Following are excerpts from a privately circulated letter written by a leading attorney who served in various official posts in the Reagan administration. I think you will find it interesting, as did I.
The Associated Press reports that in this era of the deconstruction of history, the politically-correct education establishment has not been kind to Christopher Columbus.
He is now characterized in some circles, distressingly including some American elementary schools, as the proto-imperialist, not the vanguard of the arrival of global civilization in the Western hemisphere, but the man who paved the way for the subjugation of native peoples, the importation of disease and capitalism (my detractors will say that I repeat myself), and somewhere in there, of course, global warming.
Deconstruction Crap
This crap was nicely summarized by one James Knacht, who purports to be "executive associate dean for academic affairs", remarkably enough at the Texas A & M College of Education and Human Development, where one might expect a more discerning faculty, who is quoted by AP as saying, "The whole terminology has changed. You don't hear people using the world 'discovery' anymore like they used to. 'Columbus discovers America.' Because how could he discover America if there were already people living here?" Duh!
Well, the answer is pretty simple.
Sailed the Ocean Blue
If the rest of the world didn't know that there was a Western Hemisphere, and if the people already living in the Western Hemisphere didn't know that there was a rest of the world, there you have it. Columbus was the guy who conclusively introduced them to each other. "World, Western Hemisphere. Western Hemisphere, World."
What Columbus did sure sounds like discovery to me, but if it makes you feel less Eurocentric, call it "mutual discovery".
We're All Americans
Note to our fellow inhabitants of the Western Hemisphere, from the Yukon to Patagonia: We appreciate that the whole hemisphere is properly called "America", and we are delighted to share this side of the globe with you. But the people who hate "America" don't really give a fig about Uruguay, Guatemala, Québec, or Prince Edward Island.
When people talk about "America" as a country, a nation, or an idea, it is the United States of America that they mean, and when people condemn "America" it is the United States of America that they despise.
Don't Dis Chris
To dis Chris is to dis America. (In light of the rivalry between Amerigo Vespucci (below) and Cristóbal Colón (left), this turns out to be one of those delicious ironies that make history fun.)
Columbus's discovery made possible something that was entirely new. It was not the mere migration of various peoples to new places, nor the mingling -- sometime amicable, sometimes brutal -- of native peoples with waves of, um, undocumented aliens. All that sort of thing had happened in many places many times before.
Rather, it was how this whole episode in human history resulted in the establishment in America of a revolutionary, constitutional, republic that carried forward the fundamental principles of the West while rejecting all the old and failed structures of tyranny and slavery that had pretty much dominated every other corner of the world.
This new land was based upon a vision that would admit to citizenship people of every color, race, faith, and origin, provided that they would pledge allegiance to each other and to a common commitment to liberty under law.
This Land Is Your Land
That is the "America" that some folks want urgently to de-construct. Given that, as Richard Weaver succinctly observed, "ideas have consequences", if the ideas can be propagated that Columbus was a criminal and his discovery was not a "triumph" but a "catastrophe", then one can hope that one is lobbing grenades at the legitimacy of America.
This America, for all its flaws and failures, is an unambiguously good thing. I make bold to assert that it is the very biggest and best thing that human hands and minds have ever created.
The remedy for America's sins is not the deconstruction of America. Rather, it is the holding of America true to its definition. Can the same be said of any other nation on earth? Is any other nation on earth defined, not by race, religion, or ethnicity, but by a set of moral and political principles?
A Declaration of Independence & of Principles
Scoffers at American "exceptionalism" take note.
As a fair reading of the text adopted in Philadelphia in the summer of 1776 makes clear, the principles that define America are universal. What makes America exceptional is that the Americans were the first to embrace them. What a tragedy for humanity it will be if, in the course of human events yet to come, the Americans turn out to be the last.
As with St. Patrick's Day, so it is with Columbus Day. It is a much bigger holiday in America than it is in Italy and Spain (which both claim him as their son) and, for that matter, in the rest of our hemisphere, where people are equally entitled to hail him as the "Discoverer".
But it is in this part of America that we specially rejoice, for we understand that Columbus's immediate motives are less important than what he set in motion.
Christianity & Commerce
If he sought to find new trade routes, hurrah for Columbus! No one appreciates the connection between trade, on the one hand, and freedom and well-being, on the other, than do the citizens of the USA.l
If he sought to bring the blessings of Christianity to new lands and new peoples, hurrah for Columbus! No one appreciates the connection between religion, on the one hand, and the building of a society in which ethics matter, and in which the state does not have an exclusive claim on furnishing moral guidance to people, than do the citizens of the republic that, in survey after survey, year after year, reveal themselves to be the most religious population in the modern industrial world.
If he sought discretely to provide a haven for people suffering from religious persecution, hurrah for Columbus! No one roots for the underdog more lustily, no one flips the bird to tyrants more defiantly, no one welcomes the oppressed of the world more generously, than do the Americans.
This Must Be the Place
Columbus did not design all the consequences of his voyage of discovery. He simply led people to a place where it could all happen.
This holiday is not trivial. It is worth a day of surcease from ordinary occupations. Even more, it is worth giving some serious thought to what the accomplishments of Christopher Columbus have meant for the human spirit.
The story of Columbus is far bigger than the cramped version of the historical deconstructionists. Americans should be grateful to the Knights of Columbus, the Italian-American civic committees, and all the other bodies that help us keep the memory of Christopher Columbus alive and his achievements in focus.
Happy Columbus Day! Really.
The Passport Book - 7th Edition
If you want your own discoveries of a new, freedom loving place in which to pitch your tent, deposit your cash or protect your assets, the seventh edition of my best-selling publication, The Passport Book, is now available. You can get your copy now. Here's a sample of the contents.
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