On this day, we celebrate our Declaration of Independence from a tyrannical government.
As Florida Veterans for Common Sense (FLVCS) celebrates, we also remember that without the pen of Thomas Paine we’d have a different government, and in order to keep it, we must heed Paine’s warnings about tyranny.
In January 1776, Paine published a booklet, Common Sense, that sparked the American revolution with a new idea. Before Common Sense, the colonists blamed the king’s ministers and parliament for their troubles. Common Sense convinced them to blame the king.
Paine’s idea was that one man should not govern, but that the people themselves should rule. Instead of the divine right of kings to rule by fiat, Paine made the case that the law is king. Common Sense sets forth the democratic principle that a country is free when the people rule with a common purpose in opposition to tyranny.
Paine recognized that with freedom comes the responsibility to rule ourselves. We must be involved to shape our own government. Paine tells us that if we don’t, some dictator may arise who would assume the powers of government to sweep away our liberties like a deluge.
As Paine said in the first Crisis Papers, “These are the times that try men’s souls…” We see with our own eyes the efforts of MAGA Republicans to sweep away our liberties and government. MAGA still claims that an imaginary ‘deep state’ stole the last presidential election. Worse, MAGA tried sedition and insurrection to prevent Congress from certifying the presidential election. Also, MAGA submitted false slates of electors to change the election result.
As Paine warned, MAGA’s goal is to assume the powers of government to itself so it can impose its minority will on all of us. It gladly subverts the rule of law to do so. We see a march of tyranny before our very eyes. MAGA unconstitutionally limits voting rights, gerrymanders, fires duly elected public officials, takes away a woman’s right to choose, bans books, perverts education, and scapegoats minorities.
On this Independence Day, FLVCS members and supporters rededicate ourselves to Paine’s idea that we should rule ourselves. We will not allow a MAGA minority to impose its undemocratic will on the majority.
You are an Activist!
On this Independence Day reflect on the state of our government and rededicate yourself to make American the land of the free.
