Sunday, February 27, 2011

The Integrity of America


Alright, dear readers, your very, very long wait for a new blog is to be rewarded. I'm sorry it's taken me this long to get something up! This is an essay that I wrote back in the Autumn of last year for a national essay contest put on by The Bill of Rights Institute. Unfortunately, I didn't win the competition, but it was very fun and incredibly educational. The question I had to answer was "What civic value do you believe is most essential to being an American?" After thinking about it a great deal, I decided that undoubtedly the most important civic value to the institution of our country is Integrity. So below is the essay that I composed and submitted to the contest. I hope you enjoy it! Tell me what you think!

Gretchen

The Integrity of America
by Gretchen Wolaver


Integrity is the pivotal value of America. Without it the structure of our society
crumbles. The Founding Fathers desired to design a system replete with liberty,
empowering citizens to pursue happiness without the intrusion of an oppressive
government. They knew that this idea could only be realized if the morality of each
individual was self-imposed, negating the need for excessive government regulations
to maintain justice. A person with strong morals, they believed, would find the will
from within themselves to do what was right.

The Bill of Rights is a potent example of this expectation. Consider the 1st
Amendment: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or
prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the
press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the
government for a redress of grievances.” Yet the Founding Fathers knew that without
the exercise of personal integrity these freedoms of religion, speech, press, assembly
and petition would be abused.


Modern times have shown them to be right. I have been dismayed at how my
generation exhibits an increasing lack of integrity, especially in light of technological
empowerment. The internet has given my peers the power to broadcast lies about
others, often ruining their lives. Now our courts are attempting to decipher how to
bring justice to this new world of defamation. But how can they regulate something
as gigantic as the worldwide web without marring the First Amendment? This
modern crisis has underscored the importance of personal integrity to me, and has
deepened my resolve to speak out against such slanderous bullying.


Today’s political scene is riddled with slander and deceit as well. I cringe as
the mud flies. The restoration of integrity must begin at the top, with the leaders of
our government, who would do well to look to the Founding Fathers for inspiration.


Consider John Adams, for example, an honest and principled man who played
a momentous role in the founding of our nation. Esteemed for his undaunted pursuit
of integrity, his strength of character and conviction was fully displayed when he
took on the job of defending the British soldiers in the court hearings after the Boston
Massacre. The British sentries had shot and killed five civilians in self defense, but
no lawyer would take their case—none except Adams.

At the time, he was a leading Patriot about to run for public office. Even
though he needed the Patriot vote, he knew that defending the soldiers was the right
thing to do. Adams chose to side with justice and truth over the frenzy of popular
opinion. He not only took on their case, he saved their lives. On the third anniversary
of the Massacre, Adams wrote in his diary that defending the soldiers was “...one of
the most gallant, generous, manly and disinterested Actions of my whole Life, and
one of the best Pieces of Service I ever rendered my Country.” It’s in this same
disinterestedness for his own image that we see Adams’ sense of duty to his nation
over self. He exhibited a self-driven morality that helped to secure a just government
for his posterity, regardless of personal cost or gain.


Some might say that our country’s crucial value is not integrity, but freedom,
or justice. They may say that the Founders built our society upon these values to
secure a country where the tyranny and injustice from which they had suffered would
never happen again. This is a reasonable observation, but I would argue that integrity
must come first. Freedom and justice are rooted in love and respect for mankind.
When a nation’s robes of leadership are worn by hateful and irreverent people,
freedom and justice will increasingly be overcome by litigation, bureaucracy, and
regulation.


When asked what kind of government he and the other Founders had
established, Benjamin Franklin replied, “You have a republic, if you can keep it.” To
sustain this Democratic Republic, we must preserve the same moral standards and
convictions, the same integrity that the Founding Fathers expected of themselves and
of us. It is a constant battle, but one that’s worth fighting. Integrity is vital to the
pursuit of the American dream, to the realization of a nation founded upon truth,
justice, and freedom. As John Adams said, “Our Constitution was made only for a
moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Very nice, Gretchen! Very good insight. I really enjoyed the part about Adams - I had never really considered what he was risking in defending the British.

Thanks for sharing with us!!!

Emily

kathryn Hall said...

Beautifully written, beautifully expressed...oh that people would heed this beautiful Truth in this unprecedented time.

Welcome back, my dear!

Love, Mrs. Hall :)

Anonymous said...

That's wonderful Gretchen!!! It is completely true! Thanks for posting! =P =D

Jessica

Taylor said...

You did a very good job writing this, Gretchen! It contains all eight elements of a thesis essay, which is a tough thing to do, for me at least! ;)

It was to the point, but not too short. Have you done classical writing in your homeschooling?

I honestly think your essay ought to have won the contest, it was very well written. =)

Good to read an entry of yours again, have a pleasant week.

Soli Deo Gloria,
Taylor

P.S. I'd love it if you visited my blog whenever you have the spare time! http://examineallthings.blogspot.com

Captain Starch said...

I certainly like it...

Depending on how the competition was judged, this may have slipped for technical reasons -- little things, such as "1st" in place of "first," etc. Again, I don't know what the contest rules or judging criteria were, so just guessing.

Anonymous said...

Yay! It is wonderful to hear from you again my dear girl! I was missing the “something bright to carry with me”. I loved the sentiments expressed in your essay. I can concur that integrity is before freedom in importance. I would even say that integrity is a prerequisite it obtain true freedom. It reminds me of an analogy that G.K. Chesterton made about some children whose only playground was a cliff top. They would huddle in fear away from the edges until a fence and barrier was put up. Then, they were free to skip and play without fear of falling over the edge. It was only in the setting up of boundaries that they found freedom. In the moral limits and rules that God has given us (the essence of integrity), we have freedom of conscience, freedom of guilt, freedom to enjoy. In the fear of God we are free from the fear of anything else. Without the fear of God, freedoms are fettered by fears. People that lie are afraid of being lied to. People who kill are afraid of being killed. People who slander fear being slandered and etc.
On the note that you brought up about the internet. I wonder where it all will lead. Technology speeds past wisdom. Sometimes I wonder if someone didn’t plan to have “One web to rule them all, one web to find them, one web to bring them all and in the darkness bind them?”

If you ever, have trouble thinking of blog posts, I really enjoyed the reading list and review that you posted last year.

~Briana Mahoney

Katie Mahoney said...

I am so glad you have posted again! : )
Great work on your essay! I think that integrity was a good answer since it includes honesty and moral soundness. I agree with you that integrity is over freedom and liberty. I commend John Adams. The biggest thing that I admire about the heroes of the past is, that they stood for what was right, and didn’t judge their decision by what people would think of them. They also didn’t compromise even if it cost them their lives.
There is liberty and freedom within yourself when you have integrity.
Let us say what the Psalmist said, “Judge me, O Lord for I have walked in mine integrity: …. Psalms 26:1a
Love, Katie
P.S. I was just ready to post this, and everyone told me that it sounded like Briana’s comment, although I have not read hers yet. That was the whole reason why I hadn’t read it! Oh well,…… sisters think alike sometimes. : )

Christy Mahoney said...

History is one of my favorite subjects!
Thank you for sharing your essay with us. You chose a very good civic value trait.
It is too bad the liberty and freedom has been warped, twisted and taken too far until it is not freedom or justice at all.
The French Revolution is a contrast of people who wanted their freedom and liberty without the integrity and without God period.
There was one point I beg to differ on… the part about “the restoration of integrity must begin at the top, with the leaders of our government.” I believe that integrity must begin with the people. If the people don’t have integrity they will not vote for leaders with integrity. People vote for what they value the most, for instance their pocketbook.

“Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people.” Prov. 14:34
Please keep posting!:)

Gretchen Emily Wolaver said...

Thanks for all of your feedback, everyone! I'm glad you enjoyed the essay! :)

Taylor - Thanks for commenting! I've done a whole lot of writing in my homeschooling, but this is certainly the biggest piece I've undertaken. :) I got to go to your blog, which looks great! I'll definitely start following. :) God Bless!

Christy - Thanks so much for your comment! I hope ya'll are all doing wonderfully! I would agree with you that integrity needs to begin with the people as much as with the leaders of our country, but I think that both things are equally true. A leader with deep moral integrity does more, I believe, to stoke the flame of integrity in the hearts of the people than just about anything.