"Perhaps the sentiments contained in the following pages, are not yet sufficiently fashionable to procure them general favor; a long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defence of custom. But the tumult soon �subsides. Time makes more converts than reason."
So wrote the famed British-born, American patriot Thomas Paine in his introduction to Common Sense , one of the most widely-read pamphlets of the American Revolutionary War period. According to most historians, the success of Paine's publication was nothing short of phenomenal. After bursting upon �the scene in early 1776, the booklet sold more than 100,000 copies in three �months, and one estimate claimed that 500,000 copies were printed in the first year alone.
But more important than sales to Paine was the effect Common Sense had on American Revolutionary leaders like George Washington and colonists, in general. According to Ivy League government professor Isaac Kramnick, the pamphlet captured the imagination of suppressed colonists as none had previously. Historian Bernard Bailyn called it "the most brilliant pamphlet �written during the American Revolution, and one of the most brilliant pamphlets ever written in the English language." Most agree the booklet played a significant role in causing the signing of the Declaration of Independence later in 1776 and galvanising public opinion for independence from England.
It is with such thoughts in mind that this writer presents this humble work some 221 years after Paine's Common Sense hit the country. While circumstances are different, some believe we are at no less a crisis point in our history than in 1776, and I find it hard to totally disagree with them, short of being considered an outright alarmist. The need for positive action, �for independence from the governing elite now found in Washington, D.C., in the 50 states' capitals, in your community and mine, rather than London, should not be underestimated.
Certainly, Americans are taxed more, in fact, much more, under the American governing elite's rule today as people in the colonies were in 1776. When American colonists revolted against unfair taxes and policies imposed by the British empire by staging the Boston Tea Party on Dec. 16, 1773, they paid less than 1% of their income in taxes, according to Martin Edelston, �publisher of the Greenwich, Ct.-based Tax Hotline. Today, federal, state, and local taxes grab more than 50% of our income, Edelston says (other sources put the figure at closer to 40%).
Taxes bombard us from all sides: The cities, the states, the counties, the schools, the hospital districts, the development districts, the federal agencies, Social Security, the gasoline and utility companies (yes, part of those fees you pay goes to government entities), the phone and cable television companies (ditto), the banks and lending institutions (double ditto). Indeed, according to the non-profit government watchdog organization the Tax Foundation, we paid $2.6 trillion to 35 different government entities in 1994 -- and that didn't include all the fees, part of which eventually end up in the taxing elite's hands.
Whether we Americans give more than 40% or 50% of our income over to the governing elite, that is quite a jump from 1773, and even from 22% in 1950. Personally, I believe Edelston's 50% figure is closer to the truth, especially when you tack on all the fees we pay. In return, politicians tell us relatively little about what they are actually doing with those funds, how they are wasting billions of dollars on programs that directly benefit the �wealthy elite in this country. Yes, there is waste in government programs that are set up to aid the poor, the sick, the unemployed, the disabled, the disenfrachised; but the waste in programs that aid the rich -- from tax breaks and favorable tax loopholes to the contracts to large corporations and hefty salaries and perks -- is far larger.
Such a message is not really new. In the bibliography to this book, I have listed numerous books, some of which carry a common theme. While the "mainstream pundits" found in universities, private think-tank foundations, and the major media sometimes hit on the "take back your country from the governing elite" theme, their messages are usually diluted with the compromising nature of the institutions they represent.
While many talk the talk about standing up for the "average American," relatively few walk the walk. When it comes down to voting on bills that would be really beneficial to most Americans, most politicians and those in the "elitism industry" side with the very wealthy and connected. Few admit they do this. One of those few is Pulitzer Prize-winning critic William Henry III, who even wrote a book called In Defense of Elitism in which he makes a compelling case -- but one that I still don't buy -- that elitism is necessary for a democracy to make progress and that the "myth of egalitarianism" has resulted in the "dumbing down of America."
So what makes this book different from others? What qualifications do I possess to enable myself to label the ideas and suggestions contained here "common sense?" Tough questions. I have worked in the news media for more than 17 years, with most newspapers I have toiled for being community weeklies and biweeklies, and even some that advocate for the "average American," such as the Hard Times News (I accepted a job with the daily Arlington Morning News, a sister publication of The Dallas Morning News, probably the best daily paper in the Southwest, in early 1996). While most journalists consider themselves fair, even a champion of the oppressed and disenfranchised, I believe I have walked the extra mile -- in fact, I walked more than 5,000 miles in 1984-85 with a group of Americans on a march from California to Moscow, Russia, to raise awareness for human rights, world peace, and environmental concerns. I am co-author of a book on an "alternative" history of Dallas, one that examines how people of average �means obtained liberty and justice in one of our country's largest cities.
So say what you will about me being a member of the media, I have strived to cultivate an objectivity that puts me, as Paine wrote, "under no sort of influence public or private, but the influence of reason and principle." While I am a member of a Christian church (Protestant), I belong to no political party or organization, although I have joined some media, writing, environmental, peace, and human rights organizations in the past. In recent years, I have cut my ties with such groups to maintain a clearer independence.
The trends and ideas outlined in the following pages are the product of years of reading, thinking, interviews, and discussions presented in as objective and independent a way as I know. Whether this is really "common sense," whatever that term means, is, I admit, debatable. What is practical wisdom to one person is often foolish tripe to another. Indeed, many writers tend to act like they are speaking for all Americans when they are only speaking for themselves. Let me assure you I realize I am only speaking for myself. I understand this limitation, yet the works of Paine and others so inspired me I thought it was appropriate to take a cue from the title of Paine's most famous work.
In the following pages, I cover the origin and purpose of government, our country's present condition, and some suggestions to improve our society. I divide the trends and suggestions into ten main areas: Politics, economics, the environment, criminal justice, education, sex and race relations, religion, the media, housing, health, and human services, and lifestyle and the arts.
Other books I've read tend to pick one or two of these areas and expound on their problems and possible solutions. I've bit off the whole banana in the belief that they are all related, and we must consider them all if we are really going to get to the root of our problems and come up with workable solutions. These areas are different, yet related. We cannot come up with �solutions to crime, for example, without considering religion (morals), politics, economics, education, housing, race relations, and human services. We must think in "holistic" terms, taking a wide-angle view as opposed to peering through a microscope.
I will state up front that I am frustrated at the way the elite in this country controls our lives, but I believe in channeling my frustration into positive streams. Though I understand how some can get so frustrated they resort to violence and civil disobedience of established laws, I am not advocating that here (although I believe civil disobedience should be allowed in a democracy). Paine pushed hard for a war against England to free America back in 1776, but I believe we, as human beings, have evolved to the point where we can fight our battles without physical bloodshed (winning this "war" still might take some legal, psychological bloodshed, however). I believe we �still have the legal means of revolutionizing our society for the better, if we only use them.
I still believe in the sentiments expressed by Paine more than 200 years ago, that the "cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind." This country is still a great experiment, a melting pot of many different kinds of cultures, races, religions, and beliefs. No other country in the world exudes such diversity, and if we can create a true democracy, with liberty and justice for all here, perhaps we can inspire other countries, some of which seem to be doing a better job of that at the present.
I guess we can deduce from such words by Paine in Common Sense that he didn't necessarily like government. That is, of course, an understatement, like saying Richard Nixon didn't like the media. Paine wrote that government was produced by "our wickedness," that it is a "punisher" which "creates distinctions." His theory was that man would not need such a lawgiver if he obeyed the impulses of a clear conscience.
Such a theory is similar to one espoused by another American writer and thinker, Henry David Thoreau. In his famous essay, "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience," which was written in 1845, Thoreau wrote, "That government is best which governs not at all, and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have."
While Paine wrote that the true design and end of government was security, Thoreau called government "at best an expedient...the mode which the people have chosen to execute their will." Moreover, he agreed with Paine that government is likely to be abused by those placed in positions of power.
In Common Sense, Paine discussed monarchy, asking questions like, "How came the king by a power which the people are afraid to trust, and always obliged to check?" Such power, he reasoned, could not be bestowed by a wise people or from God. Eventually, he concluded, the power in this machinery of government that had "the most weight" governed.
Both Paine and Thoreau put more stock in the people's character and will to do right than any government system. "Government never of itself furthered any enterprise," wrote Thoreau. "It does not keep the country free....It does not educate. The character inherent in the American people has done all that has been accomplished." Wrote Paine decades before Thoreau: "It is wholly owing to the constitution of the people, and not to the constitution of the government, that the crown is not as oppressive in England as in Turkey."
So where did our present concept of government originate? Paine wrote that, according to the scriptures, in the early ages of the world there were no kings or wars, which he said were primarily caused by "the pride of kings." For centuries, the Jews' form of government was a "kind of republic administered by a judge and the elders of the tribes," except in a few cases where the Almighty intervened, he said. That method is not unlike the system employed by some Native American tribes, whose methods were studied by American leaders such as Ben Franklin and Thomas Jefferson.
Government by kings was introduced by "the Heathens, from whom the children of Israel copied the custom," Paine wrote. When the Jews were clamoring for a king to lead them against their enemies, God protested against establishing a monarchial government, according to Paine's interpretation of the scriptures. In answering the question of how kings came to be, Paine listed three possible methods: by lot, election, and usurpation. While he did not nail down the precise method, there are examples of kings gaining power by all three throughout human history.
The hereditary succession of kings was one of the most foolish evils, Paine believed. "Monarchy and succession have laid....the world in blood and ashes," he wrote. Moreover, he was sickened that so many worshipped kings after their death. "Of more worth is one honest man to society, and in the sight of God, than all the crowned ruffians that ever lived," wrote Paine.
Since the formation of kings, a few have tried to bring about a fairer system of ruling. The Greeks are credited by most historians with establishing a kind of democracy between 1000 and 500 B.C. The Greek city-states established semi-representative governments with councils, public meeting places, and classes based on wealth. Some city-states even went so far to allow the wealthier citizens to elect the council representatives, and kings had no more power than any elected member.
Cleisthenes, a political leader of Athens in the 500s B.C., dissolved classes based on wealth, allowing every man over 20 to become a member of the Assembly. The 500-member Council was picked by a vote of men over 30. The court included very large juries comprised of citizens. Amazing advances in science, architecture, literature, the arts, and philosophy occurred under this more liberating system.
But like most good things, such a golden age could not last. As Plato said, "All wars come down to the possession of wealth," and such it was with the Peloponnesian War (431-405 B.C.), which left Greece's city-states in ruins. The area was conquered by first Macedonia and then Rome.
The Romans actually started with some fashion of democracy, but this degenerated into an elite dictatorship by the time the republic was established in 509 B.C. Plebians, the lower class that wasn't represented in the government, gained some rights through violent revolutions by the time Rome conquered Greece in 146 B.C. Some officials were elected in assemblies and the Senate, and the Romans did contribute a few ideas to democracy, such as the concept of a person being innocent of a crime until being proven guilty.
Modern democracies can be traced from the English revolution in 1688, although the American revolution almost a century later improved the British version, which was still controlled mostly by royalty. While the British did not allow colonists direct representation in parliament, colonists could inherit property, attend church, and enter trade professions. Until the Revenue Act of 1764, they were not directly taxed, although English landowners paid an income tax of 20% and took that out of colonists' rent, according to historian Samuel Morison.
Our Founding Fathers proclaimed people's happiness and safety to be the new government's primary purpose. Though they had their faults -- they didn't recognize the rights of Native Americans, blacks or women -- they were intelligent enough to design the constitution around the idea that power must be distributed among various institutions and individuals. Some historians believe they did that primarily to protect their own interests, that even they did not believe the average person was intelligent enough to be
trusted with the task of governing, but most agree the end result was an improvement over any previous system.
This country's founders argued long and hard over such concepts as man being strongly influenced by love of power and money. Some also feared the majority of people ruling the minority. It came down to having to choose the best alternative: Giving the ultimate voting power to the people (defined by the founders -- most of whom were wealthy lawyers -- as white men who owned property). Just as they compromised on certain principles such as "all men are created equal," they did not deal with the private empires and kingdoms that would be built in America, the sheer bureaucracy of any government, and how even the ultimate voting power was not always enough for the "average person" to hold those in government positions accountable.
In short, they did not create a true democracy, although the government has in time, with amendments and the computer age, become more accessible to people, at least on the surface. Our founders created a republican, or representative, government, as presidents did not even refer to the new form as a democracy until Woodrow Wilson did in the early 1900s.
Four days after the Declaration of Independence was read for the first time from the town hall balcony in Boston, city officials ordered townsmen to show up for a military draft. Those who were rich enough could avoid service by paying for a substitute. This is just one of many examples of the way money corrupts even the most sincere form of government. According to author Howard Zinn, when the founders gathered in 1787 to draw up the U.S. Constitution, four groups' interests were not represented: Slaves, indentured servants, women, and men without property. A strong centralized government was thus established to protect this new American political elite, Zinn wrote in A People's History of the United States.
I point out some shortcomings of this country's founders to underline a key concept: In order to make positive changes in a government, we must confront the truth and be willing to research areas that cast shadows over people whom many call heroes. Indeed, I believe our founders were heroes, for the most part. They stood up to the world's top power and won without even the full support of the colonists, many of whom fought for the British as Tories, including wealthy merchants, shippers, and lawyers who benefited from the British alliance. They embraced ideas that they knew could get them killed -- and, indeed, nine of the 56 signees of the Declaration of Independence died during the ensuing war and all were driven from their homes at one time.
The major ideas of the Declaration of Independence -- that government belongs to all people and governments that don't protect individual's rights should be abolished or altered -- have withstood the test of time. Every American should place a copy of this document on his or her wall to review on a regular basis.
But the problem with well-meaning ideas on paper is that they usually don't come out as intended in practical situations. Such is our history as human beings, but that doesn't mean we stop trying for the ideal. That's why I must point out some shortcomings: To underline areas where we can improve our democracy.
Decades after Paine and Thoreau died, American writers continue to criticize government. Many writers, and even politicians, echo John Stuart Mill, who wrote, "A governing class not accountable to the people are (sic) sure, in the main, to sacrifice the people to the pursuit of separate interests and inclinations of their own."
The ancient, almost democratic Greek city-states died when people were consumed by the lust for money, power, and pleasure, and they got away from the noble ideas of a government serving the people. Even in its present, imperfect condition, government can be a necessary instrument to improve people's lives if making sure people are secure in "liberty and the pursuit of happiness" is its main purpose. And government can benefit all people if its leaders do not lust after power and money, but they truly want to help those less fortunate become productive citizens who help themselves, and eventually, our society.
But it's clear that changes must be made if our country is to truly prosper in the coming decades. Perhaps some day when we are prepared for it, we will have a government that governs not at all, as Thoreau suggested 150 years ago. But until that day comes, let us work to improve our present model, a task that every American needs to undertake.
These chapters are omitted. If interested, contact Shay Publications.....
Along with a small group of committed, somewhat crazy friends, I had walked from my home in Dallas, Tx., to a British government office in London's Parliament Square during the previous year to meet some officials in March 1985. We were Americans on a mission to thwart nuclear annihilation and raise awareness for human rights, world peace, and environmental issues by walking about 7,000 miles from California to Moscow, Russia.
Among our methods was to meet with government officials to question them on their commitments to our concerns and lobby them. During our meeting with the British representatives, one of our party asked Disarmament Advisor David Summerhayes if he was a Christian. After he replied affirmatively, she asked him how he could justify being a Christian and supporting his government's nuclear weapons policies.
I expected this official to give a pat answer about the policies �being right and square with Christian beliefs, but he surprised me. Calling himself a "Christian realist," Summerhayes said, "Our history is such that we all seem to come short of our Christian aims. The world doesn't always go as we see it.....That's a sad fact. Actually, I'm an optimist. I believe we �should go on trying to reach our ideals."
The ideas outlined in the preceding pages may seem too idealistic, at least many of them. They may seem unattainable to the average American who is too busy trying to survive to devote much time or energy to developing them, let alone even thinking about them.
In reading through them, I can see how that conclusion can be reached. Will Congressmen really vote themselves a $100,000 annual pay cut? Will our economy really become so independent from military hardware that we cut the defense budget by more than $150 billion a year? Will lawyers, politicians, doctors, business owners, and others really turn away from greed?
Will we really live in a society where people are so mature they need neither guns nor laws nor government?
Will people live happily ever after?
Tough questions. All I can say is that in order for us to get from Point A to Point B, we must have a plan, if not a dream.
I have laid out my view of our country and my plan to solve our problems, based on years of interviews, research, meditative thought, and experiments in truth. My suggestions for a better America -- most of which have been borrowed (there are few truly original ideas) -- are here to consider, dissect, execute, and reject.
As I said in the introduction, I come with no hidden agenda, belonging to no political or social organization. I come only with open hands, an open mind, and an open heart. I believe we must take some substantial steps to help our country prosper in the next century and beyond, becoming a shining example for other countries to follow.
But while I am sincerely serious in offering these views and suggestions, I also believe we must maintain our sense of humor, not to mention a healthy sense of skepticism. Improving our country does not have to involve a battle to the death. Our mission can be conducted in happiness and laughter.
Indeed, I believe that is the best way. For all the pain a 7,000-mile march put me through in almost two years, I remember most the laughter, the friendship, the commitment of trying to do something meaningful.
Therefore, I say to you, do not take me at my word. Do your own research, your own thinking, chart your own course of action. But do something. Believe in something. Don't lose hope. Don't become, in the words of poet Ralph Chaplin, part of "the apathetic throng, the cowed and the meek, who see the world's great anguish and its wrong and dare not speak."
If your path leads you to join with others of like mind and organize a nonviolent march, demonstration, letter-writing campaign or whatever, all the better. As I've said before, that's how we can be most effective. And don't ever believe that commitment to a cause won't change anything. As Margaret Mead said, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed �citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." Whether it's four people walking down a lonely road or a million demonstrating in Washington, D.C., it makes a difference.
But I do have one request: If you take an action, make it a �nonviolent one. Do not believe that nonviolent actions don't have any effect. The examples of the power of nonviolent actions are scattered throughout history, from the civil rights marches and actions led by Martin Luther King Jr. and others in the 1950s and 1960s, to the campaign by Mahatma Gandhi, who led the revolution that ousted the British from India in the 1940s without firing a shot, to the nonviolent rebellion that ousted a dictator of the Philippines in 1986, to the political revolution brought about by Ross Perot's United We Stand organization in the 1990s.
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