The United States is 248 years old, and we are once again facing the dangerous dissolution of our democracy.
In 1863, Abraham Lincoln addressed the nation with the following words:
“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived, and so dedicated, can long endure.”
In World War II, a generation of Americans fought and died to preserve our democracy and to save the world from destruction.
Hitler was then the despot, the destroyer of Europe, and potentially the United States. Today, we have a Hitler here on our own land.
As Abraham Lincoln said:
“It is rather for us, the living, we here be dedicated to the great task remaining before us that, from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here, gave the last full measure of devotion… we here highly resolve these dead shall not have died in vain; that the nation, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
Today, 161 years later, it is still our task to recognize the enemy of our democracy, and join the battle to save our nation from destruction, whether from within or without.
“We are now engaged in a great civil war, testing whether this nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure.”
The civil war in which we find ourselves now, the battle in which we are presently engaged, is over the minds of men and women.
We now have enemies outside the country, and we have enemies within.
It is the task of this generation to recognize and fight against any force that threatens our nation, just as Lincoln advised. It is our task to dedicate ourselves to the positive values of our democracy, and to be ever watchful of the negative forces wishing to destroy them.