Maureen Farrell: The Founding Fathers Meet George Bush

" "The American system is the most ingenious system of control in world history," Howard Zinn once wrote. And, while one of the best ways to prove Zinn’s point is to quote him in the first place (Trust me. Someone is bound to protest), if recent history is any indication, many Americans would not only gladly give up freedoms guaranteed under the Constitution, but, in times of duress, have actively distrusted them. Consider the following:

* In the early 1950s, Madison's Capital Times editor John Patrick Hunter took to the streets with a petition, (which was actually the Declaration of Independence, along with portions of the Bill of Rights) and tried to get people to sign it. Only one in 112 did. The rest found it too subversive.
* In May, 1956, Senator A.V. Watkins (R-Utah) "was almost bowled over" when, during Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on a new sedition law, an attorney for Americans for Democratic Action cited one of Thomas Jefferson’s more colorful quotes: "I hold that a little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing." Watkins responded, "If Mr. Jefferson were here and advocated such a thing, I would move that he be prosecuted."
* After some California state employees refused to allow statements from the Bill of Rights to be posted because they were too controversial, Chief Justice Earl Warren admitted: "It is straws in the wind like this which cause some thoughtful people to ask the question whether ratification of the Bill of Rights could be obtained today if we were faced squarely with the issue."
* Years ago, historian Charles S. Beard noted that, "You need only reflect that one of the best ways to get yourself a reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go about repeating the very phrases which our founding fathers used in the struggle for independence."

Even more recently, in the fall of 2002, a poll indicated that nearly half of all Americans think the First Amendment "goes too far," while in the spring of 2003 (more than a year before B-actor turned President Ronald Reagan was lauded on TV for days on end), a VH-1 poll showed that fifty-four percent of US citizens believe it's "inappropriate" for celebrities to make political statements.
And so, as July 4th approaches, the divide between patriotic Americans who ache to preserve what’s left of our republic and nationalistic Americans who unwittingly embrace empire is more explosive than a beachside fireworks display. Confusingly, however, those in the latter group often shamelessly back any draconian measure the Bush administration takes "in the fight for freedom," while scoffing at concerns over preserving our freedoms at home.
Yet at this crucial juncture in American history – when analysts are all but screaming about the dangers lurking from within – our nation’s first capital is teeming with bittersweet reminders. A trip to Philadelphia’s Independence Hall, for example, invokes not only the phantoms of yesteryear, but the spirit of America herself. Because whether you’re casting a gaze towards the chair in which George Washington presided over the Constitutional Convention or eying the spot Ben Franklin occupied during the Second Continental Congress, the energy inside Pennsylvania Assembly room is palpable.
Down the street, at 7th and Market, sits the Graff House – the site where Thomas Jefferson penned the Declaration of Independence. Upstairs, two rooms Jefferson rented are convincingly recreated, while downstairs, copies of initial and finished drafts of the Declaration dot the walls. Next to those is a framed quote from philosopher John Locke, from whom Jefferson borrowed heavily. "Great mistakes in the ruling part, will be borne by the people without mutiny or murmur," Locke wrote. "But if a long train of abuses. . . all tending the same way, make the design visible to the people. . . it is not to be wondered that they should then rouse themselves, and endeavor to put the rule into such hands which may secure to them the end for which government was at first erected."
Now that we’ve been assaulted by a barrage of abuses, all tending the same way, it’s impossible not to wonder what the founding fathers would think about the state of our union. "I believe, as a Jefferson scholar who's worked at this for fifteen years, if Jefferson could see what's going on now, he'd be appalled by what the United States is doing," Thomas Jefferson Radio Hour's Clay Jenkinson said, on the eve of preventative war in Iraq.
And, of course, at the close of the Constitutional Convention, when someone asked Ben Franklin what type of government the framers had drafted, he famously and presciently replied, "A republic, if you can keep it." "