Marines defend America. Both abroad and at home.
Often when thinking of the defense of our great nation we think of distant battles. However, the defense of this great nation must also occur at home. The defense of America’s values, history, and liberties are of great import.
The battle of the hearts and minds of American’s is ongoing. The defense of good citizenship is necessary.
Samuel Adams (American Patriot and Politician of the American Revolution) stated:
The liberties of our country, the freedoms of our civil Constitution are worth defending at all hazards; it is our duty to defend them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair inheritance from our worthy ancestors. They purchased them for us with toil and dangers and expense of treasure and blood. It will bring a mark of everlasting infamy on the present generation – enlightened as it is – if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle, or to be cheated out of them by the artifices of designing men.
In light of above, with an understanding of a changing environment, we must remember
“The death of democracy [Constitutional Republic] is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.”
– Robert M Hutchins, American Educator and Activist in the mid 20th Century.
Benjamin Franklin understood the difficulties of maintining liberty. A brief story to illustrate that point follows:
The deliberations of the Constitutional Convention of 1787 were held in strict secrecy. Consequently, anxious citizens gathered outside Independence Hall when the proceedings ended in order to learn what had been produced behind closed doors. The answer was provided immediately. A Mrs. Powel of Philadelphia asked Benjamin Franklin, “Well Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?” With no hesitation whatsoever, Franklin responded, “A republic, if you can keep it.”
Thomas Jefferson, America’s philosopher of Freedom, had a few words to say on the matter. Let us think as he and defend our great nation from without and within:
Educate and inform the mass of the people…they are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty.
I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every from of tyranny over the mind of man.
Marine Corps League Temple, TX 