Our American family

I would like to start this blog entry off with a statement which is clearly a lie: When this country began, the people who created it were all one big happy family. Now, having said that, I would like to point out a few problems with that statement. First of all, as our former President said, "It depends what your definition of 'is' is." When you examine that statement, you have to look at if from several different perspectives. For instance, we need to pick a time period when this country began. Let's say that we begin at the time when the original inhabitants walked across that land bridge in Alaska and settled in North America. While the first Americans may have had some family genetic similarities, I don't even really believe that they all saw themselves as family. I suspect that the early Native-Americans just crossed into North America from Asia, looking for a few good wooly mammoths for eating, maybe some little critters which would provide easy prey and a warm place of shelter from the cold. Some were related, others not. The end result was a hodge podge of people groups (tribes) which fought each other for places to settle, food, shelter and good climate. The ultimate result was a large number of tribal groups who were related genetically, but unrelated in their own understanding. They were different tribes, for God's sake, and they didn't even share a tribal history which bound them together, like the tribe of Israelites in the Middle East.

If we begin with the arrival of the first Europeans, then the water gets really muddy. First of all, the Europeans were fighting each other for supremacy over the New World. To say that they were a united group would be comical. Not only did they struggle with each other, but the attempted to eradicate the Native peoples who were already here. And they damn well came pretty close to accompishing that task. Perhaps the only indication of a stated desire for union and a realization of their family status was the Mayflower Compact, which was a 'constitution' created by the Pilgrims who settled in Massachusetts, thinking they were in Virginia, and really only included the English settlers in their little group. The compact didn't include the Native Americans in Massachusetts, or the Europeans in any other part of the New World. Nobody else was included.

After the Europeans were allowed to simmer, stew and multiply for several centuries in the New World, the next true declaration of union occurred when the Continental Congress met in Philadelphia and declared their independence from Great Britian. Thomas Jefferson was basically given the task of creating the declaration because John Adams was unpopular and the proponents of independence needed the consent of the southern states. For an union of Americans, the group that met in Philadelphia was a contentious bunch that was dragged into independence by a group of liberals from Massachusetts, aristocrats from Virginia and merchants from Pennsylvania and New York.

When the Declaration was read on July 4, 1776, a lot of people in the American colonies would object to their inclusion in the new 'nation.' It would take several years before the colonies would be united into one United States of America. Even then, a lot of the colonist who didn't want to be included headed back to Britian or re-settled into the other British colonies like Nova Scotia, Canada, Bermuda, etc. The Native American tribes who participated in the Revolution had an opportunity to join the family, but most of them had no clue that there was a new family moved in to the neighborhood.

Again, we can look at this union of peoples when the federal Constitution was established. At this point, you can probably say that the group of people who were joined together were at least willing to acknowledge a family relationship through the new constitution. Of course, a lot of people groups were left out of this family. For instance, women, unpropertied men, slaves, and Native Americans in areas unsettled by European Americans were left out of the family. Those Native Americans who found themselves in the unsettled areas would soon find themselves thrown out of the family and given new digs in Oklahoma and other places in the western part of America. These members of the American tapestry were ultimately moved hither and yon until their presence in the American landscape became so small that the government was willing to allow them to elect to assimilate and elect to become part of the American family. Slaves in America were only able to become a part of the American family after the conclusion of a Civil War, amendments to the Constitution, a long national reconstruction, and a movement for civil rights which is still working to establish everyone on an even keel. Women were included by subsequent amendment to the Constitution and civil right movement.

It is clear that if this country is a family, then the family has been only made a family by struggle and by adoption. I suppose that some might argue that the American family has emulated a lot of contentious families, where some have been pampered, some have been kicked out, others have griped about their treatment. However, I would argue that a united family is what we should emulate as the model for this American nation. I suppose that it is clear that we probably have never been a united family in this country before, or at least a united family where each member stands on an equal footing. However, again, I would argue that we should use the concept of a united family as our goal and as our model for how this country works.

Now having said that, lets discuss how a united family would act as a model for this country. When I was in college I took a class in the English Department called 'Victorian Thought.' This class involved the study of a number of writings by English writers in the Nineteenth Century. One of my favorite writers in that class was John Ruskin. Ruskin was a professor at Oxford or Cambridge and was predominately involved with architecture. However, he wrote a piece in which he argued for a paternalistic business structure in commercial and industrial matters.

Ruskin wrote at a time when the industrial revolution in England was beginning to create some of the negative impact on English life. Ruskin felt that the proper solution was to run a business as a family, with the owner acting as the father and the workers representing the children. Ruskin's concept was based on a idealized version of the family, but was intended to use that ideal as the goal toward the business was operated.

I remember discussing that concept in class and one of my classmates, the son of a banking family in southern Ohio, objecting to the concept. He basically said that in the real world that wouldn't work. I argued with him, saying that my father worked for a very paternalistic company, IBM, that did quite well. Given the comparison between a small family-owned bank in Ohio and a large multi-national company like IBM, my classmate had little room to continue the argument. Of course, in the world we live in, there are many more examples of paternalistic companies which really try to take care of their employees. A lot of times these companies have started with several friends with a common interest getting together and developing a concept which sells on the open market. As the companies develop, the companies which try to take care of their employees do seem to do well.

This doesn't mean that paternalism doesn't have its limits. Just as in a family, the children have to individuate and develop in their own ways. It is a wise business owner who realizes this and governs his business accordingly. I truly think this concept has application to our government as well. In times of prosperity, the government should let loose the reins of power and allow the individual citizens which comprise the country to thrive in the high times. In times of recession, the government may need to pull the reins in and make sure that there is some control on the citizenry, so that individuals can get the help they need to build their private economies, which in turn builds the national economy. At the same time, prosperity requires regulation to, to ensure that the gains we make as individuals are not made at the expense of others.

In a family, when times get tough, the keepers of the pursestrings pull in the spending and economize. The desires and wishes of the children are kept in restraint. When times are good, we can afford to use some of that largesse for pleasure and recreation. We can also allow the children some portion of freedom. The wise father (or economist or government) makes use of both elements in order to make the family work. If our nation is to operate as a family, then the government needs to take the wise father as its guide.