An original play,
now for reading only: "Sincere Liberty", by Phil Beaver
Outline:
Prologue: vocabulary and comprehending
the-objective-truth; 1199 words, Phil, narrator
Prelude,
The Star Spangled Banner, Rebekah
The George
Washington scene, Phil
The Star Spangled
Banner reprise, Rebekah
George Washington: integrity, justice, law, and good will; 236 words, Gordon
Narrator
James Madison: G.
Washington implied theism as private; 231, Hugh
Benjamin Franklin: delegates did not agree with “prayer
unites us”; 150, Connie
Narrator
We the People of the United States: the willing vs
dissidents; 66, Connie
Thomas Jefferson: opposing the Federalist Party; 79, new
role.
The first Congress: the first amendment; 50, Rose
Ralph Waldo Emerson: persons may cultivate fidelity to
the-objective-truth; 885, Holly
Frederick Douglass: physics and psychology of slavery are
evil; 1730 Diana
Robert E. Lee: on the-objective-truth decides to move to
a free state; 218, Charlotte
Narrator
The CSA: declaration of secession from the USA; 59, new
role
Abraham Lincoln: willing people (not theism or government)
offer civic justice; 97, Scott
Albert Einstein: civic people do not lie so
that others need not address lies; 1034, John
Narrator
Epilogue: 556, Nancy
Each human being is obligated to develop fidelity to the-objective-truth. (Modified Sartre)
Comprehending the-objective-truth, 1216 words
(introducing narrator, Phil):
Vocabulary for comprehending the play
• “Civic
citizens”: persons who collaborate for mutual, comprehensive
safety and security both for public connections and for private hopes. Humankind is
divided: civic citizens versus dissidents.
• Civic
citizens trust and commit to “Comprehensive safety and security for living” for
the adults, for the children, and for posterity including dissidents.
• Humankind
ineluctably collaborates to discover and use the-objective-truth;
resistance begs woe---misery and loss. Neither subjugation nor
compromise is sufficient to collaboration for fidelity to the-objective-truth. The-objective-truth emerges from physics, defined herein as mass, energy, and space-time rather than a scientific study.
• The-objective-truth
is existing actual reality, which willing humans work to discover and use for civic (personal) benefits. The unfolding of the universe is controlled by
the-objective-truth, and a higher power may or may not be involved.
• Willing
citizens use the preamble to classify civic issues about justice. Dissidents
differentiate themselves by taking arbitrary risk or being passive (perhaps ignorant) to actual
harm.
Narrator’s speech to explain the-objective-truth:
In the play, “Sincere Liberty,”
beginning with the George-Washington historical-revision below, it is essential to the audience to appreciate “the-objective-truth,”
so reader, open to new usage of old words, as I explain it. Also, keep the hyphens in the phrase the-objective-truth.
The-objective-truth exists. Humankind
works to discover it and make best use of it. (For example, most people don’t
know if there is extraterrestrial life and would not act on belief there is
extraterrestrial life, for example, spend money to send messages into unknown space.) The goal of discovery is mutual, human, comprehensive
safety and security.
Discovery works both in physics and in psychology.
Aware of humankind's ineluctable march to discovery, it is not necessary to "believe", for example, believe in
extraterrestrial life. We trust and commit to the existing statistics about
extraterrestrial life, even though we have not yet discovered
the-objective-truth about extraterrestrial life. However, there seems no harm
in someone privately or publicly considering extraterrestrial life. If so, it is alright to conclude, "I do not know whether or not there is extraterrestrial life," and assert that no one knows, since there has been no discovery---neither proof nor disproof.
Civic citizens, while responsibly
pursuing personal preferences or happiness, appreciate
the-objective-truth and therefore do not support opinion that may be
doubted or action on dubious opinion. For example, it is immoral to tax
the people so as to create and stream messages to extraterrestrial beings. The
civic citizen conforms to the-objective-truth while not yielding to opinion,
even his own.
Civic citizens mutually discover
public morality using the-objective-truth rather than submit to mysticism,
dominant opinion, emotions, or political power. Humankind progresses not by
force or coercion but by personal experience, by observations, and by
practicing fidelity. Willing citizens respond to what-is rather than what-may-be. Unwilling
people are dissidents, whether innocently, passively, or intentionally. For
example, in a civic culture, if the CDC reports evidence that smoking reduces
life-span and secondary smoke kills innocent people, civic citizens stop
smoking. Also, some personal dissidents stop so as not to risk harming other people. But some dissidents keep smoking.
When the-objective-truth is
undiscovered but an idea is proposed, voluntary public integrity requires responses like, “I do not
know,” or “I think so and don’t have to know in order to hold responsible hopes.” Smoking despite risks is not responsible. Regarding religion, both the believer and the non-believer collaborate for
civic justice yet privately pursue differing personal preferences. Borrowing from Justice
Antonin Scalia, civic “responsibility is the here, not the hereafter.” See homespunvine.com/lecture-justice-antonin-scalia-on-capitalism-socialism-and-christian-virtue/.
An objective culture records
discovered-objective-truth so that future generations may benefit from past
discovery and efficiently correct errors upon new understanding or new discovery. A free and responsible press maintains an objective journal. Thereby, the individual, both young and old, may acquire first knowledge then understanding so as to make personal choices at the leading edge of
moral discovery.
Key to
civic morality is fidelity. I neither know nor can alone discover
the-objective-truth, yet I can cultivate personal, comprehensive fidelity.
Both respectively and collectively,
the civic person develops fidelity to these entities: to the-objective-truth,
to self, to family, to the people, to the nation, and to the world. With independence
from dominant opinion about the-objective-truth, individuals may acquire the liberty
to pursue personal preferences: Personal, comprehensive fidelity is
made possible. Press personnel---writers, editors, and owners---who do not journal humankind's path to the-objective-truth are irresponsible.
Civility can be un-civic. Humanity
can be un-civic. Social convention is based on temporal civilization more than
the-objective-truth. Statutory law can be unjust, especially if it is derived
by coercion/force, arrogance, or dominant opinion. Some societies think crime
pays. Most civilizations are based on dominant opinion, often that people
behave only under force or coercion, a self-fulfilling convention.
Humankind’s collective quest for
the liberty
to live in peace is stifled by failure to promote freedom from arbitrary
dominant opinion. In other words, civic citizens promote the personal liberty so
each person may exercise human psychological power. Human maturity requires freedom
from psychological tyranny. Some societies don’t admit that individuals may
achieve comprehensive fidelity.
Personal independence is suppressed
by the world’s misdirected quest for a socio-political regime that fosters
freedom according to the “common good.” Unfortunately, much of the thought is
dominated by theism---mysticism---rather than the-objective-truth---discoverable
certainty. “Self-government” is possible through fidelity to the-objective-truth. The individual has the unalienable authority to behave according to the-objective-truth, even though government may, by force or coercion, constrain the individual. Each human individual has the authority and the power to spend his or her energy developing integrity. [Added on 4/26/2018].
These statements address civic
morality. They reserve private concerns and hopes for personal pursuit. In a
civic culture, no one is coerced to negotiate personal, heartfelt concerns and
hopes. For example, no one can impose on another person concern for a “soul” or
spiritualism. Only by denying civic morality, in other words public integrity, can a person believe that crime pays. I appreciate my person (life) more than my soul (afterdeath), but do not regret other people's opinions for them.
A culture with voluntary public
integrity coaches the newborn in three principles: 1) ignoring
the-objective-truth invites woe, 2) collaborating for comprehensive safety and
security is essential to each person's liberty, and 3) the human being may, through
comprehensive fidelity, conform to the-objective-truth while privately
developing personal hopes, arts, sports, hobbies, and other personal interests---in other words, responsibly develop private preferences, in other words, private happiness.
Because it springs from
the-objective-truth, the civic culture seeks neither dominant opinion nor
democracy nor mystery. Each willing person is in charge of personal preferences
that do not conflict the-objective-truth. Yet each person may privately,
responsibly test the universal unknowns. For example, be the first person to
fly using aerodynamic principles. The freedom made possible by a culture that
conforms to the-objective-truth facilitates the personal liberty to pursue
private interests. Thus, the traditional “common good” becomes conformity to
the-objective-truth rather than conflict over mysticism. Civic people accept
public interference --- force and coercion --- only on the indisputable facts
of actual reality. For example, no one accepts someone’s assertion that they
spontaneously contacted extraterrestrial life; such reports must be confirmed
by personal experience.
The-objective-truth differs from objective reality in that there is no constraint respecting intellectual discernment: objective reality may be false. The-objective-truth may be purely psychological. Einstein's example that civic individuals do not lie is both an intellectual/psychological discovery and an element of the-objective-truth. The-objective-truth exists, and humankind's noble work is to discover, understand and benefit.
The-objective-truth differs from objective reality in that there is no constraint respecting intellectual discernment: objective reality may be false. The-objective-truth may be purely psychological. Einstein's example that civic individuals do not lie is both an intellectual/psychological discovery and an element of the-objective-truth. The-objective-truth exists, and humankind's noble work is to discover, understand and benefit.
There will always be dissidents,
some of whom cause harm. Lies, are often, erroneously asserted as the-objective-truth
or facts. Justice may be achieved with iterative collaboration to discover
the-objective-truth. Thereby, law enforcement by either arbitrary opinion or
mystery is lessened; the liar cannot communicate; and the rule of statutory
justice, or republican governance, is continually improved.
Mysteries, such as religious
beliefs that have not been disproved, should not be disparaged for the believer. However,
mysticism has no standing in the collaboration for civic justice.
“Faith in reason” seems unwise.
Science is a process for study and the student may reason based on false
perceptions --- like a mirage. The object of study is discovery, and the
product is the-objective-truth, which does not respond to reason. However,
rational thought is essential to the acceptance that repeatable evidence
represents a discovery rather than a subject of imagination and for further understanding, for example how to benefit from the discovery. People may trust-in
and commit-to the-objective-truth.
A civic culture may seem impossible,
because it has never been attempted. But it has never been expressed as voluntary
public integrity by civic citizens using the-objective-truth rather
than competition for dominant-opinion. How could this concept have improved the
history of the USA? How could it be used to improve future living in Baton
Rouge? Those are the questions of the play, “Sincere Liberty.”
Fidelity to the-objective-truth empowers self-discovery.
Prelude:
The Star Spangled Banner
After the presentation, narrator describes the scene of George
Washington’s speech. Then a reprise of the first line of The Star Spangled
Banner introduces our George-Washington reader.
George
Washington; Gordon steps forward with authority and immense public esteem
I speak to you, fellow citizens, your Excellency,
the language of freedom and of sincerity. I am aware that those with opposing political
views may remark that I am stepping out of line as General of the Army. But my
past performance informs that I could have no egocentric views in freely expressing
the opinions in the following address.
There are four things, which I humbly conceive,
are essential to the well-being, even the existence of the United States as an
independent power:
1. An
indissoluble Union of the States under one federal head.
2. Commitment
to public justice.
3. The
empowerment of peace.
4. Prevalent
goodwill, among the people of the United States, so as to overlook local
prejudices and policies, to make mutual concessions for general prosperity, and
to sacrifice individual advantages in order to establish a culture of integrity.
These are the pillars on which sincere liberty must be supported.
Liberty is the basis, and whoever would dare to
sap the foundation, or overturn the structure, under whatever erroneous
pretexts he may attempt it, will merit the bitterest insult, and the severest
punishment which can be inflicted by his injured country. At the very least, he
is a dissident.
Narrator
after George Washington
Washington, a devout theist, sincerely appealed
to citizens for integrity, justice, statutory law, and good will, leaving theism
or none to personal privacy. He emphasized civic liberty and harshness toward sincere dissidents. Yet as fellow-citizen and religiously devout
individual, he prayed to his personal God for a good future. Washington’s four pillars seem to represent
the-objective-truth.
Washington’s 1783 message influences the
subsequent players to consider or encounter the-objective-truth. The players’
messages may influence today’s citizens to consider Albert Einstein’s 1941
civic integrity and Antonin Scalia’s 2013 separation of the here from the
hereafter.
James Madison, Phil
According to the theism by which I privately pursue spiritual hopes, it is the duty
of every person to render to the Creator only the homage he/she believes to be
privately acceptable rather than tribute that would be coerced by the
government. This duty is precedent, both in order of time and in degree of
obligation, to collaboration for a civic culture. Neither society nor government
may deny the citizen’s duty to the Creator. On the other hand, if a citizen
enters into any institutional religion, he must uphold both his civic duty and
his allegiance to the Creator. In other words, the religious institution can
usurp neither government nor the Creator.
In summary, to me, it seems an undiscovered
entity controls events, and a civic person ought to pay attention to that
mystery. Many citizens believe the Trinity controls events.
Esteemed fellow-citizen George Washington, on
June 8, 1783, asserted that the four pillars necessary for a nation to survive assign
religion to privacy. That is, responsible religion is not a civic concern. How attention
to the mystery of the universe is pursued and practiced is a personal matter.
Thus, the citizen who trusts and commits to
the-objective-truth, without developing theism, is equally qualified to
collaborate for comprehensive safety and security and statutory civil law. I
join Mr. Washington in this civic morality and resist civil imposition of any
popular theism such as factional Christianity or Unitarianism. I advocate civic separation of
church and state.
Benjamin Franklin, Connie
“I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the
more convincing proofs I see of this truth-that God governs in the affairs of
men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it
probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured, Sir, in
the sacred writings, that "except the Lord build the House they labor in
vain that build it." I firmly believe this; and I also believe that
without his concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no
better than the Builders of Babel....
I therefore beg leave to move-that henceforth prayers
imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations, be
held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business, and that one
or more of the Clergy of this City be requested to officiate in that service.”
Narrator after Benjamin Franklin
Franklin’s motion failed. Perhaps George Washington’s fourth
pillar, civic goodwill, plus most delegates’ inclinations to appreciate each
personal theism, none, or the-objective-truth, influenced the Philadelphia
convention to take full responsibility for actions and decisions. A 2/3
majority signed the draft constitution, leaving 1/3 dissident for reason or
none. Perhaps the signers incidentally defended the-objective-truth.
We the [Civic Citizens] of the
United States,
Connie
We willing people of the United States voluntarily commit
to and trust in the purpose and goals stated herein --- integrity,
justice, collaboration, defense, prosperity, liberty, and perpetuity --- and to
cultivate limited services by the USA for the people in their states, beginning
on June 21, 1788.
Civic people in our
nine United States of America hope the remaining four free and independent states will join the USA before national operations begin on March 4, 1789.
Thomas Jefferson letter to George Mason
I look with great anxiety to maintain our liberty and to
prevent it from falling back to that kind of Halfway-house, the English
constitution. I still rely that most of the people is untainted by Federalist
heresies. On this I build my hope that our experiment will still prove that men
can govern using the-objective-truth.
When you say, “There is a particular circumstance, little
attended to, which is continually sapping the republicanism of the United
states,” I recall slavery.
Congress in the First Amendment,
Rose Howe
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment
of integrity, or prohibiting
the free discovery and use of the-objective-truth; or abridging the freedom of
responsible speech; or abridging the freedom of the responsible press; or the
right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition government for a
redress of grievances.
Narrator
after the First Congress
In “Sincere Liberty”, the intentions of 2/3 of Philadelphia
delegates who signed the 1787 draft constitution prevail over opinions of
dissidents in the first Congress who in 1789-1791 bid to institutionalize
legislative religion or American theism rather than the-objective-truth. Also, "our" Congress provided for both citizens and the press to use free
and responsible expression.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Holly
Humankind is constrained to appreciate the perfection of this world. It is well worth the work of willing
persons to subdue it and enjoy life. The work to discover and understand
the-objective-truth has motivated humankind in all ages.
Beauty appears when heart and mind open to the intention for fidelity to the-objective-truth, which can only
be discovered. Then a person is instructed that humanity
is physically and psychologically powerful. To be good,
to cultivate fidelity, the human is born, low as the infant lies in
weakness. The potential the child appreciates is his own, though he has not recognized
it yet. He ought, he knows, although he fails to entirely comprehend.
When coached in innocence, or when by personal autonomy, he realizes, “I
comprehend that the-objective-truth is reliable. Therefore, fidelity will I
serve, day and night, in great, in small.” Then is the meaning of life
answered.
The child amidst the toys of his decade, is learning the action of
light, motion, gravity, muscular force. In civic connections: appreciation, fear, justice, appetite, and
the good. We haven’t articulated these laws, yet we read them hourly in
each other's faces; in each other's actions; in private remorse. Humans must comprehend
and articulate the moral practices which maintain every fidelity. Yet, intention is the
essence of all inspiration and motivation.
The intuition of moral intention is an insight of the perfect laws of the human
person. These laws execute themselves.
They are out of time, out of space, and not subject to circumstance. Thus; in
the human person there is a justice whose retributions are instant and entire.
He who does a good deed, is instantly ennobled. He who does a mean deed, is by
the action itself contracted. If a man is just, then in so far is he the good.
If a man pretends, he deceives himself, and goes out of acquaintance with his
own being; the taint of vanity or the least attempt to make a good impression
instantly spoils the outcome.
Fidelity rights wrongs, corrects appearances,
and lifts thoughts to harmony with facts. A humble man appreciates
fidelity. Speak the-objective-truth, and all nature and listeners help with
unexpected extension. Fidelity empowers appreciation, and becomes the law of
willing people.
These facts have always suggested that the world is not the
product of diverse power, but of one will: to discover the-objective-truth. Of
one mind: fidelity. The willing person cultivates fidelity to
the-objective-truth, to his person, to immediate family, to extended family and
friends, to the people or nation, to the world, and to the universe.
Whatever opposes either physics or ethics begs woe, because things
are made so, and not otherwise. As we are, so we associate. The reliable, by
affinity, seek the reliable; the vile, by affinity, the vile; the dissident, by
affinity, the dissident. Thus of their own volition, persons proceed into
happiness or into misery. Evil is merely lacking, like cold, which is the privation of
heat. Evil is so much death or nonentity. When a man strays from fidelity, he lessens
his power; his being shrinks; he becomes less and less; a speck, a point, until
absolute badness brings death.
Fidelity makes our highest happiness. Wonderful is its power to
charm and to command. It is a mountain air. It is myrrh and fragrance and
stimulant. By fidelity is the universe made safe and habitable more than by research or power.
Taking advantage of another’s fidelity may motivate unkindness and
subjugation and find no purpose or integrity. But the return to fidelity gives
and is the assurance that the-objective-truth is sovereign over all physics and
psychology. The time, space, mass, energy, and motivation seem to celebrate.
Intention to fidelity corrects the capital mistake of the
adolescent adult who seeks to be great by
following the great, or hopes to derive advantages from
another person. The reliable person demonstrates the fountain of all good
to be in himself, and that he, equally with every man, is an inlet into
the-objective-truth. When he says, "I ought." When appreciation and
humility warm him. When, using the-objective-truth, he chooses the good and
great deed; then, deep melodies from wisdom wander through his person. Then he can collaborate, and be enlarged by
his listening with intention to fidelity.
The intention to listen lies at the foundation of civic morality,
and successively creates all forms of collaboration. The principle of humility
never dies out. If a man falls into superstition, into emotions, nevertheless
he does not lose sight of the moral intention. The expressions of fidelity are
reliable and permanent in proportion to their purity. The expressions of fidelity
affect us more than all other works. Development of fidelity leads to integrity.
Discovering the-objective-truth never ceases, but it is guarded by
one firm condition: It is a response.
It is not instruction that I can receive from another person. What he
announces, I must either confirm by experience and observation or reject. On
his word, be he who he may, I can accept nothing. He may coach and encourage but
not instruct.
On the contrary, the absence of authenticity is the presence of
degradation. Let fidelity depart, and the things it made possible, become false
and hurtful. Then falls hope, the state, art, letters, even life. The doctrine
of the-objective-truth, being forgotten, a sickness infects and dwarfs the
establishment and lessens humankind.
Frederick Douglass, Diana
That I am invited to speak at
Corinthian Hall, Rochester, on the 4th of July, 1852 is, to me, a
matter of astonishment as well as of gratitude. In many ways, I lived these 34
years to prepare for this speech. To prepare, I reviewed major events in our
culture’s history. As you know, I am a former slave, an abolitionist, and a free
citizen. I speak for all Americans --- affected by the burden civic citizens
did not want yet have not purged: American slavery.
British colonists declared
independence from England, their colonizer. Thomas Paine, for example, wrote a scathing letter
against African slavery and American theism. It was the colonies against the empire
--- colonists and the slaves needing
relief from the oppressor! With colonists’ success, the African slaves would also obtain liberty. American theism would
overcome English theism. American law would overcome English law. Sincere liberty would be inevitable. Colonists styled themselves statesmen.
France, already at war with England,
led the statesmen in the deciding battle at Yorktown, Virginia. Retiring
from the Continental army, General George Washington, dubbing himself fellow citizen, envisioned a nation
predicated on “four essential pillars.” In the fourth pillar, inhabitants
voluntarily collaborate for mutual living.
In Paris, representatives signed
the treaty that recognized 13 free and independent states. British-American
colonists emerged American statesmen. Yet 8 states were slave states, and
importation of slaves continued.
During three years, the states’
confederation weakened. Statesmen, with George Washington presiding, drafted a
national constitution predicated on collaboration by willing people. They
provided for congressional representation of all inhabitants, scheduled the end
of slave importation in 20 years, and counted on future people for abolition of slavery. In
these 64 years since
ratification, emancipation of the slaves has not happened---domestic slave-trade has raged. Why?
The constitution is a
sincere-liberty document. Read its preamble, consider its purposes. Is slavery
among them? If the signers intended the Constitution to be a slavery
instrument, why can neither slavery, slaveholding, nor slave be found in it?
The constitution condones neither theism nor British common law. The signers of
the constitution tacitly provided to discover the-objective-truth in order to
reform injustices like slavery. On June 21, 1788, nine states ratified the
constitution, establishing the USA as a nation for civic people, hoping willing people in
the other four states would join the USA.
Every American citizen has a right
to form an opinion of the constitution and to express that opinion for
acceptance by others. Without this right, the liberty of an American citizen
would be insecure. George Washington inspired citizens with four pillars of
civic morality: integrity, justice, statutory law, and good will. James Madison
proposed personal theism. The-objective-truth is that theism proposes hope for
the soul (afterdeath), whereas the people need mutual, comprehensive safety and
security in person (life); in other words, the people want civic peace. So Madison civically
collaborated with Washington, and each continued their private religious
practices.
However, the representatives in the
1st Congress arbitrarily interjected American theism into civic
morality. Congress hired legislative ministers at the people’s expense.
American theism supports slavery: Slave states unjustly increased from 8 to 15
while free states happily increased from 5 to 14. The increase in slave states
happened on your watch and now mine, but I want no part of slavery. It is
unfathomable that our American theism supports slavery.
The 1850 Fugitive Slave Act converts
slave-states problems, such as Nat Turner's 1831 Rebellion in Virginia, into a national disgrace. The power is prompted by the Star-Spangled
Banner and American theism. The victims are We the People of the United States---you
and me. No fewer than forty Americans have, within the past two years, been
hunted down and, without a moment’s warning, hurried away in chains and
excruciating torture. Some of these had wives and children dependent on them
for bread; but no security was offered the family. In tyrant-killing,
king-hating, people-loving, democratic, theistic America, the seats of justice
are filled with judges who hold their offices under an open and
noticeable bribe. Judges are
bound, in deciding in the case of a man’s liberty to hear only his accusers! The Fugitive Slave Law stands alone in the
annals of tyrannical legislation. I doubt if there is another nation on the
globe, having the brass and the baseness to put such a law on the statute-book.
This is the 64th
birthday of National Independence, and of your political freedom. I am glad,
fellow-citizens, for in a nation’s youth there is hope. Hope is much needed,
under the dark clouds which hover above the horizon. My personally acquired
freedom is only 13 years old. But many slaves do not have my perseverance. If
our subjugation to American slavery --- your subjugation and mine --- was even
more mature, our oppression would be disheartening. Together we have the
opportunity to end this woe.
Citizens, the British-colonists who
declared independence from England were brave men. I unite with you to honor
their memory. With them, nothing was “settled” that did not comport with
the-objective-truth. With them, justice, liberty and humanity were “final;” not
slavery and oppression. The same is true for the brave signers of the
constitution. They scheduled the end of slave importation and expected you to
end American slavery. Now, I carry that obligation with you, but having been a
slave am more committed than you now are.
The Millard Fillmore administration
tolerates slavery and lucrative enterprise on internal slave trading --- wasting
the hard-earned fame of your fathers in order to cover your laziness. They
convert the circumstance of slavery imposed on this land into a willful politic
of racism.
In 1799, George Washington freed
his slaves. Yet you began building his monument in 1848 by the price of human
blood. Fellow-citizens, pardon me, but why am I called upon to speak here
to-day if you will not listen and reform? What have I, or those I represent, to
do with our national independence if the administration does not listen
and respond to this citizen?
I call on the-objective-truth when
I refer to us as fellow citizens. Who among us would not celebrate when all
inhabitants of this land are free of oppression and have the opportunity to
pursue liberty according to their preferences rather than someone else’s plans
for them?
You exclude me from this glorious
anniversary! This Fourth of July is yours,
not mine. You may
rejoice, I must mourn. Fellow-citizens; above your national,
tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions. Their chains, heavy and
grievous yesterday, are, to-day, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee
shouts that reach them!
I appeal to the-objective-truth
when I declare that the character and conduct of this nation never looked bleaker
to me than on this 4th of July! In the name of humanity which is outraged, in
the name of liberty, which is fettered, in the name of the constitution and my
Bible, which are disregarded and trampled upon, I dare to call in question and
to denounce, with all the emphasis I can command, everything that serves to
perpetuate racism — the great error and shame of America!
The-objective-truth is plain: “There
is not a man beneath the canopy of heaven that does not know that slavery is
wrong for him.” The physics and psychology of slavery is chains,
whips, guns, brutality, blood, and rape. People who use the Bible to justify racism
rebuke the-objective-truth. The Bible should not have been canonized with such passages! Such
arrogance begs woe.
What remains to be argued? Is it
that racism is not divine; that most American doctors of divinity are mistaken?
There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices, more shocking and
bloody, than are the people of these United States, at this very hour. The old
nations have reformed from the slave trade, slave-holding, and racism yet racism
continues in America. Behold the practical operation of the American slave-trade,
sustained by American racism and American theism. Attend the auction; see men
examined like horses; see the forms of women rudely and brutally exposed to the
shocking gaze of American slave-buyers. Tell me, citizens, where you can
witness a spectacle more fiendish and shocking, now carried out at midnight to
avoid the anti-racism agitation.
I consider the Fugitive Slave Act as
one of the grossest infringements of Christian liberty. If the churches and
ministers of our country were not stupidly blind, or most wickedly guilty,
they, too, would so regard it. The
fact that American theism does not behold “the Fugitive Slave Law” as a
declaration of war against religious liberty, implies that the church regards
religion simply as a form of worship, an empty ceremony, and not a
vital principle, requiring active benevolence, justice, civic appreciation and
good will towards man.
But the church of this country is not only indifferent to the wrongs to the black
race, it actually inspires the oppressors. It has made itself the bulwark of
American racism and the shield of American slave-hunters. Many of its most
eloquent ministers have shamelessly given the sanction of religion and the
Bible to racism.
I use the
term American theism to describe the current perversion of religion
which favors the rich against the poor; which exalts the proud above the
humble; which divides citizens into two classes: tyrants and slaves; whites and
blacks. It is an abomination against the-objective-truth. Americans: our republican
politics, not less than our republican religion, are flagrantly inconsistent! We
boast of love of liberty, our superior civilization, and our pure theism, while
the whole political power of the nation (as embodied in the two great political
parties), is solemnly pledged to support and perpetuate the enslavement of
three millions of our countrymen. You are all on fire at the mention of liberty
for France or for Ireland; but are as cold as an iceberg at the thought of
liberty for the enslaved of America.
Fellow-citizens! I will not enlarge
further on our national inconsistencies. The existence of racism in this
country brands our republicanism as a sham, our humanity as a base pretense,
and our theism as a lie. We have no integrity.
In conclusion, notwithstanding the
dark picture I have this day presented of the state of the nation, I do not
despair of our country. There are forces in operation, foremost, the willing people’s
march toward civic morality, which must inevitably work the downfall of racism.
The-objective-truth is plain, and the doom of racism is certain. Let us now
collaborate for reform.
Robert
E Lee, Charlotte
My dear wife, I was displeased with President Pierce's state of
the union message, in particular, his slant against the abolition of slavery. His views on slavery, while honestly
expressed, lack integrity. Territories like Kansas should, without bloodshed,
be admitted to the USA as free-states if that’s what the people want. There are
few, I believe, in this enlightened age, who will not acknowledge that slavery
and moreover racism as an institution is civically immoral and a political
evil.
Yet every Virginia-minster’s sermon I attend preaches that black
slavery is an institution of God. I think many in the congregations disagree
with the ministers. I agree with Frederick Douglass’s statement four years ago:
“There is not a man beneath the canopy of heaven
that does not know that slavery is wrong for him.” I oppose a god who would punished me for my skin-color or ethnicity. Black inhabitants, if freed,
would be both physically and psychologically better off here than in Africa. Free-states
are agitating for reform. Have ministers no regard for the-objective-truth?
Because the State of Virginia defends slavery and promotes racism
despite what I take to be the-objective-truth --- for our family’s protection
in light of Bloody Kansas --- I plan to sell everything and relocate to a
free-state. I know you will be relieved to no longer be a slave-owner, and we
will serenely, sincerely encourage our extended family and friends to also move.
Narrator after Robert E.
Lee
One flood experience can motivate a Louisiana homeowner to
move or otherwise protect the family interests. Likewise, the common-sense of
Frederick Douglass plus the lives lost in Bloody Kansas inspired our player, R.
E. Lee, to sell all the family property and move from Virginia to a free state
five years before the Civil War would prevent his liberty to choose---before he
would be entrapped in a wrongful war to defend his home and property.
The CSA
Next March
4, the Republican Party will take possession of the USA. The South shall be excluded,
and a war waged against slavery and God’s chosen race until it shall cease
throughout the USA. Hope of remedy is rendered vain, by the fact that public
opinion at the North has invested a great political error with the sanction of
more erroneous religious belief.
Abraham Lincoln, Scott
1861: Fellow citizens, seven
of thirty-four states have declared secession and threatened war. Why should
there not be a patient confidence in the ultimate justice of the people? Is
there any better or equal hope in the world? In our present differences, is
either party without faith of being in the right? If the Almighty Ruler of
Nations, with His eternal truth and justice, be on your side of the North, or
on yours of the South, that truth and that justice will surely prevail by the
judgment of this great tribunal of the American people.
1864: After three years’ civil war the nation's condition is
not what either party, or any man devised, or expected. I attempt no compliment
to my wisdom and admit that events have controlled me. God alone can claim it. Whither it is tending
seems plain. If God now wills the removal of a great wrong, and wills also that
we of the North as well as you of the South, shall pay fairly for our complicity
in that wrong, impartial history will find therein new cause to attest and
revere the justice and goodness of God.
Albert Einstein, John
Humankind employs a process for understanding. It seems to apply
equally in physics, mathematics, and psychology. Both humankind and each
willing person, who would discover the-objective-truth, seek comprehension of
relations which exist independently from the researcher. For example,
extraterrestrial life either exists or does not, regardless of humankind’s
expectations. In a civic culture, mutual appreciation is more satisfying than
hate. “Civic” herein refers to citizens willingly collaborating to live in civic
peace, responsibly allowing for difference of opinion within the theory of the-discovered-objective-truth.
In physics,
statements of comprehension may be cosmic discoveries. For example, the
universe seems to be expanding, yet may actually be shrinking or static.
Consider the
elementary equation of mathematics: 2+2= 4. In physics, 2 apples + 2 oranges= 4
fruit. Now consider the illogical equation, 2+2=5, which can occur in art and
in games; for example, the belief that team work can exceed the sum of each
member’s contribution. This belief often motivates each team member to
contribute more. This attitude may alter the physical or actual results. However, a 6’ basketball forward with a 4’ leap cannot shoot the ball over a 7’
forward with a 4’ leap. A 6’ forward, motivated to play to the fullest by the
team’s energy and support and his own natural ability may individually peak and
move beyond the usual physical limitations, perhaps to encounter similar
peaking by the 7’ forward.
Statements
of comprehension, such as integrity, are believed not to apply to the social or
cultural sphere of ideas. In the struggle for dominant opinion, this idea could
be expressed by the mathematical equation 1+1=1. For example, my theism plus
your theism equals my theism. Restated, the one intending dominance expects the
other to acknowledge inferiority. However, if the expressions of opinions is an
honest communication, respecting the difference of each person’s traditions, chosen
associations, and personal hopes, then the equation becomes 1+1=2. This can be
restated as my theism plus your theism equals our theisms or, put another way,
my theism is valid for me and your theism is valid for you. Civic justice is
possible.
The Dalai Lama has said: “The law of action and reaction is not exclusive
to physics. If I act with goodness, I will receive goodness back. If I act with
evil, I will receive evil back.“ However, in human relations, reciprocity often
fails. The Dalai Lama is a forced exile.
Furthermore, understandings have a common characteristic: each one is
true, false, or undetermined. Because we appreciate each other’s civic peace,
despite our differing theisms or other beliefs, we are willing to collaborate
to discover the-objective-truth, which may not be knowable to us
individually, just as we don’t know if extraterrestrial life exists. Regardless,
we each maintain personal hopes about our beliefs. But they are private hopes
rather than civic concerns.
The process for understanding has another characteristic. The noble work
toward comprehension and understanding does not include emotion. For the
researcher and the collaborating citizen, there is only being. There is no
wishing, no praising, no hidden agenda, no ideology, no pride, no contradiction,
no goal beyond mutual, comprehensive safety and security. Each person who seeks
understanding rejects coercion from anyone, and likewise behaves so as to not
coerce anyone else. When we recognize self-persuasion, gullibility, pride,
hubris, self-contradiction, we stop, in humility toward the-objective-truth.
Guided by understanding, we need not respond to doctrine like “Thou shalt
not lie”. Yet, we do not claim that it is meaningless to ask questions such as:
Why do we not lie. The reasoning might be as follows: Lying destroys confidence
in the statements of other people. Without confidence, collaboration is made
impossible, or at least very difficult. After a lie, the liar may fear future
dialogue with the deceived party, who in turn, may sense the liar’s fear. Contemplating
his own behavior, the liar may suspect the deceived party is also a liar.
Listening may become impossible. The liar may disconnect himself from the communication,
never recognizing that collaboration is essential to make human life possible
and therefore good.
Our commitment to avoid lying can be traced back to these demands: Human
life shall be preserved; pain and suffering shall be decreased as much as
possible. The person who develops a high level of integrity gravitates toward human
authenticity and collaborative association. He or she rejects fear and embraces
appreciation for self among other willing persons. Liars cannot connect with
others: they separate themselves, becoming dissidents.
Thus, it seems the process for understanding
can
apply to psychology as well as to physics. Ethical directives can be made
rational and coherent by logical thinking. If we can agree on some fundamental
ethical propositions, then secondary propositions can be derived from them,
provided the original premises are stated with sufficient precision. For
example, people expect appreciation to overcome hatred.
But what is the origin of these ethical
axioms? Are they arbitrary? Are they based on mere authority? Or do they stem
from humankind’s experience and are they shaped by these experiences?
Using pure logic, all axioms seem arbitrary, including those of ethics.
But they are by no means arbitrary from a psychological or genetic point of
view. They derive from our inborn tendencies to avoid pain and annihilation,
and from the accumulated reactions of individuals to the behavior of their
neighbors. Just as physics exists and can only be discovered, likewise ethics
exists only to be discovered. Just as physics may be vainly denied, ethics may be harmfully denied.
Humankind
has the psychological power to advance ethical axioms which are so
comprehensive and well founded, that most persons will accept them as grounded
in the historical mass of individual experience. Humankind’s experience has
been accumulated from 100 billion lives over some two million years. Therefore,
for an infant to learn ethics is a daunting quest, because humans are born
totally uninformed. Nevertheless each person, on becoming informed, has the
potential to enjoy some sixty years to discover and expand the ethical axioms
of humankind. The gift of life presents this opportunity and the potential for
such joyful meaning. Each newborn may continuosly live at the leading edge of civic morality.
Ethical axioms are found and tested
not very differently from the physical axioms. Understanding is what stands the
test of experience and approaches the-objective-truth.
Narrator after Albert Einstein:
Perhaps Albert Einstein’s light on the-objective-truth can
help civic citizens restore General George Washington’s four pillars of sincere
liberty: integrity, justice, statutory law, and good will. Antonin Scalia
admired Washington.
Antonin Scalia, 2013
The-objective-truth informs us that “Government is not meant
for saving souls, but for protecting life and property and assuring the
conditions for physical prosperity. Its responsibility is the here, not the
hereafter, and the needs of the two sometimes diverge.
It may well be, for example, that a governmental system
which keeps its citizens in relative poverty will produce more saints. The
rich, Christ said, have a harder time getting to heaven. But that would be a
bad government nonetheless. This recognition of the separate spheres of church
and state is not just a teaching of the First Amendment to the United States
Constitution. It is also, I think, the teaching of Jesus Christ who spoke of
rendering to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are
God’s, and who is regarded as not having indicated any preference about
government – except one: he did not want the people to make him king.”
Likewise, a civic person collaborates for civic justice
rather than to be kind or demigod; or claim to know
the-undiscovered-objective-truth.
Epilogue, read by Nancy
Tonight we considered how a 2017 possibility
--- fidelity to the-objective-truth --- might have helped thinkers in the past,
perhaps changed their messages. Their intentions for civic morality might have
been strengthened by the very phrase, “the-objective-truth.”
George Washington, 1783, sincerely appealed
to fellow-citizens of the thirteen free and independent colonies to collaborate
for liberty as integrity, justice, statutory
law, and good will. He tacitly reserved theism or none for personal privacy. His
fourth pillar negated classism or elitism. His principles suggest
the-objective-truth. His hope at the dawn of American enlightenment, neglected and
repressed by past generations, may be restored by our generation.
James Madison, 1785, expressed his deistic theism: a civil person is
motivated by private concerns beyond civic morality. However, noting
Washington’s 1783 message, Madison agreed that civic citizens who trust and
commit to the-objective-truth are civilly appreciated equally with theists.
The delegates to the 1787 constitutional convention did not affirm Benjamin Franklin’s
assertion that theism is essential to “the affairs of men.” The draft
constitution, which 2/3 of delegates signed, omitted theism and proclaimed
governance by willing citizens in their states. The willing citizens is the
subject of the entire document, not merely the preamble.
The preamble to the constitution for the USA,
as of 1788, offers the people
self-governance according to the-objective-truth rather than conflicting
opinions. Some people are willing to use the preamble to order civic morality,
but, so far, the people impose civil division according to theism-political partnerships.
Thomas Jefferson, 1791, had encountered that faction that wanted to restore English
common law and factional Protestantism, but had faith that the people would
collaborate to discover and employ the-objective-truth.
The first amendment, 1791, could be improved by the-objective-truth rather than religion
as well as responsibility in expressions, both by persons and by the press.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1838, transcended divisiveness and promoted the-objective-truth.
Had Frederick Douglass and the people in 1852 been empowered with our players’
appreciations for the-objective-truth, the people might have listened,
pondered, and emancipated black slaves without civil war. It was a
white-church-war for the-objective-truth rather than racism. The physics and
psychology of slavery is evil. Racism is evil, regardless of Bible
interpretation. That does not mean that civically moral believers cannot hope
for spiritual salvation through the Bible’s message to them.
Robert E. Lee, 1856, upon considering the-objective-truth sold his property and
moved to a free state five years before the Confederate States of America fired
on Fort Sumter.
The CSA, 1860, asserted more erroneous
religious beliefs and attempted secession from the USA.
Abraham Lincoln, 1861, asserted that neither theism nor politics could deliver civic
justice. Comprehensive safety and security may
come from willing people. In 1864,
he, erroneously or not, ascribed to God the responsibility for the Civil War.
Albert Einstein, 1941, asserted that physical discovery and psychological fidelity
come from the same source. His only example is that civic people do not lie so
that civil people are not challenged to respond to a lie. Freed to speak of
the-objective-truth, our Einstein seems more explicit and uses more examples.
Antonin Scalia, 2013, invited the devout Christian to collaborate for civic
morality based on the-objective-truth, reserving faith in Jesus to save the
soul. He opens the door to George Washington’s four pillars for a nation that
may survive.
This was only a play: we claim to know neither
the original speaker’s intentions during their lives nor the fictional
extensions to our time.
We, in 2017,
may behold and perhaps comprehend the discoveries of the past 234 years. We
cannot speak for anyone. We may learn, from creative reviews of historical
efforts, to establish civic morality. We may consider ideas for better
communications. We may perceive public integrity as collaborating for mutually
comprehensive safety and security or civic peace. We may create a culture
wherein it is understood that each person can responsibly pursue the heartfelt
concerns and dreams he or she actually holds rather than submit to ideas someone else has for him or her. We may use the
preamble to distinguish the willing citizens from the dissident people.
References
- The Star Spangled Banner (tune, 1777; poem 1814), freepages.military.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~worldwarone/star-spangled.html
- George Washington, loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/presentationsandactivities/presentations/timeline/amrev/peace/circular.html
- James Madison,
founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-08-02-0163
- B Franklin,
scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1045&context=wmborj
- The preamble, constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/preamble
- Thomas Jefferson, founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-19-02-0020
- 1st Amendment,
constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/amendments/amendment-I
- Ralph Waldo Emerson, americanunitarian.org/divinityschool.htm
- Frederick Douglass, historyplace.com/speeches/douglass.htm
- Robert E. Lee, civilwarhome.com/leepierce.htm and history.com/topics/bleeding-Kansas
- CSA, Declaration of Secession,
avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_scarsec.asp
- Abraham Lincoln, avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/lincoln1.asp and abrahamlincolnonline.org/lincoln/speeches/hodges.htm
- Albert Einstein, samharris.org/blog/item/my-friend-einstein/
- Antonin Scalia, homespunvine.com/lecture-justice-antonin-scalia-on-capitalism-socialism-and-christian-virtue/
Copyright©2017 by Phillip R. Beaver. All rights reserved.
Permission is hereby granted for the publication of all or portions of this
paper as long as this complete copyright notice is included. Revised April 26, 2018
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