In Memory of…

Memorial Day is a day dedicated to the remembrance of those who died for our country. Rightly, we spend (or we should) some time thinking about those we know, or know of, who did just that: went off to war in the service of our nation and were killed in that service. The current total is some 1,354,000 though everyone seems to be in agreement that the number is low. (Recent work suggests that the common estimate for the Civil War, routinely held as approximately 600,000 killed, may in fact be as high as 750,000 killed).

More to the point, walk among a cemetery; take a look at the gravestones; every one of those Soldiers and Sailors and Airmen and Marines – every one had a story, every one had a life they wanted to live. We mourn when we hear a story about a Soldier killed in an unknown spot in a distant land. Each one of those stones has a similar story.

And when we remember those who died, we should also reflect on what it is that they died for. Parenthetically, this is what makes certain wars – Vietnam is the obvious example (Iraq and Afghanistan share some of that earlier war’s political undertones) – such emotional conundrums: the horrifying question soon emerges: what did they die for?

So, what did they die for? In every case, at a minimum they died for their friends, the Soldiers and Sailors and Airmen and Marines to their left and right. That is a truth as old as man himself. Homer may have written about the wrath of Achilles, but for the average Greek or Trojan before the walls of fair Ilium, once the fighting began, they fought for their buddies.

But that is hardly enough to send armies to fight anywhere. Nations, a people, send their armies out to defend their vital interests (or should, anyway). What then are our vital interests, what did our honored dead die for?

The answers are in front of us. At a minimum, there is the physical defense and survival of the nation itself. Though a look at our southern border, and the bizarre argument that we shouldn’t try to control our own border, makes one wonder. Do people who believe that leave their front door open when they go out? The history of Ellis Island is relevant: it was about controlled entry under the law.

But beyond the physical, what are we defending? For what purpose were our honored dead sent off to war, sent to die? In fact, it’s laid out in some detail in two documents: the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

The Declaration states in one of the most eloquent political statements ever drafted that:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…

The Constitution provides additional clarity, telling us that the goal is to:

“form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence [sic], promote the general welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our posterity…”

Unalienable rights – later codified in a series of amendments, life, liberty, justice… It’s not about power, it’s not about empire, it’s not about partisan politics; it’s about fundamental issues that are as true to day as when those documents were written.

In a period of increasingly bitter exchanges in our national dialog, we need to stop and ask ourselves where our real loyalty lies. Is it to some political party? To some bureaucratic organization that will use you and spit you out? Or is it to your family and friends on one hand, and your nation – your nation – on the other?

Lincoln was right when he called America the last, best hope. This isn’t government of, by and for some party; this is government of the people, by the people, for the people. Let’s remember that, while we remember those who died protecting it.

Copyright 2018 Arrias
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