Many Americans, particularly progressives, often complain that we live in an anti-intellectual country. And in a nation where many citizens couldn't tell you what the Fourth of July signifies beyond a day off from work and an excuse for a barbeque, it's hard to argue with them. Then again, what other nation would have a holiday to mark one of the Great Moments in Editing History?
In a sense, that's exactly what Independence Day marks. The eighteenth-century British political philosopher John Locke wrote that governments are instituted to secure people's rights to "life, liberty, and property." And in 1776, Thomas Jefferson begged to differ. When he penned the Declaration of Independence, ratified on the Fourth of July, he edited out Locke's right to "property" and substituted his own more broad-minded, distinctly American concept: the right to "the pursuit of happiness."
What did Jefferson mean by this phrase? Jefferson's own life provides a guide. Rather than live a life solely dedicated to the pursuit of property -- something befitting the English, a nation of shopkeepers so hostile to human happiness that they conquered the world yet never bothered to learn how to make a decent lunch -- Jefferson devoted himself not to becoming rich but to living a rich life. He made contributions to numerous fields whose chief rewards are non-monetary: architecture, science, education and politics. In his leisure time, he enjoyed good books -- and he drank good wine.
The policies Jefferson advocated showed that he took seriously his own rhetoric that people have a self-evident, unalienable, God-given right to the pursuit of happiness and it is government's responsibility to guarantee this right. Without an activist government creating and funding institutions that offer this opportunity to all, he understood, the pursuit of happiness would remain an aristocratic privilege for the wealthy. To this end, Jefferson pioneered free public education, founding a public school system and the University of Virginia. From the start, Jefferson sparred with a conservative state legislature intent on under-funding his institutions.
Though this fight in early nineteenth-century Virginia may sound like ancient history, conservatives' hostility to funding our public equalizing institutions should be familiar. In recent decades, a resurgent right has again fought to defund public higher education (not to mention public libraries, public hospitals, public broadcasting -- public everything). Today, Jefferson's own University of Virginia receives only 8 percent of its budget from the state. Not surprisingly, only 8 percent of its students now come from the bottom half of the income distribution, a shocking -- and intentional -- resurgence of aristocratic privilege.
In their modern-day war on publicly-funded education, conservative politicians often dredge up pseudo-populist anti-intellectual rhetoric. Why subsidize affluent liberals who hate America, they ask?
But who really hates America? Who fears an activist government that secures the rights of all? Who still sees government's role as protecting the property of those that have it rather than securing everyone's equal right to the pursuit of happiness?
Over two hundred years after that Great Moment in Editing History, Jefferson's words remain revolutionary.
So on July 4th, enjoy your barbeque. But on July 5th, keep fighting the revolution.