Letter to the Editor: Constant reminder
BY Dale Parsons, Bartlesville
Monday, February 04, 2013
2/04/13 at 8:15 AM
With this latest gun control debate, we're again scrutinizing that right within our nation's Constitution. Some even suggest that the entire Constitution is now irrelevant. They dismiss concerns about an oppressive government here as ridiculously unfounded.
Ask that of the surviving Japanese-Americans, who were forced to surrender their homes and property and move into internment camps, during World War II. Despite doing nothing wrong, our government felt that virtually imprisoning all of them was a safe and reasonable thing to do.
Even earlier in history, our government restricted Native Americans to isolated reservations, because they impeded that era's vision of progress. Worst of all, we forced African-Americans here, in chains, to work as slaves and advance others' visions of progress.
These examples prove that our own government, founded on the belief that individual rights are sacred, must be constantly reminded to honor its own doctrine. It doesn't matter if our rights are removed in one dramatic act or quietly eroded. The consequences are the same.
Our Founders were eye witnesses to an oppressive government. The Constitution and the oaths that are sworn by our officials, to protect it, were their attempts to ensure that that level of power wouldn't be exercised here.
We must constantly work to maintain that difficult balance that restricts only those who are deserving of restrictions, while leaving others alone to enjoy their full potential as human beings. It's that unrelenting effort that still makes this country the envy of people throughout the world.
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