Absolutely right! And Lincoln said exactly that in his “Electric Cord” speech, delivered July 10, 1858, at height of Know Nothing xenophobia. He said we Americans take pride this time of year in being descended from the men who wrote the Declaration of Independence. But there are many among us now who cannot trace a link by blood. Lincol…
Absolutely right! And Lincoln said exactly that in his “Electric Cord” speech, delivered July 10, 1858, at height of Know Nothing xenophobia. He said we Americans take pride this time of year in being descended from the men who wrote the Declaration of Independence. But there are many among us now who cannot trace a link by blood. Lincoln continued, magnificently, “but if they believe the words those old men wrote, they are blood of the blood, flesh of the flesh….” of the Founders no less than we are ourselves
Vance’s Blut and Boden, and Heimat, have no place in our Republic. We, like our sister Enlightenment Republic, France, have phrases that minimize his ascriptive categories: “accident of birth” and “hasard de naissance.”
Shared histories are important, of course, but more important are shared and universal, “self-evident,” principles.
Absolutely right! And Lincoln said exactly that in his “Electric Cord” speech, delivered July 10, 1858, at height of Know Nothing xenophobia. He said we Americans take pride this time of year in being descended from the men who wrote the Declaration of Independence. But there are many among us now who cannot trace a link by blood. Lincoln continued, magnificently, “but if they believe the words those old men wrote, they are blood of the blood, flesh of the flesh….” of the Founders no less than we are ourselves
Vance’s Blut and Boden, and Heimat, have no place in our Republic. We, like our sister Enlightenment Republic, France, have phrases that minimize his ascriptive categories: “accident of birth” and “hasard de naissance.”
Shared histories are important, of course, but more important are shared and universal, “self-evident,” principles.