The American Crisis: Defined
Journal Entry #6
…In a republican nation, whose citizens are to be led by reason and persuasion and not by force, the art of reasoning becomes of first importance…

Of the many asseverations (earnest affirmations; positive declarations) posited by the founders of the American Republic, perhaps the most consanguineous (of the same blood or origin; descended from the same ancestor) to Alexander Hamilton’s thoughts on “the important question”, would certainly be Thomas Jefferson’s opinion on the efficacy (having the power to produce a desired effect; effective) of reason. With penetrating clarity, Mr. Jefferson assigned two principle criteria by which FREEDOM is sustained.

As a practical matter, Mr. Jefferson advocated the habitual and systematic use of reason and enlightened debate by a citizenry to secure FREEDOM and all our natural rights, by establishing a government that derives its “just powers from the consent of the governed”. Accordingly, we are enabled to prudently decide Mr. Hamilton’s “…important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not, of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend, for their political constitutions, on accident and force…”

Secondly, Mr. Jefferson implicitly affirmed the absolute necessity for the employment of the study and knowledge of history. Indeed, the “art of reasoning” becomes entirely ineffectual, nay impossible, if the citizen does not understand what a republican nation is, what historical events necessitated its establishment and how it is superior to other existing forms of government, to say nothing of possessing an historical grasp of the political precursors (one that precedes and indicates the approach of another; predecessor) of generations past.

For that matter, the “art of reasoning” itself becomes, in the first instance, utterly inapproachable to the citizen who is historically unaware of the qualitative superiority of empirical-rationalism (reason, properly understood) to other modes of thinking about things.

It is precisely this method of thinking about things, from our cosmology (that branch of astronomy that deals with the origin, structure and space-time relationships of the universe), to our political structures, to our public and private financial and economic arrangements, to our moral and ethical systems, that returns us repeatedly and unfailingly to a philosophical source- specifically, the study of Logic- and therefore makes this present discourse intimately relevant and essential to every citizen.

It is my opinion, reinforced by those of the Founders of the American Republic, our present national troubles, the current American Crisis, and the subsequent threat to FREEDOM were precipitated and presently are magnified to the extent WE THE PEOPLE and our leaders have failed to engage in this discussion; our disinclination, that is, to answer Alexander Hamilton’s “important question”.