Drew Allen: This Government Cannot Last. Lessons From the Civil War

In 1838, two decades before the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln reminded Americans that “we find ourselves under the government of a system of political institutions, conducing more essentially to the ends of civil and religious liberty, than any of which the history of former times tells us.” 

This is still true 183 years later and has been true since our miraculous founding. We are the legal inheritors of the greatest country in the history of the world. The United States is a modern marvel — more wondrous than all seven of the ancient wonders of the world combined.

But with such an inheritance also comes responsibility. Our task is to defend those fundamental blessings of liberty bequeathed to us by our long-departed ancestors; to protect them and pass them on to the next generation.

This is the challenge every generation of Americans faces and the challenge our generation must face today. 

Our Nation has not been in such peril since the Civil War. As then, the enemy we face now is not abroad, but here at home. It is unprecedented in our time, but not unprecedented in our nation’s time.

Evil and amoral men and women have sprung up amongst us whose ambition exceeds the limitations of their seats in Congress and Presidential and Gubernatorial chairs. Our Constitution is not the problem, but the remedy.

Our Constitution is a contract between “we the people” and our Government. It buries the age old notion that our Rights come from man and has replaced it with the revolutionary belief that our Rights come from our Creator. That document redefined the role of the Government — as servant rather than master.

But today our Government is in breach of contract again. The breach did not begin today, but the violations have become more severe, flagrant, and numerous. The effects have become more onerous on “we the people.” A Government that does not revere the Constitution and violates the law cannot last.

This isn’t a cry for war. This is a desperate appeal for a return to sober reason and morality.

We fought a Civil War to right the injustice of slavery. 600,000 Americans died for this cause. For years afterward those husbands, sons, and fathers, with mangled limbs and bearing the wounds and scars of battle, served as living history for a generation fo Americans — a testimony to the awful consequences of an amoral Government and citizenry, which did not revere the law. 

But today those images have faded, as they must over time, and with their fading so too have the sober wisdom and warnings that furnished a generation.

Twenty years before the Civil War Lincoln said, “I know the American People are much attached to their Government; I know they would suffer much for its sake; I know they would endure evils long and patiently, before they would ever think of exchanging it for another.” 

But he also admitted, “If the laws be continually despised and disregarded, if their rights to be secure in their persons and property, are held by no better tenure than the caprice of a mob, the alienation of their affections from the Government is the natural consequence; and to that, sooner or later, it must come.”

It did come. And it will come again if our Constitution is not quickly restored as the political religion of this land.

For the past year roving bands of hundreds and thousands have been permitted to ravage, rob, and burn the stores of innocent and law-abiding Americans.

Political discrimination has now replaced the long abolished practice of racial and gender discrimination.

Cancel culture is now the metaphorical noose used by the civilian mob and politicians alike to eliminate the unalienable Rights of our countrymen. 

An American’s first amendment Right is no longer guaranteed. It is a privilege only afforded to those whose speech adheres to a predetermined and approved set of guidelines.

Nor is our second amendment Right to bear arms guaranteed. Our government intends to unconstitutionally legislate it away. But they have no more authority to legislate away our second amendment right than we have to rob a convenience store. 

For the past year our Government has unconstitutionally mandated away our Rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in the name of public health. Mask mandates, stay at home orders, and the discriminating closure of select businesses have reversed the Constitutional roles of Government and Citizen — rendering us slave and them master. 

Prior to the civil war, the slave master defended slavery by arguing the slave was better off and happier in a system in which their lives were run by others. Our ruling elite today have adopted the same mentality but their benevolence now extends to all Americans, regardless of race.

Each of these examples are foreboding signs of danger — ill omens. The same frightful irreverence for the law that troubled Lincoln should trouble us now. My intentions are the same as Lincoln’s intentions — to avoid future conflict, not endorse it.

Americans suffered under the un-Constitutional and amoral institution of slavery for nearly a hundred years before they finally stood up and said, Enough!”

What is our appetite for such irreverence and lawlessness today? How long have we suffered? How much patience remains? 

Every freedom-loving American, regardless of race, gender, or other distinction must use their voice to pledge their own fealty to the Constitution and demand fealty from others. 

The America that Lincoln left behind was better than the one he inherited. The America we leave behind must also be better than the America we inherited. Presently it is not. Presently it is in danger. And presently we must act — not violently, but with a symphony of bold, unshakeable, and Patriotic voices.

Our Government is growing increasingly unhinged. History bears out that it is only a matter of time until a desperate citizenry responds in kind.