Axar.az presents an article, "Why do I not despair?" by John Samuel Tieman.

We just celebrated the 250th anniversary of our founding on the 4th. It's an election year. And last week, Donald Trump made a speech questioning the validity of the 2020 presidential election. In my lifetime, we've never had so great an assault upon the republic. Every week, we shift more and more toward the autocratic. July 4th wasn't much of a celebration. Why then do I not despair?

We celebrate the signing of the Declaration Of Independence. We don't celebrate the ratification of the Constitution some years later. That's interesting. We don't celebrate the laws. We celebrate the idea of America. Much of the Declaration of Independence consists of a list of grievances against the British government. But nobody really remembers that. We remember the opening. The ideas. In particular, these words are worth meditating upon once again. “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 Declaration of Independence made, for its time, original claims about the source of governmental legitimacy and the rights of the people. All rights are given to all people by God, a God defined as the “Creator” and no more. These rights precede the institution of government. The protection of rights is the chief aim of government. The people govern themselves – not a king – not an autocrat – the people govern themselves. Their consent is the basis of any government's legitimacy. These rights are “self-evident”, not revealed. Put simply, God creates people, then people create government. With time, we come to have even larger ideas about the meaning of America. I could write a history of the United States about our ever-expanding understanding of “all men are created equal”.

The Trump Administration aims to restrict, not expand, the democratic republic. A survey of federal judges, lawyers, and law professors revealed that these folks "perceive a significant erosion of the rule of law since Trump returned to office, including politicized law enforcement, a dysfunctional separation of powers, and executive-branch overreach." Thomas Jefferson once said, “But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.” The administration removed 180 religious groups from the Pentagon's list of recognized religions. Donald Trump has gone out of his way to cast doubt on the efficacy of our elections – unless, of course, he wins. If you can't trust the election, then you can't trust a republic born of that ballot. The list of ways the administration has eroded democracy would take pages.

There are times when I feel like despairing. But I don't. Why? Because of a nameless election official. I am a city council member. To earn my humble office, I had to have a petition signed by not quite 100 registered voters. One fellow had just moved to my ward. It was a Sunday. He said he'd sign my petition today and register on Monday. He did just that. It would be another week before I'd turn in the petition. I didn't know that I shouldn't do this. But an election worker caught that mistake, invalidated his signature, and noted that the signatory had to be registered before he or she signed such a petition. Dozens of signatures on my petition, hundreds of petitions from around the county – and that election worker caught that one mistake. Frankly, it makes me proud to know that my county has civil servants of this quality. (I had more signatures than I needed, by the way, and won my election.) And now Donald Trump wants to call our elections corrupt.

But I don't despair. Because I remember that unknown election worker who found that tiny error. Because I remember all the people who signed the petition. Because I remember that half of my constituents are people of color, and 12% of folks in my ward speak at home a language other than English. Because one in five is Jewish. Because every Gay Pride Month, our city hall is lit in gay pride colors. Because early voting began today. I look out my window. There's a Jewish dad shagging flies with his kid. A lesbian couple is unloading groceries from the back of their car. An elderly man and woman hold hands and laugh as they walk past my home. My Italian-American wife will be home soon. These are my people. I love this town. And I will not despair.