The midterm election is only a few days away, and many of us are wondering what the Founding Fathers would say to us as we fight a culture war every bit as existential as the military war the Founders fought 250 years ago. As today (October 30) is the anniversary of John Adams’ birth, let's investigate his comments about elections and virtuous citizenship.
In April 1776, even before the Declaration of Independence, Adams wrote to George Wythe about how King George III had suspended elections in the colonies. “When annual elections end, there slavery begins,” Adams exclaimed.
We still have elections, of course, but we also have election fraud. That’s why we should insist that our representatives aggressively investigate and eradicate election fraud, and that we ourselves are looking out for suspicious activity on Election Day. Be a poll watcher or a canvasser. If you notice sketchy handling of ballots or inexplicable polling place problems, tag a state or federal official on social media. If our elections are no longer honest, then we are no longer living in any republic; we are mere pawns or slaves of an oligarchic tyranny. We had a taste of that in 2020 and during the Biden administration, and it was disastrous. We cannot afford to let that happen again.
Adams was also very concerned that free government could not survive if Americans didn’t value Judeo-Christian religion and personal integrity. Only a virtuous people is capable of true freedom; the weak, greedy, and lascivious are always vulnerable to tyrants.
Writing to Mercy Otis Warren in early 1776, Adams reflected, “The Form of Government, which you admire, when its Principles are pure is admirable, indeed, it is productive of every Thing which is great and excellent among Men. But its Principles are as easily destroyed, as human nature is corrupted. Such a Government is only to be supported by pure Religion or Austere Morals. Public Virtue cannot exist in a nation without Private, and public Virtue is the only Foundation of Republics.”
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At almost the same time, Adams urged his wife Abigail about their children, “Let them revere nothing but religion, morality and liberty.”
That ought to be our own motto as we move forward with restoring America politically, economically, morally, and culturally. Too many Americans put comfort, safety, sexual perversion, revenge, or welfare over liberty and morality.
What we are experiencing now is a crisis brought on by the fact that the American people, even many people who lean right politically, abandoned many traditional biblical morals. We became greedy, entitled, and self-indulgent. Saving America begins with each one of us, with the choices that we make every day about how we will live our lives and treat other people. We the People have the power to preserve liberty by each of us acting as a free man should.
In closing, I will share one last piece of advice from Adams in 1776: “There must be a positive passion for the public good, the public interest, honour, power and glory, established in the minds of the people, or there can be no republican government, nor any real liberty: and this public passion must be superior to all private passions.”
