Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. Howsoever, this has not been our history, it is not our present reality, and who knows what the future might hold. This first amendment, flys in the face of empires and kingdom's throughout time.
In Plato's Republic, he writes that it is not only the right, but the necessity to falsely represent yourselves, in order to maintain order. Of course this is a paraphrase, but it is true to the original, penned in a language few can read, and even fewer can translate to the modern tongues. It is truly remarkable that in the times before the printing press, so much history and so many teaching's/writing's have been retained. Scroll's, and other archeological finds have been our most trusted views of past civilizations and historical figures.
The idea of a false "more perfect union" originated in ancient Greece when the city states became one nation. Censorship was already afoot, which is why Pythagoras founded his academy in Italy, so they would be free of government dictates. In Rome, if a senator or other citizen opposed the action of the senate, they were free to state their objections in the public square, however, if they received a thumbs down from the crowd, they were put to death. The crusades and inquisitions of the church should be more than enough to convince you that freedom of speech is not fundamental to religious institutions.
With the printing press came a better world view of other nations, other governments and past failures, and revolutions resulted. A few kingdoms fell, but the world provided seemingly unlimited wealth, resources, adventure and indigenous people's to engage their army's. What we older readers were taught in school, was that very good and courageous explorer's risked their all, to serve God and the King/Queen, though the Kings and Kings served the church much more than they served God.
So, with the growth of the colonies, starting in 1654, the white, educated, European forefather's got fed up with their subservient role with England. As the Northern colonies established manufacturing and other necessary foundations of self-sufficiency, the fractures were already revealing an unspoken future truth. The church of England, (mostly North America), and the Catholic church (South and central America), had been key players in European expansionism. Our learned forefather's knew the dangers of church authority, and thus, we became the first major entity to severe the interdependency with the church, and separate the two within our constitution. Plato would only require a few years to land in the new America's, and as Thomas Jefferson predicted, the best would be devoured by the monied interests. Thomas predicted 10 years; it was much less.
The 20th century saw the early anti-sedition laws, empowering Putnam and J. Edgar to arrest, incarcerate and deport many groups of Americans. Some of the banned writings included possession of the writings of Thomas Jefferson. The 20's and 30's saw the migration of some of our finest, like Chaplin, Robison and Baker. First to Germany, then with the rise of Hitler, to France. Post war, we had the blacklisting, yellow journalism, public hearings and lives ruined, over speech and belief's. 3 number one songs within a year, the Weaver's would be blacklisted and banned from FCC airwaves beginning in 1950.
Few have dared to speak openly about the rot and filth of so many governments, fearing the fate of Robert Kennedy, Martin, John, Malcolm and so many others. So, I guess the moral of this blog, can best be paraphrased by Lee Hayes of the Weaver's. In their song, "So long, its been good to know you" Hayes could often be heard saying, "the past is not what it is cracked up to be", never was, never will be.
Comments