As the Trump regime attacks the foundations of our democracy, Americans are fighting back
Writing the Declaration of Independence by J.L.G. Ferris
(Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson)
This Fourth of July marks the 250th birthday of a new
kind of nation state – based not on ancestral ties to a land nor
on the territorial reach of monarchs, but on shared principles about the rights
of citizens and the purpose of the state.
The Founding Fathers set forth those principles in the
Declaration of Independence: “All men are created equal” and have “unalienable
Rights [to] Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” “To secure these
rights” and to ensure that equality, government must “derive [its] just powers
from the consent of the governed.”
America has come a long way over two and a half centuries, but today we face a grave challenge from within – from those who occupy the White House and control Congress and the Supreme Court.
From the outset of the nation, the noble intention of
creating a society based on respect for human rights and the fundamental
equality of man was an aspiration, not an agenda.
In a sense the Declaration of Independence was an
invitation, after independence was won, to struggle over the inequalities that
marred the new nation: slavery and white supremacy, the subjugation of native
American peoples, the legal subordination of women, the limitation of voting
rights to the well-off.
In the course of 250 years, the equalitarian principle
has advanced.
A bloody Civil War won what Lincoln called “a new birth of
freedom.” Slavery was abolished and the Constitution amended to strengthen
government’s ability to safeguard the rights of African-Americans and other
people.
Women were eventually enfranchised and achieved formal legal
equality. The lawless subordination and genocides of Native Americans were
eventually recognized as the evils they are. The Civil Rights Movement repealed
American apartheid and restored rights that had been stripped away.
America is and always has been a nation of diverse peoples,
a multi-ethnic, multi-racial mix – and that is what the Framers and their
successors had in mind.
Indeed, the Declaration of Independence complained that King
George obstructed the “Naturalization of Foreigners” and failed to “encourage
migration hither.” Enslavers brought millions of Africans to our shores, and
America became their land as well. National expansion westward – the Louisiana
Purchase and the annexations that followed the Mexican-American War –
incorporated French, Spanish and Mexican people into America.
But today the Trump regime seeks to erase the diversity
essential to our national character. White supremacy and white nationalism are
threads running through nearly every policy – from ending
civil rights enforcement to discriminating against African-American
military leaders, terminating
refugee programs for nonwhites, slandering
Haitians, and calling Hispanic
migrants “the worst of the worst.”
Free elections, majority rule and democracy itself are
Trump’s targets. Like the fleeing crook who yells “stop thief” to
confuse the pursuit, the man who led a mob to attack the Capitol in order to
overthrow a free and fair election cried “stop the steal,” and nearly all
members of the G.O.P. supported his effort to overthrow the 2020 election.
Today, gerrymanders demanded by Trump are likely to
eliminate one
third of African-American members of Congress. The Supreme Court has
erased the protections of the Voting Rights Act.
Public confidence in our elections is eroded by evidence-free
claims of voter fraud, and voter
suppression lawss are making it more difficult to eligible voters to
cast their ballots, with zero evidence of significant voter fraud or of non-citizens
voting. Meanwhile, Trump seeks to outlaw
voting by mail, and his backers threaten to deploy
ICE to intimidate midterm voters..
In a functioning democracy, “Vote the rascal out” would be
the traditional response to a party’s leader whose deportations, tariffs and
Iran war inflicts economic pain on Americans across the board, who says he
doesn’t care about the voters, uses his office for corrupt profit, and rejects
the nation’s principles. Most Americans appear prepared to throw Trump’s party
out this fall. But Trump aims to democracy-proof Congress through
gerrymandering, voter suppression and possibly political violence.
On this 250th anniversary of our first
struggle for American freedom and democracy, we Americans are fighting back
against Trump’s war on what makes America America – in the
voting booth, in the courts, in the streets, and in our hearts.
The lesson of 250 years: Democracy is hard won and may be easily lost unless we are vigilant in protecting it. Come November, vote as if the vision of our Founding Fathers depends on you to safeguard it – it does.
Mitchell Zimmerman is an attorney, longtime social activist, and author of the anti-racism thriller Mississippi Reckoning. He's also a longtime contributor to Progressive Charlestown. His writing can also be found on his Substack, Reasoning Together with Mitchell Zimmerman.
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You may also be interested in my road-trip novel / social thriller Mississippi Reckoning. Read an excerpt. Read the Progressive Charlestown review HERE.
