I’ve been much aggrieved by the untimely passing of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the baddest Justice (or human being) that ever was. And reflecting upon the venerated highest court of the land caused me to think about the supposed principles of this nation. Freedom, liberty, equality, and human rights. And in thinking about that, I asked the question, “But are we, really? Have we EVER been about those things, really? For EVERYONE?” I’m afraid that when you look at the history of this country, the answer is a resounding NO.
Think about it. This country as it is today is the natural progression of imperialist roots. The earliest settlers fled England because of oppression. But those who followed soon set up the pattern of imperial dominance. England, Spain, France; each sought to claim territory here for their country’s king. So those early invaders fought and killed thousands of Native Americans, and each other, in that pursuit. The Natives were killed, lied to, forced into assimilation, and still had treaties broken and then were finally death-marched onto reservations. Even today, our government is denying them their rights and breaking treaties with them. It’s abominable and deplorable.
We all know the ultimate result was the new American settlers defeating England and earning the right to establish the new country. But what did that look like? Wealthy white males, owning property. Then importing and buying slaves to work that property. Many brilliant Black people came up with ingenious inventions, but never reaped a penny of profit from them; it all belonged to their white masters. From Buffalo Soldiers to the Tuskegee Airmen, Blacks fought in our wars heroically but received no hero’s recognition for it. They still couldn’t even vote.
Even our vaunted Constitution, from which we get our foundation of principles, has never really ensured liberty, tranquility, and equality for everyone. Not by a long shot. Only for wealthy, white, male property owners. That’s who the Constitution was written FOR.
Over generations, we tried. We almost succeeded. The 60s and 70s saw some of the most progressive changes to our society, with Supreme Court decisions that affirmed freedom of expression, freedom of religion, and equal rights for women and people of color. But each time, the wealthy white patriarchy fought back hard. And it’s no different today.
The Equal Rights Act has yet to be ratified, over 50 years later. So women still do not have equal rights. Blacks are still enslaved by the for-profit prison system and denied equal opportunity by systemic racism throughout our institutions, from banking to health care.
No matter how far we think we’ve come, our nation’s distribution of power, liberty, and freedom isn’t very different from what it was at the very beginning. But we shouldn’t feel alone. When you get right down to it, if you look closely at the governments and social structure of the majority of nations worldwide, it looks pretty much the same.
Why haven’t we done better? As human beings, why haven’t we figured out that we’re better off uniting? It’s actually possible to do that now, in ways never before possible. Think about it. Why should there be immigration limits ANYWHERE? Why should we not be able to travel anywhere we like, without passports except to show our country of origin and the places we’ve been? Why should we not be able to live wherever we like? Work wherever we like? Think bigger! If we have the ability to have global banking and trade, we have the ability to allow work, currency flow, and trading of goods. Instead of separate governments of countries each to themselves, there should be administrations of each country in terms of allocation of resources, monitoring income and outgo, and the like. One common pot from which to fund vital services and infrastructure, so no matter where you are, you have health care, safe and clean food and water, services like telephone and television. Imagine if EVERY NATION worked TOGETHER to create a cooperative world, each country unique but united in the goals of peace and quality of life. We COULD actually do this. Perhaps one country has more of a certain resource; that’s OK, another country has more of another. That’s the basis for cooperative equal trade.
We may have come a long way. But in very many ways we’ve not come far at all, and we’ve still got a very long way to go. We CAN do this, but the time to begin is NOW.
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