Liberty, Science, Virtue

Liberty is the great parent of science and of virtue; and a nation will be great in both in proportion as it is free.

Flag Day

May 12, 1986

By the President of the United States of America

A Proclamation  (Proclamation 5476 -- Flag Day and National Flag Week, 1986)

Over two hundred years ago, in June 1775, the first distinctive American flags were flown over the colonial defenses during the Battle of Bunker Hill. One flag was an adaptation of the British Blue Ensign, while the other displayed the pine tree, a symbol of the experience of Americans who had wrested their land from the wilderness.

As the colonials moved toward a final separation from Great Britain, other flags appeared. At least two of them featured a rattlesnake, symbolizing vigilance and deadly striking power. One bore the legend

"Liberty or Death''; the other, "Don't Tread on Me.'' The Grand Union Flag was raised over Washington's Continental Army Headquarters on January 1, 1776. It displayed not only the British crosses of St. Andrew and St. George, but also thirteen red and white stripes to symbolize the American colonies. The Bennington flag also appeared in 1776, with thirteen stars, thirteen stripes, and the number ``76.''

Two years after the Battle of Bunker Hill, on June 14, 1777, the Continental Congress adopted a flag that expressed clearly the unity and resolve of the patriots who had banded together in the cause of independence. The delegates voted ``that the flag of the thirteen United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field representing a new constellation.''

After more than two centuries, with the addition of thirty-seven stars, each representing one of our 50 States, the flag chosen by the Continental Congress on that June day in Philadelphia still waves over our Nation. This flag symbolizes our shared commitment to freedom and federalism and carries a message of hope to the afflicted, of opportunity to the oppressed, and of peace to all humanity.

To commemorate the adoption of our flag, the Congress, by a joint resolution approved August 3, 1949 (63 Stat. 492), designated June 14 of each year as Flag Day and requested the President to issue an annual proclamation calling for its observance and for the display of the Flag of the United States on all government buildings. The Congress also requested the President, by joint resolution approved June 9, 1966 (80 Stat. 194), to issue annually a proclamation designating the week in which June 14 occurs as National Flag Week and calling upon all citizens of the United States to display the flag during that week.

Now, Therefore, I, Ronald Reagan, President of the United States of America, do hereby designate June 14, 1986, as Flag Day and the week beginning June 8, 1986, as National Flag Week, and I direct the appropriate officials of the government to display the Flag of the United States on all government buildings during that week. I urge all Americans to observe Flag Day, June 14, and Flag Week by flying the Stars and Stripes from their homes and other suitable places.

I also urge the American people to celebrate those days from Flag Day through Independence Day, set aside by Congress as a time to honor America (89 Stat. 211), by having public gatherings and activities at which they can honor their country in an appropriate manner, especially by ceremonies in which all renew their dedication by publicly reciting the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this twelfth day of May, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty-six, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and tenth.

Ronald Reagan

Source: https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/speech/proclamations-may-12-1986

Written, as with a Sunbeam

The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for among old parchments or musty records. They are written, as with a sunbeam, in the whole volume of human nature, by the hand of the Divinity itself, and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power.

A true friend

A true friend is the best possession.

Rightful Liberty

“Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others.”

Cause and Effect

I hope we once again have reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There’s a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.

Lyrics to 'America'

America
by Steven Sondheim (born 3/22/1930)
for West Side Story (1957 Broadway lyrics)

Puerto Rico
You lovely island
Island of tropical breezes
Always the pineapples growing
Always the coffee blossoms blowing
And the money owing
And the baby's crying
And the people trying
I like the island Manhattan (I know you do)
Smoke on your pipe and put that in!
I like to be in America
Okay, buy me in America
Everything free in America
For a small fee in America
Buying on credit is so nice
One look at us and they charge twice
I have my own washing machine
What do you have don't you keep clean?
Skyscrapers bloom in America
Cadillacs zoom in America
Industry boom in America
12 in a room in America
Lots of new housing with more space
(Lots of doors slamming in our face)
I'll get a terrace apartment
Better you get rid of your accent
Life can be bright in America
If you can fight in America
Life is all right in America
If you're all white in America
America
La, la, la, la, la, la, America
America
Here you are free and you have pride
Long as you stay on your own side
Free to do anything you choose
Free to wait tables and shine shoes
Everywhere grime in America
Organized crime in America
Terrible time in America
You forget I'm in America
I think I'll go back to San Juan
I know a boat you can get on (bye, bye!)
Everyone there will give big cheer! (Hey)
Everyone there will have moved here

Source: https://www.westsidestory.com/america

Freedoms

Star Spangled Banner - verse 4

O thus be it ever when freemen shall stand
Between their lov’d home and the war’s desolation!
Blest with vict’ry and peace may the heav’n rescued land
Praise the power that hath made and preserv’d us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto - “In God is our trust,”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Star Spangled Banner - verse 3

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore,
That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion
A home and a Country should leave us no more?
Their blood has wash’d out their foul footstep’s pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave,
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.