Human Dignity

Dignity is defined:

1. The quality or state of being worthy of esteem or respect. 2. Inherent nobility and worth: the dignity of honest labor. 3a. Poise and self-respect. b. Stateliness and formality in manner and appearance. 4. The respect and honor associated with an important position. 5. A high office or rank.

Human dignity is the state of being worthy of esteem or respect by virtue of being human. Human dignity is that inherent nobility and worth one has by virtue of being a human. Human dignity means that human life is special and warrants particular respect and esteem over all other forms of life on earth. The promotion of human dignity is at that heart of civilization and is a vital role of government. In a society built upon the principle of self-government, it is the responsibility of the citizens to examine the policies of their government through the prism of human dignity. America in particular was founded on the recognition that safeguarding the human dignity of the people was paramount. The Declaration of Independence bravely declared:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed ..."

Human dignity is that particular dignity endowed upon men and women by their Creator, who is clearly identified in the Declaration of Independence:

"WHEN in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, ..."

Following the War for Independence, the representatives of the people established the Constitution and the Bill of Rights which identified and set down safeguards for the protection and maintenance of the basic human rights that are essential to the promotion of human dignity.  

Then came the Civil War, and with it, the elevation of human dignity above the evils of slavery. Consider the evils of slavery that demanded its abolition: disregard for marriage between a man and woman, taking minor children from their mothers and fathers, using slave women as sex toys to satisfy the lusts of their masters.  Put another way, the Abolitionists made Americans look at the violence that slavery did to the family. The Abolitionists cried out for the protection of marriage, demanded the protection of the natural family unit, and condemned immoral sexual practices. The Abolition of slavery was a moral crusade of the highest standard.

The Prophet of Liberty, Wendell Phillips, one of the greatest Abolitionists condemned slavery in the strongest moral terms,

"Take the broken hearts, the bereaved mothers, the infant wrung from the hands of its parents, the husband and wife torn asunder, every right trodden under foot, ... weigh [the horrors of war] against some young trembling girl sent to the auction block, some man like that taken from our court-house and carried back into Georgia; multiply that into centuries; that into all the relations of father and child, husband and wife; heap on all the deep moral degradation both of the oppressor and the oppressed, - and tell me if Waterloo or Thermopylae can claim one tear for the eye of the tenderest spirit of mercy, compared with this daily system of hell amid the most civilized and Christian people on the face of the earth!"

As the brave Union soldiers marched with Grant to meet Bobby Lee and the vaunted Army of Virginia in the Wilderness Campaign, they sang the Battle Hymn of the Republic written by Julie Howard Ward,

He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never sound retreat; He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment seat; O be swift, my soul, to answer Him! Be jubilant my feet! Our God is marching on.

In the beauty of the lilies, Christ was born across the sea, With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me; As he died to make men holy, let us live to make men free, While God is marching on.

Over 360,000 Union soldiers gave their lives to make men free. In a single day, over 12,000 Union soldiers died at Antietam near Sharpsburg, Maryland. Following the Civil War, the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution abolished slavery and strengthened the Nation's commitment to the protection and promotion of human dignity.

Less than eighty years later, America was forced to confront the Nazis, in a moral struggle that would cost the lives of 292,000 American forces, 68,000 less than shed their blood to preserve the Union.

Following World War II, the United States and its allies put the High German Command on trial at the Nuremberg War Crimes Trial. For the first time in history, the victorious warriors assumed the heavy burden of proving that the enemy had committed crimes against humanity, and gave the conquered a fair trial. After the main trial of the Nazi leaders, the United States was not satisfied and acted alone to undertake the prosecution of the doctors and scientists that had conducted unspeakably cruel experiments on the slavs, gypies, and Jews the Nazis held in captivity. In those cases, the United States had the courage to judge evil for what it was. America condemned the German laws and judged them to be based on a morally bankrupt ideology that believed as an article of faith and science that some forms of human life were simply and factually less valuable than others. In the end, America beat the Germans badly, and then beat the Nazi ideology out of the German people. America did this based on a just sense of right and wrong, good and evil, with no apologies.

History makes it clear that America was founded upon, and at its best moments defended, those attributes of human dignity established by the Laws of Nature without which the human state is reduced to serfdom and misery. The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution embody these unchangeable principals of the free human spirit:

1) the human need to be rewarded for work and innovation;
2) the right of the individual to own private property;
3) the human need to be safe and secure from abuses of their rulers;
4) the right to join together for the common defense against enemies, foreign and domestic;
and
5) the right to defend one's life and the life of the weak and defenseless. 

Today, the government is failing to uphold these basic human rights and, in many instances, is actively working to diminish or even abolish these rights in the name of enlightened liberalism. 

The confiscatory level of income taxes, sales taxes, property taxes, and death taxes undermines the human need to be rewarded for work and innovation, leaving people disheartened and burdened.

The government's invasion of privacy, the disregard for private property, and its interference in the business ventures of creative and talented people go unchecked.

The government heaps burdens on innovation and hard work, squashing the dreams of people yearning to live in the land of the free.

The good faith attempts by the local and state police to act for our common defense against enemies foreign and domestic are thwarted by a labyrinth of rules and regulations that reward wicked schemes and mock justice.

This failure of leadership in Congress to defend, uphold and promote the human dignity of the people of Maryland and the United States is a clear and present danger to liberty. Unless the reckless policies of the powerful are reigned in, the government will consume our liberty and our lives.  

Examine your heart, test your courage, and vote for freedom now.