The Affirmation of the United States of America

[*PLEASE READ!*
We are, concurrently with this petition, also working with cities, counties, and states nationwide to have June 21st proclaimed "Affirmation Day." We are having great success with that project. It is absolutely imperative to make the distinction between that project - the Proclamations - and this petition. Proclamation by any town, city, county, municipality, State, or any other public entity does NOT imply agreement with or endorsement of this petition. This petition is the expression of opinions by INDIVIDUALS who agree with it's content, and no connection with any proclamation of Affirmation Day is either intended or implied.]

The Affirmation of the United States of America

To the President, Congress, and the People of the United States of America

Nearly two and a half centuries ago, our forefathers began a great experiment that came to be called the United States of America. 

The seeds of freedom were planted in the soil of discontent, at the feet of a tyrant. They were sown in the fields of conscience and conviction, watered with the sweat of patriots and the blood of heroes, and we reaped a harvest of Liberty. Our freedoms were neither easily gained, nor passively maintained. 

It was liberty for which they fought, not for license, not for freedom without structure. Rights without restraint are a short stone's throw from anarchy, which is it's own brand of tyranny. They relied on the assurance of the authority of a Higher Power in designing a framework by which the promise of democracy could be fulfilled and by which our Republic would stand. In their wisdom and foresight, our founders recognized that true freedom, the inherent blessings in which we are all conceived, would perish without guidance and direction. They formulated a Constitution, instituting a rule of law, not to grant these rights, but to define and ensure them. 

That Constitution has stood the test of time - through civil war, through political upheaval, through social unrest. It has been interpreted, re-interpreted, even misinterpreted, but the essence has remained.

Two and a half centuries. A quarter of a millennium. That is, historically, the life-span of a great world power. In 1887, Alexander Tyler of the the University of Edinburgh, wrote the following:

“A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse over loose fiscal policy, (which is) always followed by a dictatorship.”

“The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence:

• From bondage to spiritual faith;

• From spiritual faith to great courage;

• From courage to liberty;

• From liberty to abundance;

• From abundance to complacency;

• From complacency to apathy;

• From apathy to dependence;

• From dependence back into bondage.”

We, the people, have lost sight of the values which have thus far determined our fortunes. We have become too comfortable and too corrupt. "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" has been redefined to mean amorality, licentousness and the freedom to do whatsoever we choose, without accountability. 

We not only depend on, but demand our "entitlements," which those who govern are only too happy to provide, so as to make us beholden to them. We have come to seek freedom without regard to any higher moral authority than personal desire. 

Too many are reliant upon others to do their work, to ensure their survival. We have become an unfocused, amoral society. We have seen the loss of values and a decline in the resolve which, in times past, has ensured both the survival of this Republic and its continued success. A new barbarism has arisen within our society, depleting its former strength. We are still States, but we are no longer United. 

The "Great Melting Pot" has become a vast frying pan, in which scattered factions cannot come together. Our nation's greatness is, and has always been, derived not from it's diversity, but from the willingness of diverse people to cede their myriad national identities, religious convictions and political ideologies to assimilate toward a greater, common vision. Never has there been a call for loss of individuality, but the call to unity despite differences, the promise of 'e pluribus unum,' has been sufficient inducement to draw from all nations those who love liberty and desire freedom.

We, in our complacency, have allowed ourselves to become vulnerable to a threat, not foreign, but domestic: an enemy of America who thrives on division, panic and fear among the people, rather than on a shared resolve. 

This enemy has, for all practical purposes, reduced the Constitution to the status of an inconvenient historical document which impedes his vision of progress. 

This enemy has, for all practical purposes, declared the Congress of the United States to be a ceremonial body, without power to fulfill its charter. 

This enemy has drawn to himself authority beyond what is reasonable or necessary for him to carry out the sacred office with which he has been entrusted.

And our Congress is not blameless - they have borne this in silence. They have turned a deaf ear to both the obligations of their legal mandate and the people who elected them to govern. The silence of good men is the breeding ground of treachery.

And we, the people, are not blameless, because we have allowed it to continue.

We, the people, have allowed it. 

You, Barack Hussein Obama, with your ideological fathers, brothers, and children, have guided, influenced, and capitalized on it. It is to our eternal discredit and everlasting shame that we, the people have allowed such to occur. Our complacency has been our downfall, our failure to learn the lessons of history has led us to the brink of present crisis. You have depended on apathy and used it as an instrument of change. You have capitalized on the complacency and the ignorance of a nation gone astray, and grasped the opportunity to recreate it in your chosen image.

To the members of Congress who have sold their allegiance to partisan politics, the words and funding of lobbyists, and the continuation of their political careers to the exception of all else, rather than to the well-being, common interest, and greater good of their constituents, We, the People, bear witness to these facts and to you we also serve notice.

We are not all ignorant. We are not all apathetic. Enough of us have noticed. Enough of us have listened and observed and taken note. Enough of us have learned the lessons of history. It is no small thing to bring forth charges against a President of the United States of America, but present circumstances compel us, and we do so with the utmost gravity.

We pledged "liberty and justice for all," and all that those words represent. We fought for a promise which echoes still in the hearts of all who call themselves "American." The commitment of Lincoln that the "government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth" resounds in our very souls. 

Of, by and for...the People. Not of, by, or for your political ideology. Not of, by, or for your vision as a social organizer. Not of, by, or for any specific race, gender, or creed. Not for the Democrats, or the Republicans, or the Libertarians, not for the conservatives, the progressives or the moderates. And most certainly not of, by, or for a special interest group.

WE...THE...PEOPLE.

When, in the course of human events it becomes necessary for we, the People, to take a stand, to insist on an accounting, to demand change, decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that we should declare the causes which impel us to these measures.

A conviction unspoken is a conviction without power, and we, the People, would be heard. The laws of man, and of nature and of nature's God compel us to speak, and it is with the heaviest of hearts, the most solemn minds, the utmost sobriety and the clearest of consciences that we set forth this declaration.

You have, by Executive Order and clandestine committee, repeatedly overreached your lawful authority.

You have promoted racial, economic, gender division and promoted class warfare. You have made personal industry and individual success out to be enemies of the people. You have run an uninterrupted re-election campaign from the time you took office. You have pandered to your fellow ideologues, rewarded your largest contributors, and shown favor to your high-profile supporters. 

Here is what we, the People want, no, demand: We want justice, we want domestic tranquility, we want the common defense to be provided for, the general welfare promoted. We want the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity. That is your job description. That is what we hired you to do.

You did not inherit an insurmountable set of problems: you sought to accept such situations as existed, and along with them, the solemn obligation to address them and correct them insofar as it was within your ability to do so. This is not accomplished by the passing of blame to your predecessor, nor may it side-stepped by excuses and rhetoric.

You, Mr. President, have failed America, and we, the people, will not stand for it.

It is said that history is written by the winners. Few will read this, fewer will remember it, but if this be the case, and our part in such history is to be recorded, let it be known to both God and man that we believed in a higher calling and a greater destiny than that to which you have aspired to lead us. And let it also be written that if we fail, that we failed in such attempts to which free men have ever been called, and not in complacency.

We the People of the United States, in Order to assure the continuance of our cherished Union, to demand the Justice promised by our Constitution, to insure domestic Tranquility, to promote the general Welfare, and to secure the continued Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Affirmation of the United States of America, and declare June 21, 2012 "Affirmation Day."


Written by Poore Thomas in Nucla, Colorado, May 5-7, 2012

For details on additional future plans, please email affirmationday@gmail.com, with the subject of "Info." Your information WILL NOT be shared with ANYONE.