Bravo. This has been an interesting debate. Regardless of the politics of the matter, I think our founding fathers were cognizant that we were established as a nation by Heaven's graces. Think of all the times that we were preserved by the hand of Providence.
General Washington was blessed on a number of occasions, when battles weren't going his way, that inclement weather allowed his forces to break from the engagement and live to fight another day. There were instances in journals and letters where the writers told of rivers freezing just long enough for the Colonists to get on the other side and keep the Redcoats on the other. In the War of 1812, the British captured and burned Washington, only to be driven out of the city by a hurricane.
I think we would be wise if we enjoyed our liberty with sufficient gratitude to the Creator who endowed us with those rights. He expects us to keep his commandments. To celebrate liberty and deny the hand that gave it to us foolish.
We are currently engaged in another shooting war and we need to seek Heaven's help and not disparage it. Our force of arms is great, but Joshua took Jericho with only 200 men. The power of America is in goodness. Paraphrasing deTocqueville: "When America ceases to be good, it will cease to be great.
Can anyone here imagine that pornography is something Deity would consider praiseworthy or of good report?
GW
One more thing...my wife just coincidentally emailed me this. I think it makes my point better than I tried to.
Proclamation Establishing Thanksgiving Day
October 3, 1863
The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequalled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle, or the ship; the axe had enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years, with large increase of freedom.
No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.
It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and voice by the whole American people. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.
In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the city of Washington, this third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the independence of the United States the eighty-eighth.
A. Lincoln
MM - you haven't addressed the fact that up until in the 60s, the sale, dissemnination and production of pornography had strict limitations, subject to locality.
The ministrations of the LEFTIST ACLU, porn magnates, and a leftist SCOTUS forced everyone to accept the highly protected legality of porn, regardless of whether any communities in any state didn't want it.
Why are you siding with leftists and the use of federal force to reduce or eliminate states' rights?
The Founding Fathers of this country wrote the Constitution at a time when there were laws against obscenity and pornography. Ever heard of "blue laws"? Those wise men never considered that the right of free speech should extend to explicit pornography. It took pornography producers and pushers allied with the leftists SCOTUS and the ACLU to bring about the ubiquitous sea of porn we now find ourselves adrift in.
You refuse to address these points, and until you do, I consider your sloganeering and transparent promotion of pornography mere weasel words, meaning in essence "I want it, therefore I shall have it." Your support of pornography is nothing more than that.
Thanks for putting that quote up there.
Here for everyone's edification are a few of the Founder's words about morality and governance, just we can refer to the men who actually hammered out the original documents or fought for our freedom:
"The propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a
nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right,
which Heaven itself has ordained." --George Washington
"We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." John Adams
"[N]either the wisest constitution nor the wisest laws will
secure the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners are
universally corrupt." --Samuel Adams
"[O]nly a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." Benjamin Franklin,
"Reading, reflection and time have convinced me that the interests of society require the observation of those moral precepts ... in which all religions agree." --Thomas Jefferson