Christianity may consider civic integrity at last

Phil Beaver seeks to collaborate on the-objective-truth, which can only be discovered. The comment box below invites readers to write.

"Civic" refers to citizens who collaborate for individual happiness with civic integrity more than for the city, state, nation, or society.

Consider writing a personal paraphrase of the preamble, which offers fellow citizens mutual equality:  For discussion, I convert the preamble’s predicate phrases to nouns and paraphrase it for my proposal as follows: “We willing citizens of the United States collaborate for civic, civil, and legal self-discipline to provide integrity, justice, goodwill, defense, prosperity, liberty, for ourselves and for the nation’s grandchildren and beyond and by this amendable constitution authorize and limit the U.S.A’s service to the people in their states.”

I want to collaborate with the other citizens on this paraphrase and theirs. I would preserve the original, 1787, text, unless it is amended by the people.

It seems no one has challenged whether or not the preamble is a legal statement. The fact that it changed this independent country from a confederation of states to a union of states deliberately managed by disciplined fellow citizens convinces me the preamble is legal. Equity in opportunity and outcome is shared by the people who collaborate for human justice.

Every citizen has equal opportunity to either trust-in and collaborate-on the goals stated in the preamble or be dissident to the agreement. I think 2/3 of citizens try somewhat to use the preamble but many do not articulate commitment to the goals. However, it seems less than 2/3 understand that “posterity” implies grandchildren. “Freedom of religion,” which fellow citizens have no means to discipline, oppresses freedom to develop integrity.

Selected theme from this week

Christianity may consider civic integrity at last.

The Covington incident was a case of the Catholic Church using a 16-year-old boy to demonstrate for an adult issue. However, the boy, Nick Sandmann, 1) initially smiled and offered ears to an adult, aggressive activist who approached the boy in an incendiary situation, 2) endured about ten minutes of drum beating in his right ear, 3) changed his facial expression from smiling to concern, and 4) turned and walked away. The world has not yet awoken to the lessons Nick Sandmann delivered.

The aggressive redskins, the vile blacks, and the Catholic Church ought to reform. The media ought to move to an island on mars.

What is African-American Christianity? Does it promote trust-in and commitment-to the preamble to the U.S. Constitution?

News

Lakota People’s Law Project proposes that a man’s Alinsky-Marxist behavior toward a boy justifies a meeting with the pope (Jack Jenkins, RNS) (https://religionnews.com/2019/01/22/native-american-man-from-viral-video-offers-to-meet-with-catholic-students-leaders/)

Jack Jenkins expresses either eternal youth, ignorance, or leftist leanings in this report of an Omaha-Nation elder invading the space of high school students being taunted by another AMO (Alinsky-Marxist organized) group present for their typically violent Bible-thumping. The Bible thumpers mocked the elder as an erroneous god, "Gad."

It was an amazing clash of black victims, indigenous victims, Catholic Church victims, and civic integrity expressed by Sanmann. It takes more journalism than the media possesses to perceive it that way. History’s journal knows 1) slavery, 2) the Catholic doctrine of discovery and “authorization” of African-slave trade, 3) the British Empire’s political influences including prolific Atlantic slave trade, and 4) the opportunity for individual happiness with civic integrity that is offered in the civic, civil, and legal agreement that is available to fellow citizens in the preamble to the U.S. Constitution.

It’s a piecemeal story; see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=da1Wy4O2shc for one view of an event that the media despicably distorted. It is not easy to discover that after ten minutes, previously smiling Nick Sandmann grew tired of the drum beat in his ear, motioned to a friend, and eased away from the drum beating AMO activist; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzJU1L-1VrE. Every 16-year old who can demonstrate civic integrity as Nick Sandmann did is among my heroes. His greatest act of courage was thinking for himself during ten minutes of mystery and developing the decision to calmly walk away.

There’s an old saw: Give them enough hanging and they’ll rope themselves. It is unimaginable that the media are so determined to demonstrate the saw. President Trump has confronted them for at least three years, and if the media had Sandmann’s wisdom, the media could reform. Alas, the media's days seem numbered, but I don't know what change is coming.

Posted on the above cite.

Covington Catholic High School news (Jarrett Stepman) (https://www.dailysignal.com/2019/01/22/the-covington-fiasco-is-a-perfect-example-of-why-the-founders-distrusted-democracy/)

Jarrett Stepman’s coverage of the Covington Catholic High School event is an example of writers for the media defying a civic people’s collaboration for ultimate justice under law. The freedom to collaborate for statutory justice creates the U.S. dichotomy: fellow citizens both the willing and the dissident. Stepman illustrates the failure of civic integrity in journalism that led to the well-earned label “lying media.” Journalism records the ineluctable human march toward statutory justice, and writers for the media are either clueless or deceivers.

In sequence, Stepman uses traditional, misunderstood phrases for higher political ground he erroneously hopes the reader will accept. He starts with colonial British phrases in order: self-governing society, the Founding Fathers, governing institutions, [controversially Greek] the rule of law, basic freedoms, the American people, and the perfectibility of man. He quotes John Adams, “Individuals have conquered themselves. Nations and large bodies of men, never.” I disagree with Adams: Some individuals discipline themselves. A majority of at least 2/3 could collectively discipline a nation.

Still later, Stepman uses a common U.S. political trick: interweaving references to “the framers” and “the Founders,” typically overlooking the signers. The 55 framers served from May to September, 1787, and 39 of them signed the U.S. preamble and the articles of the U.S. Constitution on September 17, 1787. Rather than founders, an erroneous First Congress enacted the First and Second Amendments on December 15, 1791. I can’t imagine how Stepman constructed the nonsense “Then, knowing . . . only to the people . . . put guardrails on the people.” The actors in the U.S. preamble are the civic people, We the People of the United States, rather than the Congress or "Founders."

Finally, Stepman attempts to impose his god on the reader citing first “the fallen nature of man” and second Stepman-rights according to his god, which Stepman would impose on fellow citizens. Anytime anyone invokes God to beg political power or influence, he or she has individually denied personal pursuit of civic integrity. The ideas he or she expresses cannot be appreciated as collaboration.

No one wants to collaborate about their god or none. A person’s god or none is a private pursuit. I do not care to consider Stepman's god for evaluation, let alone effect the judgement.

Stepman seems supportive of Trump. I voted for Trump/Pence twice and am on deck to vote for them two more times. However, I never wanted America great again. I want America to become great by accepting the power, the energy, and the authority of the ultimate We the People of the United States.

An achievable better future is possible if 2/3 or more fellow citizens adopt the U.S. preamble---to order the civic, civil, and legal purpose and goals---and collaborate to discover the-objective-truth by which to pursue statutory justice rather than dominant opinion. Impossible as perfection may be, it is the worthy goal.

Columns

On deck for my 3^rd and 4^th votes for Trump/Pence (Rich Lowry) (https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/commentary/2019/01/19/rich-lowry-trump-is/)

I thought President Trump made a good decision to not insist on a state of the union address when uninvited by the House of Representatives’ majority. Lowry’s column increases my hope that I will actually have the opportunities to vote Trump/Pence the 3^rd and 4^th times. Mind you, I never wanted MAGA. I think America’s promise was alive from June 21, 1788 until March 4, 1789 when the First Congress set it aside. It’s been that way ever since. Without pursuing the promise, greatness cannot be expected.

On June 21, 1788, nine states ratified the U.S. preamble and the articles that follow its agreement. They established a Union of people in their states that legally ended the confederation of states declared in 1774. This event had been made possible by the 39 of 55 delegates from 12 of 13 states who signed the 1787 U.S. Constitution. However, on March 4, 1789, the First Congress, with representatives from only eleven states, began operating like adolescent parents who know no better than to squabble over the four child-rearing ideas they inherited from four families.

The Congress neither trusted-in nor committed-to the civic, civil, and legal agreement that is freely offered to fellow citizens in the U.S. preamble. The First Congress negotiated re-establishment of American-modified Blackstone law with American-factional-Protestantism as surrogate for Canterbury in a legislative partnership that made congressmen feel divine.

American “freedom from religion” has progressed from Protestant theism in a divergent path to Jude-Catholicism. Consider the nine justices who makeup the U.S. Supreme Court. As a person who is committed to the-objective-truth rather than my god, I am in the major majority of non-theists. Perhaps our faction numbers ¼ of fellow citizens or 82 million Americans and growing.

For America to become great, a majority of fellow citizens, perhaps 2/3, may choose to collaborate for statutory justice that is civically ordered according to the purpose and goals offered in the U.S. preamble. It holds pursuit of religion or spiritualism as a private choice by adult fellow citizens.

Statutory justice is perfection, perhaps unattainable yet a necessary and worthy commitment. The fellow citizens who think crime pays need statutory law and enforcement with civic citizens who by example may motivate reform.

Criminals are too psychologically powerful to yield to arbitrary opinion, and they reject equal justice under written law. Statutory justice is measured by the-objective-truth, which can only be discovered rather than constructed by reason, mystery, or any other human coercion/force. Ultimate justice comes from civic, civil, and legal people rather than their governments or gods.

I thought he said it in his first inaugural address and hope at some time President Trump will publicize his intentions to make America great at last. He’ll need most fellow citizens to either perceive or consider a vision of individual discipline by which the nation manages its governments---local, state, and federal.

Posted on the site per the above URL.

Quora
 

https://www.quora.com/unanswered/Why-do-many-people-assume-society-is-the-ultimately-just-moral-or-civilized-faction-of-humankind

Anonymous:  https://www.quora.com/anonymous/a968ad23081947d9b3f98f9dd7369545

 
Why do many people assume "society" is the ultimately just, moral, or civilized faction of humankind?

To Vejay Raj:  The question is distinguished by “humankind” and “the . . . faction.” Also, it does not stipulate the majority. The just, moral or civilized faction may be a minority.

From your perspective, individuals “from a group” to lessen disagreement. But group agreement establishes only group justice, morality, and civilization.

To Vejay Raj again:  In your example, the group agreed to enslave others. Who were just, moral, or civilized: the group or the slaves? And which was the majority: the group or the slaves?

Where do the conclusions for your example leave humankind in a possible quest for ultimate justice? Dependent upon society? What faction of humankind is society?

John S Miller Jr, former Nuclear Operations/Engineering Support

Depends on the society. Some people are just believers in the human capacity for goodness and that is an admirable trait. However, there is no place on earth that fits your standard in the question. Humans are creatures of moral and immoral behavior. There is no perfect place or person alive today nor will there be in the future as we know it. Looking on the bright side has its perks but also the pitfalls of human weakness in all things moral and/or civilized.

To John S Miller Jr:

Might there be an achievable better future if 2/3 or more of fellow citizens in a place like the United States agreed to collaborate for equity under just law, a modification of the phrase that adorns the U.S. Supreme Court building, “Equal justice under law”?

To John S Miller Jr again:

The U.S. is in 50%-plus-one-vote divergent cycling. A super-majority would break the problems—for example, that there will always be people who think crime pays.

I have no problem with “equal” but do not think U.S. law is just.

Accepting your thought, I wonder the consequence of most fellow citizens, say at least 2/3 during the future, collaborating for equality under just law.

https://www.quora.com/What-one-major-change-in-our-society-would-help-most-to-end-the-plutocracy-in-our-society?

I have no idea what you mean by “our society,” but let’s assume you mean fellow citizens of the United States.

Most fellow citizens could read, comprehend, adopt, promote, and practice the civic, civil, and legal agreement that is offered in the preamble to the U.S. Constitution. After some time, perhaps 2/3 of the inhabitants would perceive that the U.S. preamble offers each individual the free opportunity to collaborate for mutual, comprehensive safety and security during life or not. With widespread example, the 1/3 dissidents to the agreement could be encouraged by a better way of living. Of the dissidents, the faction that believes crime pays might lessen.

With a few years practice, most fellow citizens might imagine that the U.S. preamble ultimately offers the discipline required for individual happiness with civic integrity. With widespread individual discipline, the people would discipline the government.

https://www.quora.com/Will-society-ever-be-able-to-completely-trust-the-media-again?

What is the meaning of “society” in your question?

I have never trusted the media and can’t name a fellow citizen who did.

https://www.quora.com/How-does-individualism-makes-civil-society-stronger?

First, let me object to the oppressive phrase “civil society.” It’s a phrase that purports to speak from a higher ground without the required basis, much like citing god with a capital “G” to express opinion. It attempts the pretense better than humankind. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_society. A couple of examples come to mind: first, the Catholic pope and second the free and irresponsible press.

More importantly, political phrases---“God,” government, and “civil society”---are used by many people to attempt to consign their IPEA. That is, his or her inalienable human opportunity to use their individual power, their individual energy, and their individual authority (IPEA) to develop either infidelity or integrity. Many people admit to IPEA but ignore it so as to nourish existing habits and explore new banal appetites. The pope looks sadly into his mirror and thinks he did it for the Church. A writer for the press looks sadly into the mirror and says, “I did it for journalism.” In either case, IPEA could be used for personal integrity, more importantly civic integrity.

The person who embraces IPEA does not constrict personal, intellectual potential and may become a master criminal until actual harm he or she caused becomes public knowledge. Then, he or she must face statutory law and its enforcement. It is personally advantageous to use IPEA to develop integrity, especially civic integrity---preservation of fellow citizen’s opportunities to develop integrity to the-objective-truth.

The person who commits to integrity discovers and collaborates for the-objective-truth, the basis of statutory justice. Like the-objective-truth, statutory justice can only be discovered and studied so as to understand how to benefit by reforming written law and its enforcement. For example, a civic person never lies, so as to lessen human misery and loss. Statutory justice may not be attainable, yet it is an essential goal.

The human being is so psychologically and physically powerful that he or she will not accept arbitrary, dominant opinion as the basis for statutory justice. Life is so brief, and the individual strains under seeming oppression, so some individuals choose to violently reject injustice, inviting subjugation to statutory law. People who adopt fidelity to the-objective-truth negotiate reform, no matter how difficult the task may seem, rather than use physical or psychological violence.

Societies appeal to the individual to consign IPEA to the association. For example, a religious institution may appeal to fellow citizens to forgo commitment to equity under statutory justice so as to favor the association. The person who commits to his or her society may find himself or herself at odds with the ultimate justice he or she personally perceives. The pope of the Catholic Church maintains the unenviable posture of favoring the wealth institution at the expense of obvious justice before humankind. His “civil society” would appear better than humankind. Fortunately, not all of humankind adopts papal fallacy.

The current or the next papal individual could strengthen humankind by declaring once and for all that the Church will conform to the-objective-truth and collaborate for statutory justice rather than pretend that Catholic Tradition is superior both to the world’s literature and to statutory justice.

Humankind psychologically evolved during perhaps 3 million years. It would be strengthened by the reform from the last 0.01 million years’ cultural developments so as to effect separation of metaphysics from physics, beliefs from the-objective-truth, doctrine from statutory justice, and separation of church from state. One individual, the pope, could effect this improvement of humankind and establishment of his institution as a “civil society,” at last.  

Law professors

https://libertylawsite.staging.wpengine.com/liberty-classic/bringing-natural-law-to-the-nations-vattel-review/

The opinion expressed in “. . . the United States Declaration of Independence . . . unequivocally locates the source of the enumerated rights identified in the document as “the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God” and man’s “Creator.”

“Vattel . . .  adhered to a “balance of power” understanding of international relations rather than the type of perpetual peace project advocated by Immanuel Kant in 1795. Hence Vattel sought to delineate principles that self-interested states led by flawed individuals should follow when making political and economic decisions.”

But by what standard do states discover their self-interests and does economics, a progeny of physics, tolerate non-peace by any definition, for example, war? Do economic decisions tolerate political arrogance?

“Hamilton agreed with Hume that it is foolish to ignore human corruptibility when considering how to establish and maintain stable political communities. But reading Vattel’s Law of Nations seems to have helped convince Hamilton of the basic reasonability of core propositions of natural law: that, for instance, there are universal moral truths knowable by reason.”

Universal moral truths is only another vain, proprietary attempt to usurp the-objective-truth, which can only be discovered rather than constructed and does not respond to reason. Justice is judged as fidelity to the-objective-truth, and the scholar who ignores the-objective-truth is erroneously promoting his or her truth. When the-objective-truth has not been discovered, justice requires the posture “I opine but do not know.” For example, I opine that termination of my body, mind, and person will leave nothing beyond appreciation I expressed and my accomplishments: But I do not know that there is no spiritual world.

Alexander Hamilton signed the 1787 U.S. Constitution and was a major influence in its June 21, 1788 ratification, authoring many of the Federalist Papers. In Federalist 84, he asserts that a bill of rights is not needed because of the civic, civil, and legal (I assert) agreement that is stated in the preamble to the U.S. Constitution.

The UN statement of human rights is wrong, unwieldy, and a force for social democracy or socialism. It cannot compare with the freedom-from oppression and liberty-to pursue individual happiness with civic integrity that is offered in the U.S. preamble’s agreement by willing fellow citizens.

https://www.lawliberty.org/2019/01/24/the-woke-and-the-dead-democratic-primary

“The Election of 2016 offered us the spectacle of Republican civil war, one that revealed a huge gap between GOP voters and the party’s leaders.”
 

Why the gap? What if the genes and memes of most fellow citizens adhere to the civic, civil, and legal discipline that is freely offered in the preamble to the U.S. Constitution (hereafter U.S. preamble)? By freely offered I mean offered without coercion. That is, the individual may reject the agreement, for example, believe that crime pays.

And what if most elected and appointed officials err---hold themselves above fellow citizenship? Officials forgetting they are fellow citizens creates a gap that begs woe and classes such officials among the criminals---other dissidents to the U.S preamble’s agreement.

Political jargon increases gaps that fellow citizens who focus on responsible individual behavior but passive civic integrity cannot explain or articulate---jargon like party elite, left, party’s soul, liberal, universal equality, progressive policy, white privilege, social justice, identity, voters, revolution, post-liberal, fairness (Rawls), social welfare, social order, and inequality. “Cosmic justice” is over my head. Social justice threatens statutory justice, which seems a tacit goal of the U.S. preamble’s agreement.

The U.S. preamble orders civic justice by specific purpose and goals manifested by current families working to assure that the parents’ grandchildren and beyond (our Posterity) may enter an achievable better future. “Social justice” has saddled posterity with $22 trillion developing debt. Written law and its enforcement are continually reviewed to discover and reform injustices. The worthy goal is statutory justice—that is, written law that has no injustice---unachievable as perfection may be.

It seems President Trump seems aware that ultimate justice comes only from a civic, civil, and legal people (perhaps learning the suggestion from Abraham Lincoln’s first inaugural address). Regardless of appearances, We the People of the United States---those who collaborate for justice using the U.S. preamble’s agreement---perceived candidate Trump intended to accelerate the journey toward statutory justice. He constantly behaves under the U.S. Constitution, which, by purpose and goals ultimately serves the U.S. preamble.

President Trump often confuses me. However, I do not doubt him. He did not make the GOP contenders he defeated weak; they were weak. He did not make fake writers fake; they are fake. He did not make the social democrats ruinous; they are ruinous.

I doubt there exists a member of the Democratic Party who could or would offer civic, civil, and legal fellow citizens hope for an achievable better future. But if a candidate Democrat emerges, I would be reluctant to vote the chance I understood him or her. I do not understand President Trump, but he established the hope that our posterity may enjoy opportunities for individual happiness with civic integrity in the United States. Both major parties are clueless, I guess because the players consider themselves better than fellow citizens.

“To be an advocate for a thoroughgoing social justice demands a radical and ongoing exposure of oppression, injustice, and especially inequality. You can always find another kind of inequality and there’s always another frontier for social justice to conquer. So, last year’s radical position is today’s orthodoxy.”

If fellow citizens ignore the U.S. preamble’s agreement, social justice may end all hope to discover statutory justice under the written rule of law. The viable candidate against Donald R. Trump must admit first that he or she is a fellow citizen.

https://libertylawsite.staging.wpengine.com/2019/01/22/solidarity-true-and-false/

Background I did not address:

“Who, asked [Peter] Bauer, could possibly be opposed to aid to the poor or unfortunate, except the callous and the heartless? Never mind that aid propped up tyrants, destroyed local economic activity, promoted corruption and politicized life. In like fashion, who could possibly be against solidarity?”

“[The] welfare state results in a better society than any other kind of state currently known . . . I concede that it is a respectable point of view.”

Oxford dictionary online defines “welfare state” as “A system whereby the state undertakes to protect the health and well-being of its citizens, especially those in financial or social need, by means of grants, pensions, and other benefits.”

How distant is that from “socialism” as “A political and economic theory of social organization which advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole.” And “social democracy” as “A socialist system of government achieved by democratic means.”

These definitions seem consistent with a Dalrymple view that socialism cannot work; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-SdftH0mfA. “You can only impose theoretical absurdity by force.” Political influence is tyranny; organizing for the benefit of all by an organizer of the organized. Dalrymple rejected the claim that humans are only selfish beasts. “No society has ever been like that.” Recall the opening words of Adam Smith’s “The Moral Sentiment”:  “How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it except the pleasure of seeing it.” http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/Smith/tms111.html. “Socialism requires that all people be altruistic all the time.”

“And in the eternal search for convenience and value for money, or at least low prices (not quite the same thing), most people prefer to patronize commercial centers than to take the trouble, and accept the greater expense, of shopping in a series of small merchants along a main street. In a sense, then, and to an extent, the yellow vests are protesting against the consequences of their own priorities, which had assisted in, if they are not wholly responsible for, the destruction of real, non-state-mediated, solidarity.”

My short comment:

“Curiously enough, few people stop to consider the nature of human solidarity.”

 

Dalrymple did not explicitly explain “the nature of human solidarity.” Perhaps he recommended British conservatism.

Most individuals want mutual, comprehensive safety and security (Security) so that each person may responsibly pursue the happiness he or she perceives rather than the tyranny someone would impose on him or her. They appreciate a fellow citizen’s responsible happiness.

Security is possible when fellow citizens collaborate for statutory justice. But some individuals think crime pays. Justice does not yield to democracy.

Written law and its enforcement are required. The human being is too psychologically powerful to yield to dominant opinion, and therefore statutory law must be grounded in the-objective-truth.

The-objective-truth is the standard that judges truth, Dalrymple’s truth, and his consideration of human solidarity.

https://www.lawliberty.org/2018/11/16/aristotle-and-the-seriousness-of-politics/

Pericles was born more than 2,500 years ago, but Aristotle only 2,400 years ago.
 
Pericles controversially informed a civic people that individuals may demand equity when they collaborate-for and behave-under statutory justice. Since statutory justice is an ultimate quest (perhaps impossible in a changing, diverse world), a civic, civil, and legal citizen observes statutory law as he or she collaborates to reform discovered injustices.

“The talk of politicians reveals the souls of both the politician and those who listen to him and respond. Politics confronts the souls of our kind while they are citizens in the actual polities, in the nation-states of this world. The politician does not govern our individual souls. We do that.”  
Clinging to the mystery of “souls” foments the psychological violence that frustrates human beings unto physical violence. For this reason, the discipline of civic, civil, and legal pursuit of statutory justice requires responsible citizens to reserve imagined-mysteries for private contemplation and to avoid traditionally-imposed-mysteries. Consider the mystic hate imposed on non-believers in John 15:18-24.

The first of the mysteries to be confronted is “soul” itself. My person did not concern itself with soul when my ovum emerged for fertilization, and I speculate that I can trust my ultimate destiny as readily as I commit to my origins. Meanwhile, I accept my individual power, my individual energy, and my individual authority (IPEA) to develop integrity toward the-objective-truth rather than the infidelity of electing my god.

Following the development of Pericles’ suggestion of “equal justice under law,” the framers in 1787 constitutional convention created the arguments that led perhaps Gouverneur Morris (b. 266 years ago) to author the preamble to the U.S. Constitution. It is the civic, civil, and legal agreement by which a U.S. citizen may choose to either collaborate for statutory justice or be a dissident.

It seems self-evident that a “soul” does not discipline a human life: the person has that ineluctable IPEA.

  

Other fora

https://carm.org/submit-research-request

African-American Christianity was mentioned regarding MLK Jr's background in https://www.wsj.com/articles/dr-kings-radical-biblical-vision-1522970778.

I heard Jeremiah Wright speak in Baton Rouge in February, 2015; https://www.nola.com/opinions/index.ssf/2015/02/jeremiah_wright_tells_a_southe.html. He tacitly asserted that God's chosen people have black skins.

Wright attitudes derive perhaps from black power, back liberation theology, and Alinsky-violence to assert arbitrary rights, all latently nourished but emerging after King's death in 1968.

I prefer Frederick Douglass's 1852 assertion that he is a fellow citizen and his claim to the preamble to the U.S. Constitution as well as its articles.

I think it would be helpful for fellow citizens to have an authoritative history that explores the sects within African-American Christianity.

Phil Beaver does not “know.” He trusts in and is committed to the-objective-truth which can only be discovered. Conventional wisdom has truth founded on reason, but it obviously does not work.

Phil is agent for A Civic People of the United States, a Louisiana, education non-profit corporation. See online at promotethepreamble.blogspot.com, and consider essays from the latest and going back as far as you like.