When, in the Course of Human Events…

By Mark Jamison –

As we approach the nation’s 250th birthday, we find ourselves in a moment that echoes the months preceding the issuance of the Declaration of Independence.

Jefferson’s primary purpose in writing the Declaration was to create a moral basis for separation. He tells us, “a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.” Jefferson then goes on to list the abuses he ascribes to King George III.

Consider the following abuses ascribed to George III by Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration.

• He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
• For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments.
• He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
• He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass [sic] our people, and eat out their substance.
• He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
• He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
• For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world
• For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent
• For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury
• For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences

Each of these charges has a corollary in the actions and Executive Orders taken and issued by the Trump administration.

Trump has abrogated treaties, abused emergency powers, and ignored fundamental precepts of the Constitution. Article I, which gives primacy to the legislature, has been dashed to bits on the rocks of executive orders that usurp and undermine the enumerated powers of Congress.

Armed, anonymous troops walk the streets of our nation’s capital, not in response to any need or request of the citizenry but merely as a show of strength. Trump has threatened other cities led by Democrats who are generally in opposition to the administration.

Trump and his minions have cut over $800 million in local and state policing grants. His claims of rampant, out-of-control crime are mendacious and without merit. Crime is at its lowest level in thirty years, and violent crime rates are higher in cities and states that voted Republican—yet Trump has taken no action against them.

DOGE acted without legislative authority to eliminate Congressionally mandated spending. Trump has fired Federal workers without cause and disassembled Federal agencies without legal authority.

The Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security have ignored fundamental Constitutional protections against arbitrary loss of liberty. The rule of law does not exist when individuals—citizens and noncitizens—can be scooped up by masked, unidentified thugs without warrants, habeas corpus, or any form of due process.

Having made clear his intent to enact revenge on those who had opposed or displeased him during the campaign, Trump has undermined the integrity and independence of the Justice Department, weaponizing it as an instrument of power not justice.

Trump has declared his intent to “liberate” areas of the country from their duly elected governments. He has made clear his intention to impose Federal power on those states and cities that did not support him.

Trump has usurped Congress’s enumerated power over trade and tariffs by making a mockery of emergency declarations and arbitrarily imposing tariffs for the flimsiest of reasons. Those tariffs act as taxes on the American public.

In short, the Trump administration has abandoned any pretense at due process, the rule of law, or following the US Constitution that has governed us for two-and-a-half centuries. In their obsession with undocumented immigrants, his agents have grabbed up both citizens and those with legal residential status in ways that look more like the renditions enacted by totalitarian and authoritarian governments. The practice of rendering people to gulags in other countries is both illegal and unjust and appears to be nothing more than an exercise of cruelty for cruelty’s sake.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.  ~ July 4, 1776

Martin Luther King Jr. was wrong; the arc of the universe does not inherently bend towards justice. People, working together, make it so. Community, solidarity, and moral vision make it so. Our two most important founding documents are aspirational.

The Declaration of Independence aspires to an ideal of equality. Our Constitution expresses an intent to form a more perfect union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, and promote the general welfare. But for all our hopeful aspirations our country has also harbored the worst of human inclinations.

In 1964 the historian Richard Hofstadter wrote about The Paranoid Style in American Politics. For all of our high-minded aspirations we have always been beset by strains of conspiracism, intolerance, and paranoia. Seventy-seven million Americans voted for Trump, slightly less than a majority. He had no overwhelming mandate to radically transform our form of government as he has claimed.

Of the millions who voted for Trump, many claimed to be concerned about the price of groceries, but is undeniable that many were driven by racial and cultural grievances and reactionary impulses. Some were driven by a heretical Christian nationalism, a philosophy that directly contradicts our founding premises. And, sadly, some are driven by cruelty and spectacle.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.
~ A. Lincoln, Nov. 1863

For those not captured or driven by the ugliest of impulses we have reached a crossroads. The events and executive orders of the last several days make it clear that we no longer live under the semblance of a Constitutional order. Trump and his minions like Stephen Miller and Russell Vought have made it abundantly clear that they are willing to use force and violence against Americans in order to cement their power. To believe otherwise is to deny the clear evidence before us.

George Orwell warned us about denial in politics, “All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome.”

Trump appeared at a press conference in the Oval Office with a hat that read: Trump Was Right About Everything. He demands tribute from corporations and universities. He classifies those who disagree with him as enemies. He ignores laws and courts. He puts troops in American cities without reason or provocation. These are the actions of a dictator. These are the actions of a fascist.

A Republic, if you can keep it.
~ B. Franklin, Sept. 17, 1787

When asked what sort of government the Constitutional Convention had devised Benjamin Franklin responded, “A Republic, if you can keep it.” Today every American is faced with the challenge of keeping the values expressed in the Constitution. The challenge exists whether we accept it or not.

A quote often attributed to Orwell—though it doesn’t appear in his writings—captures a current imperative: “In a time of deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”

In a time when our civic space is polluted with lies, misinformation, and disinformation one can commit the revolutionary act of seeing Trump for what he is, a fascist dictator, simply by telling the truth.

NOTE: The views and opinions expressed here, as well as assertions of facts, are those of the author. They do not necessarily represent the views or opinions of The Urban News.