September 11 Digital Archive

tp166.xml

Title

tp166.xml

Source

born-digital

Media Type

story

Created by Author

yes

Described by Author

no

Date Entered

2003-03-03

TomPaine Story: Story

AGENDA INTERRUPTED:



Although Joseph J. Ellis, in his best-seller, Founding Brothers , tells us with justifiable pride that the United States is now the oldest enduring Republic in world history, with a set of political institutions and traditions that have stood the test of time , he warns us too, with historical wisdom , that our unrivalled democracy is still a work in progress. The American agenda from the beginning was a heady introduction of the principles of equality and the renunciation of the twin evils of monarchy and religious tyranny. Tom Paine said The only legitimate government, in the end, was self-government . And, Like Voltaire, Jefferson longed for the day when the last king would be strangled with the entrails of the last priest. .

It was this historic tradition, Americas revolutionary contribution that burst upon a world of monarchical privilege and religious power, that was attacked on September 11, as religious fascism, the 21st. century version of mediaeval thought, sought to destroy the American agenda of freedom and liberty.

From its inception the American experience has been an exuberant expansion of liberty in a nation of diversity. The concept of freedom runs as a unifying thread as each generation fought to maintain and extend individual rights: slavery, state-sponsored racism , civil rights, the rights of women, labors right to organize, religious freedom , the separation of church and state, the struggle against fascism, each held center-stage in its time, and together they represent the ongoing saga of the centrality of freedom started at our nations birth.

We have stopped the fascist-religious-terrorists for now. Our challenge now is : Will we be able to do so in the years ahead while continuing our historic American agenda of freedom and liberty?

Citation

“tp166.xml,” September 11 Digital Archive, accessed November 4, 2024, https://911digitalarchive.org/items/show/754.