Moral Authority and America's Promise

Submitted by Mike Gutowski (United States), Mar 19, 2003 at 22:29

The moral authority of any individiual or society is vested in the type of life the individual lives or the society cultivates. For over two hundred years, Americans have shown strength (overcoming all odds), resiliency (adapting to a changing world), patience and understanding (inviting and assimilating people of all cultures) like no other culture in mankind's history. Americans were so sure of their resolve that they put the values to paper and signed it (the Constitution), for all to see and inspect, as if they were offering a contract with and to all of the human race. The often tortuous and painful keeping of the promises in that contract have been born first, foremost and almost solely by Americans. Our moral authority to act in the world stage has been rewritten in the blood of our fathers, mothers, sons and daughters.

The failure of some of our citizens to understand thoroughly this contract is sad. Our free discourse and peacable assembly rights give us the power and the obligation to make our promises known as often and widespread as possible. The author pointedly exposes the weakness of those citizens who question the moral authority of America. They merely have to read their Constitution and ask what type lives are they leading to find the answer to the questions they raise about their country. When they denigrate those who are living up to America's moral ideals and promises, they are exposed as ignorant, willfully misleading, biased against the interests of their country, or subversives. Intelligent Americans know better.

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