The Moral Premise and the Decline of the American Heritage; P. Adams

Man's choice to partake of the "forbidden fruit" provided him with the promised knowledge of good and evil, but along with it came an incalculable complication Dr. Adams is Academic Dean of Roberts Wesleyan College. This article is from his address before the Sons of the American Revolution, Rochester, New York, November 11, 1967. 170 of his circumstances. Nature be came a challenge to his physical existence. Other people constituted to him a confused complex of vari ant relationships that ranged from love on one hand to virulent hatred on the other. God faded from his consciousness, and with that loss went also the meaning of man's struggle. Man was thus lost in the only sense in which he could be really lost, and the need was there fore critical for a major premise which promulgates for man a su preme purpose for life, a purpose which justifies the physical hard ship, the social conflicts, the spir itual struggle, and the disappoint ments with which life is filled. On ly such a premise delivers life from the insanity it sometimes appears to be - struggle without hope, achievement without happiness, victory without exaltation, death without resurrection.

1968 DECLINE OF THE AMERICAN HERITAGE 171 Man, himself, throughout the concourse of his history has given ample evidence of his longing and need for an all-embracing purpose. He knows so little that is perfect, yet he always looks for perfection - a seminal response which de rives from the moral image in which he was originally created and the perfection of the environ ment in which he found himself. Though corrupt by his own choice, he still yearns for the ideal, like some earthling wandering in a cosmic wasteland dreaming of the green hills of earth. Basically, he seeks a society which will fulfill his demands on nature, ameliorate his relationship with his fellow man, and provide the ultimate rea son for existence. In the search, man's thinking has led him, inevi tably, into metaphysical and on tological problems, to a considera tion of the first principles of all existence. It would be presumptuous, in deed, for me to attempt a defini tive statement of the major prem ise with its detailed ramifications, and presumption is, among college professors, a sin of great magni tude. Perhaps, however, one might conclude that within such a premise are these parts; Man is a spiritual being, created by God and en dowed with the freedom and re sponsibility of moral choice; his purpose in living is to glorify God by exercising his reason toward those ends that his highest moral nature urges, and his task is to refine his intelligence, develop his creativity, discipline his con science, and clothe himself in robes of righteousness.

The Moral Premise - Like a Golden Thread Man has never been without some first principle, some maj or premise, sometimes consciously, more frequently unconsciously, held up before him. It runs in some form like golden thread through man's history, and it may be noted in various efforts and forms that mark man's societal action. The Israelites had in Jeho vah God the source of law in the observance of which was life. The Greeks promulgated Natural Law as an absolute reference point for man's excursions into lawmaking. The Romans embraced Stoicism and with it the Natural Law con cept which, in the Western wo~ld, yielded place to the Divine law of Christiani ty. This is clearly seen in the Gelasian theory which placed absolute value on the sword of spiritual power. All of these systems with their varied premises failed to produce the ideal society. The Hebrew sys tem ended, oppressed by evil and corrupt kings. The Greek system, even in the Golden Age of Pericles, 172 THE FREEMAN March was marked by corruption, vice, weakness, and personal lust for power. The Roman could observe the cruelty and inj ustice of his state, and he suffered from tyrants who plundered the poor to lavish wealth on the idle, sensual, and effete nobility. The slight amelio ration that feudalism supplied was due chiefly to the fact that there was less economic distance be tween master and serf - for goods were fewer, even in this paternal istic social order, and pillaged more frequently by incessant war ring . Certainly, there was little understanding of nature, no mas tery of production, and a very low level of social justice. Seemingly, man was destined to a perpetual slavery only thinly disguised in an embracing paternalism that left him without hope.

Christian Europe was not with out hope, however, for the six teenth century saw a rebirth of the idea that man was free, must be free. Dramatically stated first in theological terms, the fuller im plications in nontheological terms were soon asserted, and Europe began a long and costly march toward freedom. Costly, for hu man liberty has never been se cured or maintained without sacri fice, and it was our own Jefferson who said, "Every so often the tree of liberty must be watered by the blood of patriots - and of tyrants." The American Foundation With all of the foregoing in mind, it can be assumed that those who raised a new nation on this continent had a wealth of history on which to draw. The responses of our forefathers were partly the product of a vicarious intellectual empiricism and partly the intui tive conclusions of liberty-loving men playing it by ear. What these men gave to America and the world was the moral premise em bedded in a philosophy of moral absolutes. It was shaped and nur tured in the minds and hearts of people who recognized in it the last, best hope of man. These fore bears of ours were of the breed of men who count not their own lives dear unto themselves; they were prepared to die for America and for freedom. Need I remind you that it was a young man not yet twenty-two who said in a last mag nificent moment of life, "I only regret that I have but one life to give to my country"?

These great men espoused a moral absolute which accepted God as creator, as ultimate Truth, and they believed man to be a moral creature, responsible to God, and capable of discharging that re sponsibility only through freedom of choice. It logically follows, then, that freedom is more than just an other attribute. It is so essential that life without it loses signifi1968 DECLINE OF THE AMERICAN HERITAGE 173 cance. These Founding Fathers saw in freedom and liberty the only perfection a human society can know, for in freedom's house the individual can shape his own perfections and follow his noblest aspirations. The exercise of free dom, then, is for man the perfect ing of his humanity - not that the exercise will ever be perfect, but the continuing exercise rep resents a constant affirmation of the eternal principle that man can find himself only in God. Limited Government These men of great vision clearly understood that the only real threat to liberty and freedom is government, for men assign a sancti ty to government not ac corded to individuals and groups.

But government is a faceless thing and can hide the predators who lurk behind its fa~ade and exer cise its function; and govern ments assume, quite naturally it seems, government's right to a monopoly of physical force. Fear ing government, and the natural tendency of power to beget power, these men established a constitu tion which attempted to assure man's freedom by limiting the sphere of government to a work able minimum. The clear intent was to magnify the responsibility of the individual and subordinate government to its primary function of serving freedom's cause. Even among its most ardent de votees, there was never any sug gestion that this Constitution was a panacea for all the social ills to which man is heir. There was no guarantee of identical status for individuals or groups. There was no promise of material rewards. There was only the implicit as sumption that freedom and liberty were their own rewards and worth any sacrifice. The Constitution promised only the system itself, but under it liberty and freedom were to be nurtured. It was Ben jamin Franklin who saw the only flaw, and he stated it in simple terms when he suggested that per haps the people might not keep what they had acquired. It was George Washington who stated in eloquent prose that liberty is guar anteed only by the eternal vigi lance of those who share its vision.

These architects of nation were men of great faith - faith in the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen - faith in their vision of a vast land and great people - faith in the tri umph of truth over error, of jus tice over inj ustice, of right over tyranny, of knowledge over ignor ance, of reason over prej udice, and the ultimate triumph of eter nal values over the temporal. Faith in such a vision together with commitment to the program for its 174 THE FREEMAN March fulfillment constituted in their thinking an irresistible force that would shake the world - and it did. In addition, it gave rise to a compelling spirit of national mis sion. Eternal Vigilance It is a truism that tragedy lurks close to the surface of all enter prises of great pith and moment. George Berna.rd Shaw suggested that there are two great tragedies in life. One is to not get your heart's desire; the other is to get it. The observation is so applic able to the American scene that it arouses almost a response of sharp physical pain. America had her great dream, her grand design.

History provided her with the opportunity to realize it. So she avoided the first of the tragedies that Mr. Shaw suggested. The al ternate tragedy was left to be real ized, for tragedy must follow the failure to understand the tremen dous demand such a society places on the individual. It calls for enor mous self-discipline in behalf of freedom's preeminent claim; it requires a conscious articulate sensitivity to freedom's climate; and it mandates a firm dedication to freedom's methods and goals along with a determination to live with the results. It is not debatable that we have had an imperfect and uneven performance in this regard. The stu dent of American history recalls the demarche of the Federalist party into unconstitutionalism to retain power. It can hardly go un noticed that there were those who were blind to the implications of education for a substantial seg ment of our society, including women. Even more compelling shortly after the centennial year of Appomattox Court House is the thought that there were those who insisted on the immediate attain ment of their ends and refused to recognize longer that the Consti tution provided a certain, if slow, mechanic for resolving great in equities and injustice. This im patience sent men to graves like beds and finally resulted in the slaughter of more Americans than World War I and World War II combined.

Unhappy though these examples be, we note with satisfaction that the Federalist returned to, make the great right decision in 1800, and that educational opportunity has approached universality in this nation. We could even say that although the larger lessons of the so-called irrepressible con flict were lost on us, we have at times demonstrated our belief that the nature of our system· cannot be defined in terms of any appeal to the doctrine that might and right are inseparable.

1968 DECLINE OF THE AMERICAN HERITAGE 175 With liberty and freedom iden tified in the Constitution and ac cepted as the norm for human ac tion, we demonstrated a vitality and creativity that produced achievement which first caught the' attention of the world and then beckoned her disinherited mil lions to the "lifted lamp beside the golden door ." We enlarged indi vidual opportunity, secured reli gious toleration, and established the basis for political diversity and cultural pluralism. We edu cated the masses, refurbished the concept of individual justice and charity, and we took over leader ship of the revolution in communi cation, transportation, and produc tion. Our free market led the world in the production and dis tribution of goods for the benefit of all classes. Somewhere along the line, too, we began to develop a distinct literature of merit and other artistic forms. Finally, and without great fanfare, we assumed world leadership in moral idealism as a natural concomitant of our commitment to principles based in the eternal verity of ! the moral law.

Obstacles to Be Overcome Such have been the fruits of the American system, and such a na tion or system, meeting as it did man's age-old search for an ideal society, should fear no challenge. Nature had been transformed into an ally; a beginning had been made toward a solution of the omnipresent problem of human re lationships; and man's right and need to know and experience God had been left unrestricted. We who received such a heritage should fear no challenge, yet we are alarmed by a challenge of so great a magnitude that we seem unable to plot its dimensions. Wis dom and intelligence, however, as well as the instinct for survival dictate that the problem must be stated, understood, and attacked. There are those, undoubtedly, whose disquiet is solely in terms of the problem posed by nuclear physics. These people might think beyond it, but the possibility of a nuclear war produces in them a trauma that makes further ra tional thought on their part im possible. Those of whom this is descriptive tend to view the great ultimate catastrophe as physical death, forgetting that the great moral premise assigns little signif icance to the fact of mere physi cal existence. They would estab lish a new commandment which may be simply stated, "And now abideth the mind, the spirit, the body, these three, but the greatest of these is the body." It is not to be expected that those who hold such a belief could or would give rise to any inspired resolution, for 176 THE FREEMAN March that which they treasure most is most easily subject to threats and force.

Then there are those who react to the problem in materialistic terms. These have altered the su preme moral principle to read, "Man shall live by bread alone." The member of this group is quite likely to attach himself to any of the several simplifications which this group has institutionalized in policy: the answer to any domestic problem is governmental spending to raise everyone's material stand ard of living; neutralists such as Tito will be won to our side if our gifts are large and continuous; the communist will soften his at titude toward the United States and the noncommunist world if we allow them the trade advan tages of our productive system. Again, there is a class we could call passivists, and, like some of their medieval forebears who went into monastic seclusion, they seek to escape the world of decision and action. A tendency of the members of this class is to rely on discus sion, fruitless though it may be, and on a complete negation of de cisive action. Discussion becomes for them not a means but an end, and failure is not failure, for non productive discussion guarantees the need of still further discus sion. No international conference is a failure, in this light, as long as it ends without definitive com mitment. There is some truth in the assertion that protracted dis cussion on a point at issue often results in a blurring of the thought of both parties, but it logically follows that in such a situation, the party with commit ment to a principle and a con comitant course of action stands in the least danger.

Detoured by Relativism None of those in the classes just mentioned sees the challenge to the American heritage in its true di mensions, and obviously they have little understanding of the re sources necessary to meet the challenge. The basic problem is the failure of Americans to dedicate and rededicate themselves to the great moral premise - freedom under God. As dedication to that premise built the American her itage, decline from it has given rise to the problems that appear in the guise of insecurity - the fear of physical extinction, the compensation of materialism, and indecision. The decline was initiated by the introduction of a philosophy of relativism with its inherent nega tion of moral absolutes. This phi losophy relieves man of all respon sibility; it erodes his moral stand ards, for morals, it says, are a product of man's own thinking 1968 DECLINE OF THE AMERICAN HERITAGE 177 and are therefore subject to change. Further, it has no fixed reference point; rather it has a multitude of reference points, dis coverable only by a process of ex pediency which itself becomes the criterion for judgment. Such thought canonizes Nicolo Machia velli who baldly and boldly as serted that the end justifies the means. In such a philosophy, man is not free; he is rather a pawn of history, and he has significance only as he participates in great mass movements. In action, the philosophy is expressed in positiv ism which denies any supernatural standard and acclaims any law as valid if there is sufficient force in the lawgiver to enforce it. Such a philosophy does not produce Nathan Hales. It is more apt to produce those who seek the undis ciplined refuge of mass anonymity and mass conformity. The end of such a system is pictured in Or well's 1984, in which he describes a society where Big Brother de cides what is truth for the unre sisting masses. Orwell doesn't say it, but the tragedy is that under such system, life doesn't really matter.

Improper Methods The increasing acceptance of such a philosophy has spawned an incredible number of value stand ards and courses of action not consistent with our original premise and the institutionalizing of lib erty. Time forbids a discussion of them, but some of the more dan gerous may be listed. There are those who change or pervert the Constitution to gain the ends they desire, and the ends are presented as good ends to justify the action. It was for good reasons that the Gracchi started the process of violating the Roman constitution. The end of the process was the destruction of liberty in Rome, for each succeeding constitutional vio lation takes less explanation and less and less justification. Eventu ally the constitutional image is lost, and the term itself becomes a shibboleth. Then, there are those who for get that material wealth is a hap py by-product of our pursuit of amorally legitimate goal, and they relentlessly pursue the materialis tic largess of nature as an end in itself. It is again the old story of selling the birthright for a mess of pottage. The goal of this philos ophy is ever greater materialism with .less and less effort. This idea seems to offer a built-in contradic tion, but still the belief persists that we have invented a slot ma chine which pays off for every body.

Again, there are those who per vert the definition of freedom to mean an absence of fear, of indi178 THE FREEMAN March vidual responsibility, of self-dis cipline, and they include within its context the strong presumption of egalitarian doctrines. These find the answer to all of our problems in the increase of central, bureau cratic government. Washington is their Mecca. They do not, perhaps, make a pilgrimage to Washington, but well they might, for not only is their money there, it is fast becoming a repository of the American soul. In international relations, these people have a naive faith in the United Nations, as sign to it a supernatural aura, and claim for it a practical success not demonstrable in logic or actuality. A Time for Rededication Finally, there are those who are totally oblivious to the fact that the American forefathers, like the early Christians, were men whose vision and faith were such that they intended to turn the world upside down - and did so. We have lived in the golden heritage of their dedication to a great moral principle and the abundant life it provided. That we have grown insensitive to such a principle presages failure where they suc ceeded. We cannot escape the fact that the virility of communism stems from the fact that the com munist is committed totally to the belief that it is necessary to change the world - and as an individual he is prepared to give him self to realize such an end. We cannot change the form or sub stance of the communist move ment or threat. We can, however, reclaim, revive, and renew the American heritage as the eternal answer to those who would, under any guise, enslave the free spirit of man.

The innumerable paths of his tory are thick with the dust of decayed nations that knew the passing radiance of a glorious mo ment. Khrushchev and communism promised to bury the American heritage because it no longer serves history's purposes. For me, I fear no physical threat com munism can offer. I do fear the retreat from our heritage. I do not fear Khrushchev's judgment. I fear the inexorable judgment of God's law which has ordained man's freedom. Should this nation so blessed by God forget His or dinance, then we have no valid claim to existence. We will have failed those who lived and died that we might be free as well as the serf of the future who will not long remember our moment of his tory. As Americans we can, as one has said, "spend ourselves into im mortality" in freedom's battle or we can make our way carelessly to nameless graves and be part of the dust of history's passing parade. ~ H. B. PHILLIPS As USUALLY PRESENTED, freedom is a negative idea, the mere ab sence of restraint. That does not seem to be a very valuable notion.