Second Coming of American Democracy (Copy)
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The Broadway musical Hamilton set box office records, largely on the seeming ability of this founding father to envision and prophesize our country’s future. While gone for more than two centuries now, Alexander Hamilton seems like he’s sitting right beside us, watching our political leadership fail, and observing the results of nativism, nationalism and populism that he predicted:
“A torrent of angry and malignant passions will be let loose…(and) they will mutually hope to evince the justness of their opinions, and to increase the number of their converts, by the loudness of their declamations and the bitterness of their invectives.
History will teach us that…of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the “people”; commencing demagogues, and ending tyrants.”
I believe if he were speaking to us today, channeled through the Hamilton depicted by author Lin-Manuel Miranda, he might say this:
“We need a strong. unencumbered federal government to fight for all its citizens, on many fronts. There is no longer a place for assaults upon our sacred and loved core values of equality, justice, fairness, and the pursuit of happiness. This is true for all who have landed upon these shores, no matter their circumstance. “
However…in fact, the foundation of our country’s democracy is eroding. The bedrock—our Constitution and Bill of Rights—rests firmly on the multicultural layers of our dead. Yet this bedrock, this binding agent for “We, the people”, has been flawed from the start by greed, arrogance, and entitlement. Thus, our continuing racial and cultural divide.
As I see it the following must occur:
First, we must secure our democracy through the assurance of an unfettered vote.
Our country's conversation must focus on who will have the integral responsibility to deliver on our sacred promises. We have the choice in the upcoming elections to write the music of our future. We pick the tune to which we will dance.
Second, we must reconcile with our past transgressions.
Doing this will call for a lot:
—redirection of our efforts to peaceful and binding national resolutions, while insisting on disarming the political party system which weakens the safety of our freely maintained democracy;
—rewriting or dismantle entangling alliances favoring one nation over another;
—paring down our overgrown military establishment; and,
—loosening the bonds and ties that define our corporate/elite servitude.
The people who continue to use our government for selfish ends endanger us even more than any threat from outside our borders. Their malice is not accidental, but a choice of arrogance and entitlement. It places them above “We, the majority,” of everyday people.
Third, we must ensure by amendment the guarantee of equal rights.
The Equal Rights Amendment must be passed. Many believe, today, as in the past, that we cannot handle truth and our economy cannot shoulder equal pay for equal work. They are wrong.
Now, more than ever, we are ready. This can be the second coming of American democracy. The moment is at hand.
So, what are we waiting for? Hamilton urged…
“…decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitutions on accident and force.”
We write the music of our future.
So let us sing.
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