There is no doubt that in 1773, King George III and his military enforcers in the then “colonies,” would have designated the Boston Tea Party as a “non-essential activity.”
On December 16th of that year in my hometown of Boston, during one of our first recorded political protests, 342 chests of tea belonging to the British East India Company, were dumped from ships into the Boston Harbor by American patriots disguised as Mohawk Indians.
As history used to teach us before it devolved into Social Justice Warrior micro-aggression dissertations, those colonists were engaged in the “non-essential activity” of protesting “taxation without representation.”
The Boston Tea Party was organized by “The Sons of Liberty” and led at the time by Samuel Adams. Other noteworthy members of “The Sons of Liberty” being Paul Revere, John Hancock, and John Adams.
Patriots who eventually all risked their very lives for liberty.
Inspired by those “Sons of Liberty,” over 5,000 people then gathered at the Old South Meeting House to protest the tax then, draconian dictates of the Crown. From that number, hundreds then stormed the ships to throw the tea overboard. Sixteen were teenagers and only nine were above the age of forty.
Because that “non-essential activity” of civil disobedience was witnessed by thousands who spread the word to thousands more, it became the grassroots of the American Revolution.
Flash ahead to today and the crisis of COVID-19.
There is no denying that it is a highly infectious virus which must be taken very seriously.
That said, three incredibly important questions demand answers: Are our “leaders” taking the right approach? Why aren’t the American people being given a greater say in their own fate and their own demise? And since when did speaking up for our Constitutional rights become a “non-essential activity” punishable by arrest and imprisonment?
What – in just a few short weeks – has become of the United States of America? The land of the Free and the home of the Brave.
Instead of wanting to give Americans a greater say in their own fate, politicians like New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer seem to be moving in more tyrannical directions.
De Blasio recently tweeted out that New Yorkers should inform on each other for violating the dictates of the lockdowns or proper social distancing.
In the United States of America, a major politician is encouraging Americans to turn on each other for the greater-good of dictates imposed upon all of us by a handful of politicians, “experts,” and bureaucrats.
In Michigan, Whitmer – who seems more concerned with being picked as Joe Biden’s running mate than running her state – is now facing a recall by outraged residents for her authoritarian and punishing measures against the people. As of this writing, the recall effort has over 300,000 signatures.
If de Blasio, Whitmer, and other like-minded, answer-to-no-one mini-dictators were alive in Boson in 1773, would they have informed on “The Sons of Liberty” or had them arrested? Would they have stopped the American Revolution in its tracks?
In a few short weeks, what has become of the United States of America President Ronald Reagan envisioned as a “Shining City upon a Hill” when he gazed out the window of his residence at the White House?
During his farewell address to the nation in January of 1989, President Reagan spoke to the enduring promise of that shining city upon a hill: “After 200 years, two centuries, she still stands strong and true on the granite ridge, and her glow has held steady no matter what storm.”
In but a few short weeks, have the draconian responses to COVID-19 turned that “granite ridge” into crumbling sand? Are the few taking away the rights and liberties of the majority “for their own good,” the storm which does finally kill the glow of that “Shining City upon a Hill?”
In what America is a father arrested for taking his child to a park?
In what America do police drones seek out our fellow citizens for trying to get some fresh air and remain sane?
In what America are those seeking to worship God threatened with having their license plates recorded so they may be tracked and punished?
Answer: In the United States of America right now.
This must stop.
The American people must be given a voice in their own fate. It is their right as…Americans.
Douglas MacKinnon is a former White House and Pentagon official and an author.