their strict observance of the divine commands both as to their government and religion.

Langdon then gave an account of how Moses, upon the wise counsel of his father-in-law Jethro, “the priest of Midian,” set up a republican form of government, with representatives (“leaders,” “rulers,” “judges,” depending on the biblical translation) from groups of thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens. In addition, 70 elders, or wise-men — a type of national Senate as described by biblical and Jewish scholars — were selected by Moses and approved by the consent of the people.

Langdon added,

A government thus settled on republican principles, required laws; without which it must have degenerated immediately into aristocracy, or absolute monarchy. But God did not leave a people, wholly unskilled in legislation, to make laws for themselves: he took this important matter wholly into His own hands, and beside the moral laws of the two tables, which directed their conduct as individuals, gave them by Moses a complete code of judicial laws.

“About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.”

— Calvin Coolidge

As for the complaint that Trump is making the Fourth of July “political”, such a complaint would stun people like Presidents Lincoln, Jefferson, Madison, and Adams all of whom (and more) celebrated Independence Day with a show of military force.

Let’s be clear: the Fourth of July is a political holiday because the American revolution was the quintessentially political act. More specifically, the revolution was a military action that, among other purposes, enabled us “to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them.“

It’s completely just and good, moral and right that the U.S. military, yes with tanks and warplanes, should be part of the celebration, if not a key part, of the founding of our nation by this  inherently political act.