The "Pursuit of Happiness" is the pursuit of blessedness. When we say "God Bless America" we seek a state of happiness. We seek "Liberty Under God."
The Framers of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution used the phrase "happiness" in the way Sir William Blackstone used it in his Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765), knowing that the English word happy was the equivalent of the Latin word beatus, as in "Beatitudes":
"Blessed (or happy) are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth." (Matthew 5:5).
The Framers agreed with Blackstone when he said that God has "so inseparably interwoven the laws of eternal justice with the happiness of each individual, that the latter [happiness] cannot be attained but by observing the former [laws]; and if the former be punctually obeyed, it cannot but induce the latter."
The Delaware Indian Chiefs came to George Washington inquiring how they could leave their world of superstition and poverty, and become more like the Americans. On May 12, 1779, Washington told them:
You do well to wish to learn our arts and ways of life, and above all, the religion of Jesus Christ. These will make you a greater and happier people than you are. Congress will do every thing they can to assist you in this wise intention.
The Writings of George Washington, JC Fitzpatrick, ed., Wash. DC: US Gov't Printing Office, 1932, Vol 15, p.55.
George Washington to New Hampshire Founding Father Meshech Weare, June 8, 1783:
I now make it my earnest prayer, that God would have you, and the State over which you preside, in his holy protection, that he would incline the hearts of the Citizens to cultivate a spirit of subordination and obedience to Government, to entertain a brotherly affection and love for one another, for their fellow Citizens of the United States at large, and particularly for their brethren who have served in the Field, and finally, that he would most graciously be pleased to dispose us all, to do Justice, to love mercy, and to demean ourselves with that Charity,
humility and pacific temper of mind, which were the Characteristicks of the Divine Author of our blessed Religion, and without an humble imitation of whose example in these things, we can never hope to be a happy Nation.
— a Circular Letter of Farewell to the Continental Army, containing "my final blessing to that Country, in whose service I have spent the prime of my life."
Inscribed on a bronze tablet adjoining the Washington pew in St. Paul's chapel in New York City.
The programs of atheistic socialism are obstacles to the pursuit of blessedness. Our Constitution rejects these obstacles. Our nation's Organic Law (founding charters) confidently declares:
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"Religion, morality, and knowledge [are] necessary to good government
and the happiness of mankind," |
"Religion" for the Framers meant the true religion of Christ, not the false religion of Osama bin Laden, or the anti-religion of "Secular Humanism." Governments that ignore God or declare themselves "separate" from God deprive the People of happiness, "the blessings of liberty."
When a society is blessed, there is peace and security, and everyone enjoys life under his "Vine & Fig Tree." This was the goal of America's Founding Fathers.
Religion and morality are the necessary foundation of freedom and prosperity: "the blessings of liberty."
The "Pursuit of Happiness" is the risk, the work, and the production of happiness. It is not the "right" to prosperity, the "right" to happiness, the "right" to the blessings of liberty.
Joel Miller describes America in pursuit of Happiness:
When discussing the incentives granted by government to people thinking about settling in America, Benjamin Franklin cited only those “derived from good laws and liberty.” Recent arrivals would have to roll up their sleeves and put their backs into it because, as Franklin noted, streets were not “paved with half-peck loaves,” houses were not “tiled with pancakes,” and edible fowl did not “fly about ready-roasted, crying ‘Come eat me!’” But if a person were “sober, industrious, and frugal,” he could “establish himself in business” and “enjoy securely the profits of his industry.”[1] Pursuing happiness could be hard and possibly very rewarding work.
A little more than a generation later, Alexis de Tocqueville visited America and reported on the results of this policy of good laws, liberty, and secure profits in Democracy in America. Almost everyone was engaged in commerce, and every honest trade was considered honorable, “more or less laborious, more or less profitable. . . .”
| A truly prosperous country does not exist because the government forces everyone to build a huge pyramid; it exists when billions of human beings freely play a part in the creation of millions of small things that improve our lives: like a pencil. |
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He marvels at the scope of commerce, citing communications, tradeways, and railroads: “In the United States the greatest undertakings and speculations are executed without difficulty, because the whole population are engaged in productive industry. . . .” But he also admits to being “astonishe[d]... not so much [by] the marvelous grandeur of some undertakings as [by] the innumerable multitude of the small ones.”[3]
Everyone seemed animated by what Jefferson in his first inaugural called “pursuits of industry and improvement.” Every family pursued its happiness.
The culture of business and industry had its problems, which de Tocqueville duly reported, but note the focus on his discussion between free and unfree nations:
On passing from a free country into one which is not free the traveler is struck by the change; in the former all is bustle and activity; in the latter everything seems calm and motionless. In the one amelioration and progress are the topics of inquiry; in the other, it seems as if the community wished only to repose in the enjoyment of advantages already acquired. Nevertheless, the country which exerts itself so strenuously to become happy is generally more wealthy and prosperous than that which appears so contented with its lot. . . .[4]
When this pursuit of happiness was engaged politically, it was undertaken in keeping with the concept of the general welfare and the common good: “[I]t is not the exigencies and convenience of a single class for which provision is to be made, but the exigencies and convenience of all classes at once,” he writes.[5]
When the pursuit was engaged commercially, it was undertaken with “a sort of heroism”— immense risks taken, gratification deferred, long hours suffered, and hardships endured for the prize.
Good laws, liberty, and the right to enjoy the fruit of one’s labors and ventures allowed an irrepressible enterprising spirit to prosper. Consequently, America flourished. Franklin himself might serve as an emblem of this volatile mix of freedom and possibility that goes under the now-clichéd and oft-maligned moniker, the American Dream: first a printer’s apprentice, then a printer, then newspaperman, writer, almanacist, postmaster, inventor, scientist, diplomat, and statesman.[7] It allowed people settling this new land the room to try new things, to cut new paths through new terrain in the panoply of pursuits open to settlers in the New World—pursuits that stifling governments back in Europe had prevented for most.
The enterprising spirit still flourishes today in America, but unlike people in Franklin’s day, many Americans see their efforts are frustrated by bad laws and the lack of liberty.
Much of that law comes about because one political player or interest group uses the power of government to substitute his own particular happiness for the general happiness, undermining the rule of law and the common good. Recalling de Tocqueville’s comment, provision is today made out of the “exigencies and convenience” of a particular class or subset. The immediate result of this substitution and subversion is discord and strife as interest groups must work to defend their endangered happiness. There can be little harmony between, say, Handgun Control Inc. and the National Rifle Association or between the Sierra Club and a consortium of logging and wood-based product interests. But this discord is only the first result.
- [1] Benjamin Franklin, “Information to Those Who Would Remove to America,” The Autobiography and Selections from His Other Writings, ed. Herbert W Schneider (Bobbs-Merrill, 1952), 196-197.
- [2] Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, trans. Henry Reeve, ed. Phillips Bradley, Vol. 2 (Vintage, 1954), 162.
- [3] De Tocqueville, Vol. 2, 166.
- [4] Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, trans. Henry Reeve, ed Phillips Bradley, Vol. 1 (Vintage, 1954), 258.
- [5] De Tocqueville, Vol. 1, 259.
- [6] De Tocqueville, Vol. 1, 439-444—an instructive passage about America’s commercial success on the seas.
- [7] Edmund Morgan, Benjamin Franklin (Yale Nota Bene, 2003); Walter Isaacson, Benjamin Franklin: An American Life (Simon & Schuster, 2003).
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The government created by the U.S. Constitution was not intended to guarantee happiness to everyone. The government can only impede the pursuit of happiness when it attempts to do so. Government can only make us less happy, less blessed.
If ye love wealth better than liberty,
the tranquillity of servitude than
the animating contest of freedom
—go from us in peace.
We ask not your counsels or arms.
Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you.
May your chains sit lightly upon you, and
may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen!
Sam Adams, speaking at the State House in Philadelphia, “to a very numerous audience” on August 1, 1776 |
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Government programs do not bring blessedness:
Next: Term Limits and the Need for a Citizen Legislature
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