The Shot Heard! by William T. Newton I begin this morning after reading some thoughts from others, at those measured points in history when they too reflected upon a similar situation activated by their own observations and subsequent lessons; mine emerge from the recent election cycle and the results. Rose Wilder Lane wrote in “The Discovery of Freedom: Man’s Struggle Against Authority”: “Most men had better sense; most men knew they could do nothing and they stayed in bed, that night in Lexington. But one man got up. He put on his clothes and took his gun and went out to meet the King’s troops. He was one man who did not consent to a control which he knew did not exist. The fight on the road to Lexington did not defeat the British troops. What that man did was to fire a shot heard around the world, and still heard….. That shot was the first sound of a common man’s voice that the Old World ever heard. For the first time in all history, an individual spoke, an ordinary man, unknown, unimportant, disregarded, without rank, without power, without influence. Not acting under orders, not led, but standing on his own feet, acting from his own will, responsible, self-controlling, he fired on the King’s troops. He defied a world-empire. The sound of that shot said: Government has no power but force; it cannot control any man. No one knows who began the American Revolution. Only his neighbors ever knew him, and no one now remembers any of them. He was an unknown man, an individual, the only force that can ever defend Freedom.” In my opinion, symbolically, running for public office seems a lot like that narrative and as a result there are two thoughts which become my take-away lessons. It arises along the lines of that often quoted phrase from Edmund Burke concerning the ‘triumph of evil and good men who do nothing’. My first thought is that it was my duty to step forward to defend my community, to speak up instead of choosing to remain silent, to put at risk the safety one finds in personal obscurity and to forge a noble bond with my neighbors by the public declaration of my own beliefs and moral pronouncements. The fight on that road I chose to travel over the last many months did not defeat the enemy of Freedom or even Authority but it was a “shot” heard locally and hopefully awakened the hearts of those who had become complacent and under the belief that they were powerless. It has been said “One man with courage makes a majority,” penned Thomas Jefferson; and today we have become many. E Pluribus Unum or rather - out of one, many. When that courage is armed with principle and backed by constitutional precepts, it’s formidable. I did not receive the most votes this time, but I did secure the ‘best’ ones. Those ballots were from people who share the same obligation and their acceptance of that message is not diminished simply because of other seemingly over-whelming forces and so we persevere with our voice…..that still can be heard. As I alluded to there is that second thought. Throughout the campaign, I said many times that I wish there could be six more months to stump because it presented me the means to speak to people, one-on-one, who were otherwise disengaged in the operation of their government; people who were generally focused on the daily task of their survival against our ever-advancing battlefronts. A ‘campaign’ is just a battle, it is not a war. The Generals will sooner or later all act with impunity against those they have sworn to protect (a good argument for term-limits) so I prefer the rank of private, one marching in the streets and a campaign is the medium. I have personally witnessed the veil of ignorance lifting across the faces of oblivion. I have seen the uplifting spark of possibility in the eyes of the desperate triggered by awareness and the sweet taste of truth rising in their common souls. And I discovered that it was me who is inspired. The individual, who spoke, was you. The ordinary man, thought unimportant, disregarded without rank, without power, without influence walked out on the road that day and “voted”. “Not acting under orders, not led, but standing on his own feet, acting from his own will, responsible, self-controlling…….and he defied a world-empire”. That’s why I say…… “I did not receive the most votes this time, but I did secure the ‘best’ ones” and a New American Revolution has begun as we rediscover our Freedom and I trust you will find that “reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated”. “It is the common fate of the indolent (apathetic) to see their rights become a prey to the active. The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt.” – John Philpot Curran. (Speech upon the Right of Election, 1790).
Posted on: Sun, 09 Nov 2014 18:12:16 +0000
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