Revolution. It means different things depending on your political ideology. To the far right, it represents the break from Great Britain and our rich, heroic history associated with the founding of this country. To the far left, too often it represents overthrowing capitalism and replacing it with communal socialism.
I’ve heard the idea of revolution bandied about among conservatives recently. Their belief that the government is no longer representing their interests has pushed them over the edge into considering that violence may be necessary to turn things around in this country. You’ve no doubt heard about the recent incident in Texas, where a man felt he no longer had a voice, so he flew a plane into an IRS office. Some are calling it domestic terrorism; some are calling him a hero. After some thought about it, I disagree that, at this point in history, it is going to take a revolution to reset America’s course.
While conservatives may not like the direction our country or the government is headed and feel disaffected, the people in Washington didn’t arrive there by force or coup. They were elected, just as they have been for over 200 years. If we’re upset about what is happening, it’s not the fault of our representatives, as they, for the most part, are doing the will of the people who sent them. That is where the true problem lies – in the people. Because the wisdom of the Founders created a government that is forced to accept change, based on the outcome of elections, attempting to change our government by force, right now, is no more honorable than the 3rd world attempts of some petty dictator’s rise to power. Another revolution, at the cost of human life and doing violence to fellow citizens would be unjust and imprudent.
To find the cause of the horrible mess that politics has become, we have no further to look than the mirror. The questions conservatives must ask themselves, considering the current course of the country as we slouch towards socialism, is “are we willing to be perpetually in the minority?” If we cannot win at the polls, taking the country back by force will be our only option. But doing so will not be justified if the majority is content with the way things are. It would be no more right than if we were in control and the left decided to take up arms against the government.
Our true calling as conservatives isn’t the ‘R’ word, it’s the ‘S’ word. To legitimately point this country in the right direction is going to require sacrifice on our parts. It means that we need to really know why we believe what we believe. Learning just isn’t something you did in school, for the wise, learning never stops. And for the conservative, it means learning how to argue intelligently and understanding both sides of the debate. It is more important to understand foundational truths than to keep up with desperate housewives or find out which contestant got eliminated in some reality show.
Sacrifice also means that we can’t be silent in the face of ignorant political discussion. If we know what we believe, we should jump in with both feet, we can’t change people’s minds if we are silent. It also means we will have to be confrontational when we see the government overstepping its Constitutional boundaries. That may mean a phone call to a representative, writing the local paper, or filing a complaint or even making a FOIA request. It might inconvenience you, but it also might open someone else’s eyes.
Sacrifice also means that during campaign season, we will have to get involved and quit sitting on the sidelines whining about how bad things are now and how much better they were under Bush or Reagan. It means we may have to run for office ourselves if there are no other true conservative voices willing to run. And even if we don’t run ourselves, we need to campaign for whoever the true conservative is in a race, rather than whoever the establishment says can win, like they were our own son or daughter. And finally, if they win, we can’t simply slide back into our apathy, we need to hold that candidate to account on how they handle the office we've elected them to.
After the first Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin said when asked what kind of government they had come up with, “A republic, if you can keep it”. Another quote, attributed to various people including Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson, describes how we keep it – “Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty”.
We need to step up our vigilance and own our government – before it owns us.