First of all, I want to thank Jeff, Robina and Feona for hosting this party every year on July 4th weekend to celebrate this country’s birthday. And now I’m going to spend five minutes talking about US History.

If we look at Western civilization during the middle ages, people were controlled by monarchies and by the Roman Catholic Church for centuries. Then in the 18th century, along came the Enlightenment which included a range of ideas centered on reason as the primary source of authority. The goal of the Enlightenment was to reduce the number of those filled with dark, using science, the arts, and learning to remove some of the individual’s veils of ignorance. The Enlightenment was marked by ideals like liberty, progress, tolerance, constitutional government, separation of church and state, equality before the law, upward mobility and a social order based on meritocracy. It’s emphasis on individual liberty and religious tolerance eventually weakened the authority of the monarchies of Europe and led to the American and French revolutions.

The US Constitution was ratified in 1787 which was 11 years after the Declaration of Independence. The ratification of the US Constitution was very controversial and it led to the founding of the first two political parties in America. The Anti-Federalist party led by Thomas Jefferson wanted the government’s power to reside at the state level; opposed the US Constitution; and supported the French Revolution - its base resided in the South. The Federalist party led initially by Alexander Hamilton wanted a strong national government; the creation and ratification of the US Constitution; and it opposed supporting the French Revolution - it held a strong base in the cities and in New England. Before the US Constitution was ratified, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay wrote the Federalist Papers for the sole purpose of persuading the individual states to support the ratification of the Constitution.

In 1789, two years after the US Constitution was ratified, the French Revolution broke out and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen was written and adopted. This document was directly influenced by Thomas Jefferson, working with General Lafayette, who introduced it to the newly formed French government. In 1791, 2 years after the French Revolution began, and 4 years after the US Constitution was ratified, the US Bill of Rights was ratified. The Bill of Rights was introduced to Congress by James Madison, who is considered the Father of the Constitution. Madison, being from Virginia was a lifelong friend and political ally of Thomas Jefferson. The Bill of Rights addressed a major concern of the Anti-Federalists that there was nothing in the Constitution that guaranteed individual rights.

In the US Bill of Rights and the French Declaration of Rights, the rights of the individual are held to be universal: valid at all times and in every place. In these two documents our rights are maximized because the only constraint on our rights is that the exercise of our rights cannot infringe upon the rights of others. These rights come at a price. Americans have a duty to vote responsibly, serve on juries, be drafted if the need arises, and our duty to reduce the number of those filled with darkness as expressed in the Enlightenment. The US Bill of Rights changed the social order from one in which individuals are treated as serfs and servants to the king, the church, and the nobility, to one in which the rights of the individual predominate.

AND NOW FOR THE U.S. BILL OF RIGHTS!

The tenth amendment gives power to the states in all matters not specifically granted to the federal government

#9 There are additional fundamental rights that exist outside the Constitution, and the rights listed in the Constitution are not an exhaustive list

#8 No cruel and unusual punishments, no excessive bail or fines

#7 The right to a trial by jury in federal civil cases

#6 In criminal cases, the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury, the right to be confronted with the witnesses against you, and the right to have a lawyer assist you in your defense

#5 You cannot be forced to testify against yourself in a trial, and you cannot be tried twice for the same crime

#4 No unreasonable searches and seizures, search warrants must be supported by probable cause

#3 No quartering of troops

#2 A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed

AND THE NUMBER ONE AMENDMENT TO THE US CONSTITUTION: Freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom to peaceably assemble to petition the government for a redress of grievances

Above is what I said verbatim, but there are a couple of things that I wanted to add so that I could remember precisely what happened.

Jeff started playing an instrumental version of the song America when I got down to the third or second amendment which made me increase my volume substantially; I practically shouted the first amendment

Someone yelled out, “that’s the Star Spangled Banner” and I responded, “no it isn’t, the Star Spangled Banner goes like this (and I belted out) AND THE ROCKET’S RED GLARE

Jack Lewis fortuitously turned on the police siren noise on his flashlight as I was reading amendment #4

I stood on a chair with my headlamp on facing the crowd of 30 or 40 people to read my speech

I heard a few pieces of feedback (not including Miki who said I shouldn’t read from a page) that implied that the speech was too long and boring: Feona said, “I didn’t know it was going to be like that”, another party attendee Chris said, “you said it was five minutes, but it felt like 27 minutes” and Robina said, “Victor’s speech was great, I can’t believe the kids sat through it.”

I noticed that five of the ten amendments have to do with the treatment of criminals.