Americans should take their Fourth of July to higher ground. What matters is not what politicians say on any given day but the principles and values by which Americans live. Regardless of how often government agents violate the Constitution, citizens retain all the rights for which our forefathers fought. Government has become far more oppressive and intrusive in recent decades. But we still have enough freedom to left to make it hot—at least sporadically—for politicians who trample the Constitution.
On the Fourth of July, Americans should recognize those who fought for individual freedom in past times and those who are fighting for it now. One of my favorite Washington Fourth of July events was the “Stop NSA Surveillance” rally a decade ago. That protest occurred one month after Edward Snowden began leaking documents exposing the Deep State crime wave. Thomas Drake, a former National Security Agency executive who heroically whipped the Justice Department in federal court, challenged the audience: “The government has given up on the Constitution. Have you?” Drake warned that “the acid of government secrecy is eating out the heart of who we are as a people” and that “national security has become the state religion.” His warnings are as true now as they were then—and the Fourth of July is a fine time to watch this video of Drake’s fiery speech.
To safeguard our remaining rights, we must keep up a spirit of resistance to official abuses and political lies from all parties. Federal Judge Learned Hand warned in 1944: “Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it.” On this Fourth of July, Americans should nourish that spirit of liberty by taking a long walk, drinking a good beer, or heartily cussing the politician of your choice.
Original Lyrics:
Complete version of "The Star-Spangled Banner" showing spelling and punctuation
from Francis Scott Key's manuscript in the Maryland Historical Society collection.
O say can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hail'd at the twilight's last gleaming,
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight
O'er the ramparts we watch'd were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket's red glare, the bomb bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there,
O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
On the shore dimly seen through the mists of the deep
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream,
'Tis the star-spangled banner - O long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore,
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion
A home and a Country should leave us no more?
Their blood has wash'd out their foul footstep's pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave,
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
O thus be it ever when freemen shall stand
Between their lov'd home and the war's desolation!
Blest with vict'ry and peace may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the power that hath made and preserv'd us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto - "In God is our trust,"
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
