Fwd: John Quincy Adams' worst nightmare

July 4, 2006

John Quincy Adams' worst nightmare

" This July 4th, as we celebrate the 230th anniversary of our nation's

founding, we find ourselves in a tragic position: a nation born out of

a longing for freedom from domination has now become the dominator.

The US Declaration of Independence proclaimed the need to fight

against Britain because King George III had 'kept among us standing

armies' that committed intolerable 'abuses and usurpations.' Today our

government, sending 140,000 soldiers off to fight in a foreign land,

is committing abuses and usurpations in Iraq.

" George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison all warned that

the invasion and occupation of other lands would turn America into

precisely the sort of occupying force they had rebelled against. 'If

there be one principle more deeply written than any other in the mind

of every American,' said Thomas Jefferson in 1791, 'it is that we

should have nothing to do with conquest.'

" But it is the words of John Quincy Adams that should haunt us today.

As Secretary of State in 1821, he called on America to be 'the

well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all', but 'the champion

and vindicator only of her own.' He advised against going abroad 'in

search of monsters to destroy' because 'once enlisting under other

banners than her own she would involve herself beyond the power of

extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual

avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the

standard of freedom. The fundamental maxims of her policy would

insensibly change from liberty to force.' The United States might

become the 'dictatress of the world,' Adams warned, but 'she would be

no longer the ruler of her own spirit.' "

Recommended Posts