The Foundational Fathers

This will round out the blogs discussing Chapter III of And Keep Your Powder Dry by Margaret Mead. In this one, we will invoke the founding fathers.

This next part is important, because Mead explains a connection to our founding fathers that goes beyond hero worship or simple respect and gratitude.

What a beautiful sentiment is that: “…the past to which one tries to belong by effort…” (2000).

Adoration of Washington isn’t an attempt to hold onto a past; he’s a symbol of what we, as an individual in America, can achieve here. I love this explanation, as well, for why a nation of revolutionaries doesn’t really revolt. If we take on the characteristics of the third-generation American, she explains, our place as Americans finally feels certain. We won’t be deported. Our parents won’t be deported. We know the rules. Everything’s cool. We don’t revolt, because don’t want to lose our place. This place.

Americans do not fight authority and beat him down, because we presume we can more easily work hard and pass him. Our goal was never revolution for its own sake. It was always for the sake of progress. And, progress is just a matter of progressing.

At the end of the day, we don’t have to revolt, because Washington and Hamilton already did that. We don’t have to save the union, because Lincoln already did. Our purpose and cause are beyond their imaginings, so we need not lay theirs to waste.