Tuesday, October 30, 2007

That John Adams Quote About Our Constitution

I'm sure that you have seen it before. I often see it quoted by Christians, but I've never seen it properly sourced. So I went hunting.
While our country remains untainted with the principles and manners which are now producing desolation in so many parts of the world; while she continues sincere, and incapable of insidious and impious policy, we shall have the strongest reason to rejoice in the local destination assigned us by Providence. But should the people of America once become capable of that deep simulation towards one another, and towards foreign nations, which assumes the language of justice and moderation while it is practising iniquity and extravagance, and displays in the most captivating manner the charming pictures of candor, frankness, and sincerity, while it is rioting in rapine and isolence, this country will be the most miserable habitation in the world; because we have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallanty, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to a government of any other. ["To the fficers of the First Brigade of the Third Division of the Militia of Massachusetts," October 11, 1798, in John Adams, Charles Francis Adams, ed., The Works of John Adams (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1854), 9:228-229.]
And this may explain why those who decry originalism will eventually win. Our Constitution is "inadequate" to modern America. Something a lot more totalitarian would fit the increasingly depraved population. It would just be a miserable place for decent people to live.

UPDATE: To clarify: I wasn't wishing for a totalitarian society. Quite the opposite. Just pointing out that the reason the left is increasingly looking for ways to get around original meaning is because the society that they wanted--one without morals or religion--doesn't work so well with the U.S. Constitution.

No comments:

Post a Comment