Is This the Country the Founders Envisioned?
"You will never know how much it has cost my generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it.", John Adams.
September 17, 1787, a date stamped into history, the start of a world power, pressured into existence from the fallacy of Great Britain that they can do what they want with their colonies. Set inside the written words of the Declaration, is the rights to Life, Liberty, and pursuit of Happiness. But has our Country kept these sayings throughout the years, or has it failed?
The first historical period we will travel too is 1860s, in which the American Civil War occurred. This is the first main period of fighting for the preservation of Freedom for All. The Union was victorious, and it brought about the changes to the fundamental structures of the South's belief system and economy. The freedom of slaves was the first part in giving freedom too all, though this one was more of a physical rather than a structural freedom.
The second historical period we will visit is the late 1940s - 1960s. During this time, there was an event called the "Civil Rights Movement", in which African Americans and their supporters banded together for mostly peaceful protests in an effort to end segregational slavery. In this, the African Americans earned the rights to be able to choose where their kids go to school, to go to the same restaurants, bars, shops, and other places with the whites, and was a big step towards equal opportunity for all people.
Finally, the last historical period we will visit is today's world. We see the pressure imposed by the Black Lives Matter movement, which called our system a systemically racist system, and calls for a Marxist version of governmental control. We see the destruction and the deaths that are connected to the "mostly peaceful" protests.
Is this the history of a country the founders envision, as well as the country the founders had thought would come to pass? The short answer is Yes, but mostly no. Remember most people who signed the Declaration of Independence were slave owners, with slavery built into their system. Few, if any, truly supported abolition, and were afraid to do so from the backlash that may occur from mainly the south (who owned large amounts of slaves). They may have envisioned the gradual change from slavery to abolition (as believed by Jefferson and the Republicans, as well as the civil rights movement. However, they would not have envisioned the Black Lives Matter Movement, and it's failure to bring about what they called for, and their failures to follow history. In essence, the ideology of what is envisioned is there, but the actions taken by those who envision this is a failure.
What the Founders envisioned was very different from their life styles. There is no straight answer to "Is this the Country the Founders Envisioned?" The answer is probably, but probably not. There will be parts in which they would nod their heads and say "yes, this is what we meant when we say that", but the majority may disapprove of what occurs in today's world. Remember, time's are different, and ever changing. The Founder's wrote the articles for the government to be as true as possible throughout the years, and allowed us to change it as needed. However, that is not too say that the Founder's envisioned the nation to be as it is, they just made it so that we were given the chance of taking a path that the Founder's have left open to us, regardless of whether the Founder's have thought of it or not.
Is this the Country the Founder's envisioned? It really depends on who you ask, as well as how much they understand the current world's perspectives. To be frank, the answer is "yes and no, but mostly no".