John Mohawk
It is a positive development that Americans are encouraged to revisit, and hopefully revise, an anomaly in the way the culture views its history. It has been said, erroneously, that America does not have, or does not follow, a philosophy of history. This is, regrettably untrue, especially in the case of what has been called the “American consensus.” It goes like this: Long ago, the founding fathers fought for the rights of man: freedom, liberty, equality, and, first among the descendants of Europe's monarchies and oligarchies, democracy. These rights, as they said in the Declaration of Independence, were “self evident,” meaning they were obvious. These rights, which by implication had already existed but were denied the founders, had their origins in, of all places, nature. They were natural rights.
Those who succeeded the founders expanded the claims quite dramatically. Because the founders had pursued such lofty rights, the United States alone of the world's nation states had been designated with the goal of freeing the world's peoples, of spreading democracy, of creating a new and utopian world.
American historians do not challenge this consensus. It is a kind of defining cultural consensus, similar to the way people in the Middle Ages believed there was a physical or physical-like place called heaven and people who died went there. They believed this much as people today believe there are islands in the Pacific, although no one have ever been there (heaven) and returned and plenty of people have been to Pacific islands and returned. The American consensus about not only what the founders were about but what their project meant has enjoyed this kind of immunity from challenge among mainstream American historians. If you were a Medieval European, you would not challenge theories that heaven existed just beyond the clouds and you could be sure that you did you could be subject to punishment for doing so. It is the same here, except the model stretches a modern person's credulity.
Whether or not the founders were to be commended for pursuing lofty ideals, the assertion that they were entitled to special immunities from normal expectations of the limits of human behavior –- that they were immune to the laws of nations – has led to such horrifying peculiarly American inventions as manifest destiny and American exceptionalism. The argument has been that when American commits crimes against humanity, it is excused because its ancestors were engaged in a struggle for freedom and democracy which would eventually free humankind from oppression.
This idea is obviously a very difficult sell among the peoples of the world because it asks them to suspend disbelief about other and possibly less noble motives but to grant that the United States can never be wrong or engage in unacceptable acts as long as it continues to generate rhetoric about its inheritance of goodness from its founding ancestors. The very root of the conversation begs revisitation.
When 9/11 happened, it was said, “They hate our freedoms.” Those would be the freedoms secured by the founders. The word “freedom” is, as many have pointed out, problematic. A condition in which a people are free must be preceded by one in which such freedom is absent. When the American Revolutionaries challenged the British Crown, they were surely seeking relief (freedom) from something. Was it freedom to assemble, freedom to petition against grievances, freedom from taxation, freedom from unjust surveillance, freedom to dissent, freedom against imprisonment without charges and the right to face an accuser? Does the fact (if it is fact) that two centuries ago America's political ancestors fought for such principles give today's American politicians the right to impose their will on other peoples in other cultures? It is not a simple yes or no, up or down, question. A good argument can be made that the United States can find principles within its traditions supporting human rights and opposing genocide and a list of other crimes against humanity, but a question needs to be raised about when and how such a project can change from liberation to oppression. The American consensus, including the idea of our country, right or wrong, is not a conversation about how to achieve the goals of the founders. It is exactly the kind of thing the founders struggled against the British crown over in 1776.***
It is a positive development that Americans are encouraged to revisit, and hopefully revise, an anomaly in the way the culture views its history. It has been said, erroneously, that America does not have, or does not follow, a philosophy of history. This is, regrettably untrue, especially in the case of what has been called the “American consensus.” It goes like this: Long ago, the founding fathers fought for the rights of man: freedom, liberty, equality, and, first among the descendants of Europe's monarchies and oligarchies, democracy. These rights, as they said in the Declaration of Independence, were “self evident,” meaning they were obvious. These rights, which by implication had already existed but were denied the founders, had their origins in, of all places, nature. They were natural rights.
Those who succeeded the founders expanded the claims quite dramatically. Because the founders had pursued such lofty rights, the United States alone of the world's nation states had been designated with the goal of freeing the world's peoples, of spreading democracy, of creating a new and utopian world.
American historians do not challenge this consensus. It is a kind of defining cultural consensus, similar to the way people in the Middle Ages believed there was a physical or physical-like place called heaven and people who died went there. They believed this much as people today believe there are islands in the Pacific, although no one have ever been there (heaven) and returned and plenty of people have been to Pacific islands and returned. The American consensus about not only what the founders were about but what their project meant has enjoyed this kind of immunity from challenge among mainstream American historians. If you were a Medieval European, you would not challenge theories that heaven existed just beyond the clouds and you could be sure that you did you could be subject to punishment for doing so. It is the same here, except the model stretches a modern person's credulity.
Whether or not the founders were to be commended for pursuing lofty ideals, the assertion that they were entitled to special immunities from normal expectations of the limits of human behavior –- that they were immune to the laws of nations – has led to such horrifying peculiarly American inventions as manifest destiny and American exceptionalism. The argument has been that when American commits crimes against humanity, it is excused because its ancestors were engaged in a struggle for freedom and democracy which would eventually free humankind from oppression.
This idea is obviously a very difficult sell among the peoples of the world because it asks them to suspend disbelief about other and possibly less noble motives but to grant that the United States can never be wrong or engage in unacceptable acts as long as it continues to generate rhetoric about its inheritance of goodness from its founding ancestors. The very root of the conversation begs revisitation.
When 9/11 happened, it was said, “They hate our freedoms.” Those would be the freedoms secured by the founders. The word “freedom” is, as many have pointed out, problematic. A condition in which a people are free must be preceded by one in which such freedom is absent. When the American Revolutionaries challenged the British Crown, they were surely seeking relief (freedom) from something. Was it freedom to assemble, freedom to petition against grievances, freedom from taxation, freedom from unjust surveillance, freedom to dissent, freedom against imprisonment without charges and the right to face an accuser? Does the fact (if it is fact) that two centuries ago America's political ancestors fought for such principles give today's American politicians the right to impose their will on other peoples in other cultures? It is not a simple yes or no, up or down, question. A good argument can be made that the United States can find principles within its traditions supporting human rights and opposing genocide and a list of other crimes against humanity, but a question needs to be raised about when and how such a project can change from liberation to oppression. The American consensus, including the idea of our country, right or wrong, is not a conversation about how to achieve the goals of the founders. It is exactly the kind of thing the founders struggled against the British crown over in 1776.***
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