who denies freedom
to others, deserves it not …
cannot retain it

Today’s haiku is based on the following letter written in 1859.

Springfield, Ills, April 6, 1859

Messrs. Henry L. Pierce, & others.

Gentlemen

Your kind note inviting me to attend a Festival in Boston, on the 13th. Inst. in honor of the birth-day of Thomas Jefferson, was duly received. My engagements are such that I can not attend.

Bearing in mind that about seventy years ago, two great political parties were first formed in this country, that Thomas Jefferson was the head of one of them, and Boston the head-quarters of the other, it is both curious and interesting that those supposed to descend politically from the party opposed to Jefferson should now be celebrating his birthday in their own original seat of empire, while those claiming political descent from him have nearly ceased to breathe his name everywhere.

Remembering too, that the Jefferson party were formed upon its supposed superior devotion to the personal rights of men, holding the rights of property to be secondary only, and greatly inferior, and then assuming that the so-called democracy of to-day, are the Jefferson, and their opponents, the anti-Jefferson parties, it will be equally interesting to note how completely the two have changed hands as to the principle upon which they were originally supposed to be divided.

The democracy of to-day hold the liberty of one man to be absolutely nothing, when in conflict with another man’s right of property. Republicans, on the contrary, are for both the man and the dollar; but in cases of conflict, the man before the dollar.

I remember once being much amused at seeing two partially intoxicated men engage in a fight with their great-coats on, which fight, after a long, and rather harmless contest, ended in each having fought himself out of his own coat, and into that of the other. If the two leading parties of this day are really identical with the two in the days of Jefferson and Adams, they have perfomed the same feat as the two drunken men.

But soberly, it is now no child’s play to save the principles of Jefferson from total overthrow in this nation.

One would start with great confidence that he could convince any sane child that the simpler propositions of Euclid are true; but, nevertheless, he would fail, utterly, with one who should deny the definitions and axioms. The principles of Jefferson are the definitions and axioms of free society.

And yet they are denied and evaded, with no small show of success.

One dashingly calls them “glittering generalities”; another bluntly calls them “self evident lies”; and still others insidiously argue that they apply only to “superior races.”

These expressions, differing in form, are identical in object and effect–the supplanting the principles of free government, and restoring those of classification, caste, and legitimacy. They would delight a convocation of crowned heads, plotting against the people. They are the van-guard–the miners, and sappers–of returning despotism.

We must repulse them, or they will subjugate us.

This is a world of compensations; and he who would be no slave, must consent to have no slave. Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it.

All honor to Jefferson–to the man who, in the concrete pressure of a struggle for national independence by a single people, had the coolness, forecast, and capacity to introduce into a merely revolutionary document, an abstract truth, applicable to all men and all times, and so to embalm it there, that to-day, and in all coming days, it shall be a rebuke and a stumbling-block to the very harbingers of re-appearing tyranny and oppression.

Your obedient Servant
A. Lincoln

This is a world of compensations; and he who would be no slave, must consent to have no slave.

Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it.

Can we choose up sides based on that last?

Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves?

Which side do you want to be on?

A Just God IS watching by the way.

already convinced
of the conspiracy will
likely be unmoved

In the article, No, Chemtrails Are Not Real or Causing Floods, E.P.A. Says By Maxine Joselow in the New York Times, Ms. Joselow opens with:

No, chemtrails are not real, the Environmental Protection Agency said on Thursday, in a notable instance of the Trump administration debunking a conspiracy theory that gained traction amid catastrophic flooding in Central Texas.

For decades, scientists have sought to shut down the chemtrails conspiracy theory, which asserts that the federal government is spraying harmful chemicals into the sky to control the weather, population or food supply. On Thursday, their efforts got a major boost from an unexpected source: two new E.P.A. websites that seek to “provide clear, science-based information” on chemtrail claims as well as on geoengineering, or efforts to intentionally alter Earth’s climate.

But she closes with:

Andrew Dessler, a professor of atmospheric science at Texas A&M University, said the E.P.A.’s new sites “appear to be a reasonable effort to give people the facts they need to recognize that chemtrails claims lack any scientific basis.” Still, he said, “those already convinced of the conspiracy will likely be unmoved. Instead, they’ll probably just conclude that the E.P.A. is in on the coverup.”

As the King says the Duke in the book The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn:

“Hain’t we got all the fools in town on our side? And ain’t that a big enough majority in any town?”

remember always
that all of us are descended
from those immigrants

Adapted from Remarks to the Daughters of the American Revolution, April 21, 1938, Washington, D.C. by President Franklin D. Roosevelt when he said:

Remember always that all of us, and you and I especially, are descended from immigrants and revolutionists.

And I am particularly glad to know that today you are making this fine appeal to the youth of America. The importance to this rising generation, to our sons and grandsons, and great grandsons, we cannot over-estimate; the importance of what we are doing this year, in our own generation, to keep alive the spirit of American democracy, the spirit of opportunity, the kind of a spirit that has led us as a nation, not in a small group but as a nation, to meet the very great problems of the past.

We look for a younger generation that is going to be more American than we are. We are doing the best that we can, and yet we can do better than that, we can do more than that:

Let’s say that again … out loud maybe.

We cannot over-estimate;

the importance of what we are doing this year,

in our own generation,

to keep alive the spirit of American democracy,

the spirit of opportunity,

the kind of a spirit that has led us as a nation,

not in a small group but as a nation,

to meet the very great problems of the past.

We look for a younger generation that is going to be more American than we are.

We are doing the best that we can, and yet we can do better than that, we can do more than that:

each generation
so far, has been blessed, with chance
to conduct itself …

I want not only to join with you in an expression of thankfulness for the nation’s mighty past, but to join with you in expressing the resolution that we of to-day will strive in our deeds to rise level to those deeds which in the past made up the nation’s greatness.

Each generation so far, in this country, has been blessed, first, with the chance to resolve, and to put into effect the resolution so as to conduct itself that the next generation in turn would have the opportunity to feel a like gratitude.

It is a good thing, on the Fourth of July and on all other occasions of national thanksgiving, for us to come together, and we have the right to express our pride in what our forefathers did, and our joy in the abundant greatness of this people.

We have the right to express those feelings, but we must not treat greatness achieved in the past as an excuse for our failing to do decent work in the present, instead of a spur to make us strive in our turn to do the work that lies right at hand.

If we so treat it we show ourselves unworthy to come here and celebrate the historic past of the nation.

In 1861, when Lincoln called to arms you men of the great war, how did you show your loyalty to the men of 1776, to the spirit of ’76? You showed it by the way in which your hearts leaped to the performance of the task that was ready in those days.

President Theodore Roosevelt on July 4, 1903.

Each generation so far, in this country, has been blessed, first, with the chance to resolve, and to put into effect the resolution so as to conduct itself that the next generation in turn would have the opportunity to feel a like gratitude.

Each generation so far …

So far …

Well, I guess it had to happen sooner or later.

We must not treat greatness achieved in the past as an excuse for our failing to do decent work in the present, instead of a spur to make us strive in our turn to do the work that lies right at hand.