As the impeachment moves into the Senate this is what I am hearing more and more. Now if you will all sing along with me to a song written by Burt Bachrach made famous by Dionne Warwick… ready?
🎵WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS NOW IS LOVE, SWEET LOVE…🎵
..and some perspective for goodness sake, and some history wouldn’t be a bad thing either.
Not that this Congress would win any medals in the “for the good of the country and its people which I have taken an oath to serve” department. They have been singularly obstructive and divisive and wholly partisan.
However, this is not the first time and since Congress is made up of human beings (although I think on an individual basis that is debatable), it will not be the last time that we have a self-serving partisan Senate.
I am hoping that what I am about to share with you will give you the hope we need to carry on and remember, “This too shall pass.”
Let me take you back to 1776, the first Continental Congress, the beginning of the American Revolutionary War. Only 13 colonies. Each colony a kingdom unto itself. Divided geographically and culturally, coming together only in common cause to separate from their Mother Country, England.
The Declaration of Independence, written and approved by the delegates, aka Congressmen, was their Declaration of War against England. A war because of the selfish, partisanship, and venality of its members would have surely been lost and the United States today would still belong to England. And don’t think for a minute that today the English think we would be far better if we had not separated. It’s a very love/hate relationship… sibling rivalry. But that is another subject.
Back to Congress almost losing the Revolutionary war. Our history lessons gave us the Boston Tea Party, Bunker Hill, Nathan Hale, The Founding Fathers, etc. But did you know that each of the colonies, to the point of almost losing the war, played the same unpatriotic game of partisan politics.
Did you know that George Washington had to play along with these political games and placate this Congress to try and pay his soldiers, organize his staff and select his generals to fight a war against the largest most highly trained military machine of its day? That his position as General of The Revolutionary Army was not at all assured? Each of the New England colonies had a favorite son they wanted nominated to take over for General Washington. He had a rag tag army not getting paid and he did not have this Congress’s full support. The new United States of America stood on the brink of doom if the Congress had had their way.
If you want to know how the Revolution was saved from this self serving obstreperous Continental Congress then you must go to the library or your favorite book store and read Nathaniel Philbrick’s book, Valiant Ambition.
As the absurdity of, dare I call it… The Impeachment Process continues – and really what it should be called is the… You Scratch My Back and I’ll Scratch Yours Tango (a little lower please), reading this book offers a perspective we desperately need.
The Union that brought forth this nation, conceived in Liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal, was saved.
Let us hope it not too late for this expanded Union today.
Right? Of Course, right!!
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