0803 Family and the Republic
“No Government could be established on the same principle as that of theUnited States, with a different code of morals. The American Constitution is remarkable for its simplicity; but it can only suffice a people habitually correct in their actions, and would be utterly inadequate to the wants of a different nation.” So wrote Francis J. Grund in 1837. To make it completely clear Grund continued, “Change the domestic habits of the Americans, their religious devotion, and their high respect for morality, and it will not be necessary to change a single letter of the Constitution in order to vary the whole form of their government.”
Without a doubt, anyone reading Grund’s words through a liberated twenty-first century mindset would inevitably understand his reference to “domestic habits” broadly. While they would have the freedom to do so, that thinking would be woefully inaccurate. What Grund witnessed and wrote so insightfully about would make any historical revisionist cringe.
In Grund’s own words, what he came to admire so much about America was its pervasive commitment to “the sanctity of the marriage vow,” “rapid increase of population,” and “domestic happiness.” He saw “the domestic virtue of the Americans [being] the principle source of all their other qualities.” Another observer of American ways during that same time period, Alexis de Tocqueville, summarized the situation well when he wrote, “While the European endeavors to forget his domestic troubles by agitating society, the American derives from his own home that love of order which he afterwards carries with him into public affairs.”
Historians have noted that the success of the American experiment was based on the high admiration and unique legal position of the traditional family. Indeed, the case can be made that a proper understanding of both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution must be rooted in the founding fathers’ vision of liberty and happiness as rooted in the security and tranquility of the home as they understood it.
The gradual demise of the family did not begin until the so-called “sexual revolution” of the 1960’s. In 1965, taking its cue from academic liberalism and a swell of social rebellion, the Supreme Court shifted allegiance from the family to a newly discovered “penumbra” (shadow) of personal privacy lurking unwritten in the Bill of Rights. The Court’s realignment was clarified in 1972 when it decided that “The marital couple is not an independent entity with mind and heart of its own, but an association of two individuals…” As Carl Scheider has written, the last decades have seen civil nurture of the natural family turned to governmentally imposed redefinition and redirection. With few exceptions, the transformation has occurred, not democratically, but through royal decree from an unelected judiciary.
With that development began the destruction of the cultural staples which were part and parcel ofAmerica’s formally well-deserved greatness. National dissolution through natural family decay is easily seen in neighborhoods across the country were broken families are becoming the norm. The resulting lack of domestic stability, tranquility and security continues to feed no-fault divorces, youth violence, substance abuse and climbingSTDrates. Murdering teachers, scientists, doctors and future leaders before they’re born becomes the other guy’s problem or even right. Rather than avoiding high-risk sexual behaviors, more and more people self-fulfill and wait for cures late.
As each generation passes and the sense of natural family weaken, selflessness gives way to self. Under these circumstances it should come as no surprise that when only half of our citizens vote in national elections, they tend to vote for the politician who best promises the most regardless of character or proven ability.
As the family goes, so goes the nation.