It is time for Americans to take action in defense of our rights and freedoms. There are two options available to us: to work within the system, or from without. Our political system is broken, but it is not yet beyond repair – so we should begin by attempting to reform the system. George Washington warned us not to divide ourselves into parties, but the reality is that just two parties hold all the power today. We can either form a new party of our own, or work to reform one (or both) of the two existing factions. The deck is heavily stacked against any fledgling upstart party, so reform should be our first aim. We need members of both parties to call on their leaders to return to the principles upon which their existence was originally based. If they refuse to hear our demands, we will do our best to bring a new party into existence.

If all attempts to work within the system fail, we will have no choice but to fight against it, in a campaign of non-violent non-cooperation. This task will be much harder today than it was for the revolutionaries of the past, because our government oppresses us in more subtle and devious ways than the tyrannies of old. Instead of putting laws on the books that explicitly deny or limit specific freedoms, today’s despots are simply giving themselves more and more power to control and bully us, ignoring the rule of law when it is inconveniently inhibiting their goals, and systematically dismantling the Constitution’s protections for citizens. There is therefore less raw material that the civil resistors of today can use to make principled stands against injustice. To make a comparison with the American civil rights movement of the 1960’s – it is a lot harder to openly defy the Patriot Act, for example, than it was for civil resistors to sit at segregated lunch counters and willingly suffer the consequences of their actions. There are, however, imminent developments that may soon set the stage for mass acts of civil disobedience.

The leaders who have blazed the widest and clearest trails for justice have always followed and preached a philosophy of non-violence. As our “sword for justice,” non-violence must be understood to be not a passive lack of force, but rather as an active substitute for an old and tired way of relating to our fellow men. Left alone, cycles of violence spiral out of control and cause men to lose their capability to reason, to reach a state of beast-like insanity. Only non-violence can end the cycle. Only noble and voluntary suffering can effectively counter the use of force. This is what Jesus meant, when he asked men to “turn the other cheek” – to conquer through courageous submission. When all men have faith in the infinite nature of their free will, and believe in non-violence as the path to peace, only then will we drive poverty and suffering from the Earth. As Dr. King said, “It is no longer the choice between violence and non-violence in this world, it’s non-violence or non-existence.”

We need to start by raising our own consciousnesses. We need to re-learn for ourselves what true freedom is, and how it has been taken from us. There are several books and essays I’ve read over the past year that have shaped my thinking on this matter and I recommend them to all who strive for truth:

Common Sense - Thomas Paine
Civil Disobediance - Henry David Thoreau
Satyagraha - Mohandas Gandhi
The Little Prince - Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Nineteen Eighty-Four - George Orwell
Why We Can’t Wait - M.L. King
Dying to Win - Robert Pape
Imperial Hubris - Michael Scheuer
Blowback - Chalmers Johnson
The Web of Debt - Ellen Brown
The Coming Economic Collapse - Stephen Leeb
The End of America - Naomi Wolf
A Theory of Justice - John Rawls

I am taking a few more books with me on the ride:

The Kingdom Of God Is Within You - Leo Tolstoy
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin - Benjamin Franklin
The Road to Serfdom - F.A. Hayek
Delusional Democracy - Joel Hirschhorn
Bad Money - Kevin Phillips
The Art of Loving - Erich Fromm