The Declaration of Independence

I face several classrooms full of community college students every year and confess to being appalled at the lack of any knowledge about their government or the significant history of our grand experiment in democracy. I try to teach my course in American Government as something more than a trivia contest. I try to talk about process and function and problem-solving and ideology. But, I usually find myself having to return to essentials, like what is a legislature and an executive.

When it comes to our essential documents, none have read our brief Constitution and usually after ten or twelve weeks in a semester I get tired of telling them it is an assignment from day one of the class. They simply don't know what is there, nor do they care to know. They want "hope" and "change" and government to fix things for them so they can Tweet and surf and FaceBook and listen to their iPods.

Confusion inevitably reigns between the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. They don't know what that document did, nor do they note that twelve years elapsed between the two papers, filled with a revolution and a faltering attempt at a confederation.

The Declaration was a statement of principles. It expressed fundamental beliefs and the violation of those principles was established as cause for revolt. It isn't, however, a document of law in our system.

On this week-end commemorating the signing of the Declaration, it is interesting to note this piece:

American Thinker Tells Us What the Declaration Isn't

The perspective is an important one as we watch the news unfold each day about the dismantling of our freedoms by the government which was charged to "protect and defend" them.

Maybe you should take a few minutes and scan through the words of Thomas Jefferson again:

The Declaration of Independence

I wonder what it would take to re-establish the self-evidence of that in Washington?