In the hinterlands, something is brewing...
An interesting essay by
Jeff Warren:
A RURAL REVOLT?
No one could write dialogue like Paddy Chayefsky. Who can forget, Howard Beale (the Anchorman in �Network�) galvanizing a generation with, �I�m mad as Hell and I�m not going to take it anymore.�
Who amongst us didn�t want to throw open our windows and shout that we weren�t going to put up with it anymore?
America is no stranger to rebellion. We were ripped from the womb of tyranny in 1773 by some angry folks who felt his majesty�s tea was better suited for the bottom of Boston Harbor than the top of certain East India Company�s sailing vessels.
Of course, it didn�t begin with those intrepid souls protesting a series of �Intolerable Acts� being levied against them from afar.
It began in 1215 when King John was forced to sign the Magna Carta which guaranteed �No freeman shall be taken or imprisoned or disseized,�..or anyways destroyed�.unless by the lawful judgment of his peers, or by the law of the land.� We recognize this more readily in our 5th amendment, �no person shall be....deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.�
John Locke articulated this in his Second Treatise on Government. Locke wrote that in a natural state all people, are born free and equal, and possess certain rights. He said that these �natural rights� were life, liberty, and property.
As prelude to the Revolution, Thomas Paine (in Common Sense) expanded �property� to the phrase �pursuit of Happiness,� which Thomas Jefferson ripped off and declared it an unalienable right which he placed at the top of our Declaration of Independence.
�Property� has only recently become a dirty word. Until the 60�s �Private property� was not considered obscene.
What follows is a meditation on the differences between urban and rural life and the impact (for the greater good of course...) that a few people in the cities are having on those of us who practice a greater degree of self reliance.
Posted by DaveH at March 29, 2009 7:09 PM