We Still Hold These Truths: Rediscovering Our Principles, Reclaiming Our Future
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- ISBN13: 9781935191674
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Product Description
At a time when economic crisis, ever-expanding government, rising international threats, declining civic education, and many additional problems cloud America’s future, political leaders increasingly pay lip service to ‘first principles’ – the principles on which the nation was founded. But just what are persons principles? On that question, sadly, politicians and pundits have small to say. Fortunately, Matthew Spalding provides the answer in “We Still Hold These Truths”. Spalding, an practiced in American political history at The Heritage Foundation, the esteemed Washington, D.C. – based research and educational institute, clarifies and brings to life ten core principles that define our national creed and common identity. His enlightening and entertaining tour through American history recalls our first principles as they were understood by the Founders and reveals their deep roots in Western civilization. But “We Still Hold These Truths” is more than an inspiring account of the nobility of America’s accomplishments. It is also a bracing reminder of how far we have strayed off course as a nation. Spalding shows how readily political leaders and cultural elites abandon – indeed, trample on – the principles to which this country is dedicated. Even more troubling is how readily we all let it take place. Before we can rededicate ourselves to the core principles that made America, we must rediscover them. For as Thomas Jefferson experimental, ‘If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be’. Appreciating our vital heritage, Spalding lays out a strategy to reclaim our future – getting our nation back on track and holding accountable persons who seek to take us in a different direction.
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This book includes some appealing discussions about the history of our fundamental documents and American values, quoting selectively from notable founding facts. What it doesn’t do is set up a levelheaded logical tie between these discussions and the veritable glossary of modern conservative philosophy outlined in the last chapter: anti-government, anti-regulation, anti-welfare, anti-gay, anti-secular, anti-deficit, pro-free enterprise, and pro-”liberty” (whatever that really means — you won’t find a scholarly or even thoughtful definition).
Despite being published in late 2009, this book doesn’t even mention any of the events that occurred from 2000 onward. Bush, Cheney, 9/11, the nearly-depression of 2008 — none of them are even mentioned. The straw man Spalding attempts to ruin is nearly exclusively the progressive movement of the early 20th century — lacking even attempting an analysis of the degree to which this movement corresponds with liberal thoughts in the early 21st century.
Especially in the last chapter, Spalding resorts to the name-calling so common to today’s “political debate” — with appointed judges, intellectual elites, mainstream journalists, bureaucrats, even Europeans as a broad class, all falling victim to his conservative keyboard.
If you’re a conservative, you already agree with all of his conclusions, and you don’t need to read this book. If you’re a liberal, the lack of logic will infuriate you. If you’re just hankering for some American history, there are more reliable sources. Save your money.
Reader’s Rating: 2 / 5
In “We Still Hold These Truths,” “Rediscovering our Principles, Reclaiming our Futhure,” Matthew Spalding has collected most of the apropos quotations of the Founders regarding the fact that only when and if the USA it is realized that our government is founded on the non-Constitutionalized writing of the Founders, that our federal government is only the secular tip of the iceberg resting on a biblically faith-filled country.
So regularly, President T. Jefferson’s quote from his PRIVATE letter to the Baptists Ministers of CT is quoted regarding ‘the wall of separation of Church and State.’ But did you know that 2 days after that letter, Jefferson attended a relgious service (presumably not Muslim, Buddhist nor Hindu) in the US House of Representatives? Do not actions speak louder than words? (p. 63) Or if you are a Jeff/secularist fan, do you aver him as a hypocrite for attending public religious services?
Another fantastic Founder, regularly cited as an agnostic or Deist, is James Madison. But on p. 65, Spalding quoted Madison from his Memorial and Remonstance against Religious Assessments that “Before a man can be considered as a Member of Civil Society, he must be considered a theme of the Administrator of the Universe.” [ emphasis Madison's]
On p. 129, Spalding shows quotes that James Wilson, Thomas Jefferson and Joseph Tale agreed that the Constitution could only be accurately interpreted in the light of the meaning of the Founders. He also shows how as early as the presidencies of of T. Roosevelt and W. Wilson, the leaders of government stirred away from the meaning of the Founders’ words. [p. 195]
But nearly unanimously the 2 finest Presidents of the USA were George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. On p. 116, Spalding quotes Washington as stating: “But the Constitution as at any time exists, till changed by and explicit an authentic of the whole People, is sacredly obligatory upon all.”
And Lincoln, protesting the Supreme Court’s egregious error in the Dred Scot choice, stated [ p. 128] “if the policy of the government upon vital questions, distressing the whole people, is to be irrevocobly fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made, in ordinary litigation between parties in personal actions, the people will have stopped to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their Government into the hands of that eminent tribunal.”
This book is a clarion warning against Leviathan, Nanny national government by all 3 branches.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
Dr. Matthew Spalding’s “We Still Hold These Truths” succintly restates the fundamental principles of the American constitutional order in one modest volume. Spalding clearly relates the basics of the U.S. Constitution through the philosophical prism of the Declaration of Independence. Crucially, he also includes an vital chapter addressing the anti-constitutional, anti-Declarational progressivism. The book also points the way to a variety of additional books and written works that provide more in-depth treatment of the topics under discussion.
This book is especially significant for these times when our constitutional system of limited government, free markets, and individual liberty are under attack by massive increases in government power through out-of-control spending, arbitrary regulation, etc. If I were to pick a half-dozen “must reads” for the citizen who cares about upholding the principles of the Declaration and the integrity of the Constitution, “We Still Hold These Truths” would be on it.
Persons new to these topics will benefit from the case for the Declaration and Constitution that Spalding has place together. Even serious students of history and constitutionalism can benefit by absorbing the book’s succint manner of language and thereby apt better public advocates of fundamental American principles of liberty and self-government. In my view, Spalding’s work here is flawless. I will be sure to re-read “We Hold These Truths” in the years yet to be.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
Absolutely fantastic book. I truly wish I would have had something like this when I was still in school. So much I wish I could have learned back then just to question the right questions now! Things make so much more sense now. Our forefathers were really inspiring and I’m so ashamed of myself for not knowing.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
this is a concise history of our constitution and what lead up to these enduring documents.A must for every conservative!!!!!
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5