Achieving American independence required immense interdependence.
After more than two centuries, that hasn’t changed. The interplay between American independence and interdependence remains the nub of the nation's Fourth of July celebrations in which Americans gather together to, counterintuitively, commemorate separation.
But the proper equilibrium between freedom and communalism is still a matter of national discussion. The Founders established the Constitution to simultaneously form “a more perfect Union” and secure “the Blessings of Liberty.”
Striking this balance continues to be a quintessentially American quest.
As barbecues blaze and fireworks flare, somewhere within America’s cognitive recesses remain lingering questions about health care and tax reform, foreign policy and domestic agendas.
These and other issues demand well-calibrated scales to weigh the merits of whether the nation should have greater wealth distribution or increased freedom from taxation.
Senate Republicans have put forward a health care bill that aims to create an economically sustainable plan to replace the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare. The bill cuts federal spending but also eliminates services to the poor and elderly.
Progressives lobby for universal health care as conservatives warn that redistribution ultimately hurts broad economic prosperity.
Who is right?
The American answer usually comes from synthesizing seemingly paradoxical principles of independence and interdependence.
To date, America's ongoing debate has never collapsed into complete communal redistribution or radical libertarianism. Most often, the American dialogue is anchored in the messy middle, which requires the challenging work of cooperation and, yes, even compromise in an effort to create that “more perfect Union.”
But Americans must always remain vigilant to see that this fruitful exchange doesn't cave. America’s most widely embraced living historian, David McCullough, frequently stresses the idea that American history “could have gone any way at any point.” Not unlike contemporary Americans, he observes, the nation’s forebears “didn't know how it would all turn out.”
On Independence Day, citizens must remember that the republic thrives on freedom and independence but also, as the Constitution states, on preserving the “common defense” and the “general Welfare.”
Long before Sen. Mitch McConnell, Rep. Nancy Pelosi and President Donald Trump occupied positions of political prominence, the likes of John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and Thomas Jefferson debated the size, scope and role of their newly created government. President George Washington didn’t shun their disagreements — he kept them close so as not to lose their perspectives.
Compromise, of course, is not always the answer — and, contrary to Aristotle’s thought, virtue is not by necessity “the mean between extremes.” Yet, as the nation enters big debates over health care, tax reform and myriad issues of import, it’s wise to watch for interlocutors who understand that American independence has always thrived when inextricably tethered to American interdependence.