The Founding Fathers

"To succeed, jump as quickly at opportunities as you do at conclusions." Benjamin Franklin said this in an effort to explain to people that they must take action as well as they assume things. One of the things that people assume is that the founding fathers would be disappointed in the America of today. On the surface, this seems true. Pick up any news report and you will find horror stories about what is happening in America. Political tensions are at an all time high. Poverty seems to be an endless struggle. The good that should be so prevalent in the world, the good that the founders fought for, seems to have vanished.

This ideal, that birthed our nation, is almost as straightforward as a crooked, forked path. The founding fathers were not quiet about what they thought America should be and, most of the time, were contradictory with each other, adding to the impossibility of a cohesive aspiration. President Washington was famously opposed to getting involved with foreign politics. Benjamin Franklin on the other hand, thrived on foreign affairs, working overseas as a diplomat for years. Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson fought bitterly over America's future economic prospects. John Adams vied for a fair government-controlled legal system. His cousin, Samuel Adams, believed in letting citizens handle their own problems, violently if necessary. It comes as no surprise to anyone that, when people can’t agree on anything, few things ever get done. And wouldn’t that be a difficult world to live in. So, how can America be as the founding fathers envisioned if they contradicted themselves? The assumption is that the founders would be disappointed, but this assumption is ultimately wrong. The founding fathers argued about semantics, but their goal for America was the same.

The founding fathers all wanted equality and freedom for the people. Not all of them practiced what they preached, of course, but they all agreed that this was the goal for America. As stated in the Declaration of Independence, "...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." The founding fathers had high hopes for America. They wanted to make Her a place of freedom and opportunity. The founding fathers tried to create something that had never been successfully accomplished. With simple hope and the odds stacked against them, they made themselves a country so we could have a future.

But complete equality and complete freedom can rarely coexist. It is a struggle in America to find a middle ground that will make people happy. It is a constant game of tug-of-war that the population is playing and it seems that no one will ever be completely content because everyone is trying to create something else. But that's the point! America isn't just a country, it is also an ideal. America is people getting up and trying to make a change, whether for themselves or the world is up to them.

The American people do this all the time. America’s military consists solely of volunteers who give their services willingly to defend their country. They are willing to give up not just a few years of their lives, but the rest of their lives, to make changes that they may not ever see come to fruition. They do this in place of their own dreams and goals in an act of selflessness that is unique to few countries, the United States being one. I was a military brat, born on a base and moved around as my father was stationed in different states. I got to see first hand what sacrifices not just him, but my mother made. He fought for his country as my mother raised two small children by herself most of the time. Serving his country was not a decision that only affected him. It was hard for them but both say that, to this day, it was worth it. He was fighting for the country he loved while she supported him in the hardest way possible.

These struggles allow people to grow and for things to get better and for them to pursue their own happiness. There was never any chance for America to be how the founders envisioned because you cannot define happiness for another person.

So no, this is not the America that the founding fathers envisioned. But it is not a disappointment and it will never stop moving towards that future of equality and freedom. They wanted to create a place, a country, for people to be able to reach their own definition of success, to reach their full potential in spite of ever-looming challenges. We are still, and probably will be forever, working at that goal. Not everybody will ever be completely happy with America, whether that be its government, ideals, or people. But the founding fathers set down a foundation for us to try, and the legacy that we leave on that foundation is not just their vision, but ours as well.

Work Cited

Ellis, Joseph J. “John Adams”, Britannica. 10 September 2020. https://www.britannica.com/biography/John-Adams-president-of-United-States. Accessed 19 October 2020.

Franklin, Benjamin. https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/benjamin_franklin_383996. Accessed 14 October 2020.

Freeman, Joanne B. “Jefferson and Hamilton, Political Rivals in Washington’s Cabinet, George Washington’s Mount Vernon. https://www.mountvernon.org/george-washington/the-first-president/washingtons-presidential-cabinet/jefferson-and-hamilton-political-rivals/. Accessed 10 October 2020.

Office of the Historian. 2016. https://history.state.gov/milestones/1776-1783/b-franklin. Accessed 14 October 2020.