|
When: Saturday, July 25, 2009 @ 9:00 AM
Where: Slope's BBQ, 1131 North Tennessee St., Cartersville, GA 30120
Speaker:
Gubernatorial Candidate, Congressman Nathan Deal
Future
Meetings:
August 22 - To be Announced
September 26 - Candidate for Labor Commissioner, Rep. Melvin Everson
October 24 - Candidate for Insurance Commissioner, Mayor Harold Logsdon |
|
Upcoming Bartow Events
Independence Day Activities
Join us on July 4th for Cartersville's annual Independence Day Parade and Dellinger Park activities. If you want to be in the parade, please join us and dress as a colonial or from one of the wars that help win us our freedom. We will march in the parade alongside our great looking float (yes, we have a real float this year and not just a truck). After the parade we will be going to Dellinger Park where we will have a booth and have many activities for the family to enjoy.
If you want to help or just join in the fun, please email michael@bartowgop.com to find out what you can do.
What: Independence Day Parade and Park Activities
When: July 4th starting at 9:00 AM
Where: Downtown Cartersville and then Dellinger Park |
Our 2009 Sponsors
State Senator Bill and Susan Heath
Former Rep. Jeff and Kim Lewis
State Insurance Commissioner John Oxendine
John and Terry Bangert
Rep. Paul and Marijon Battles
Wanda Cagle-Gray
Susan Crockett
Ted and Gail Henry
John & Kerry Howard
Douglas and Joan Jones
Rep. Barry & Desiree Loudermilk
Become A 2009 Sponsor TODAY! |
|
Become a Bartow GOP Member  If you have not joined the Bartow County Republican Party, please take the time to do so now. Click the button below to join at the $35 Family level, or you may print a PDF membership form and send it in by clicking here. All membership dues will help in electing Republicans in 2010 and informing voters of how their elected officials are representing them. Join today and be a part of the Bartow County Republican Party.
You may join at the $35 Family level now by clicking on the PayPal button or visit BartowGOP.com to become a sponsor or join for two years. |
|
|
|
Greetings!
Tomorrow all across the nation, hundreds of millions of Americans will gather with their friends and family and enjoy a day of fun and games, hot dogs and hamburgers and Cokes, playing baseball and football and frisbee in the back yard or at the park, watching fireworks displays and in general just enjoying a great day together. That is how it should be. However, that is not always how it was, and if we fail to remember the history behind the holiday, then one day, sooner rather than later, there will be no more Independence Day to celebrate because there will be no more America as we know it, or maybe no America at all. This grand experiment in individual human freedom is not guaranteed to us just because we are Americans. Many people in other countries are actively working to see America fall, and even some within our country would like to see a more "European" style of governance, which gives power to the state and not the individual. It is only through remembering the history behind the holiday and honoring it that we can keep our country as strong and free for our children and grandchildren as our parents and grandparents left it for us.
Far from food and fun and games, for the Founding Fathers of this country, the prospect of declaring independence from Britain was rife with peril. For these great men, that declaration was an act of treason against the British crown, to which these thirteen colonies owed allegiance. However, continuous mistreatment (in the form of excessive taxation, compounded by no real representation in Parlaiment, and being required to quarter the army, among other insults to these overseas British citizens) at the hands of King George III and his army and government officers was finally more than could be borne. These men, having petitioned the crown for relief, and receiving in return open contempt and disdain, made a decision that would alter the course of their lives and the history of the world.
On July 2, 1776, Congress voted to sever ties entirely from Great Britain, and on July 4th, the first signatures were affixed to the draft of the Declaration of Independence: John Hancock (President of Congress) and Charles Thompson (Secretary of Congress). On July 8th, members of Congress assembled on the steps of Independence Hall to read the declaraton aloud to the people of the city of Philadelphia, sealing their fates for what was to come. Upon completion of that reading, the Liberty Bell was rung. Appropriately, in keeping with their reliance on their Creator, the bell that announced to the world that we would be free men and women, relying only on our own industry and the benevolent hand of Almighty God, was inscribed with the words found in the Book of Leviticus, chapter 25 verse 10: "Proclaim liberty throughout the land and to all the inhabitants thereof." From this declaration there was no turning back. They were now in open defiance of the British crown, and for many of these men, their proclamation that they were free and sovereign men answerable only to God would be sealed with their blood.
Looking back now, we have a tendency oftentimes to believe that we were always great, that our ability to proclaim our independence and then defend it was an accepted fact. That is far from the truth. In July of 1776, most of the colonists were angry at what they felt was heavy-handed treatment by their king, but only a small percentage were willing to fight to correct these grievances. Most were just hoping for a reconciliation with King George III that would not come. So they were faced with a decision; either accept the burdens placed upon like the Israelites of old had done for so long, or rise up and fight for freedom. This was not an easy choice. The British Army and Navy were the most powerful in the world at that time. They were well supplied, well trained and well armed. In contrast, the colonists were farmers and merchants, not fighting men. They were also without a store of arms to pull from, and severely outgunned against their foes, which had rifles and cannon and fighting ships. The American army, if it could even be called that, on paper was no match for such a superior fighting force. Yet having declaring themselves to be free, having pledged to their God and each other their lives, their fortune and their sacred honor, with a firm belief in divince providence and the righteousness of their cause, they set out creating a new country from those former colonies.
Having first attempted to make peacable amends with the king, only to be met with more burdens placed upon their backs and even with violent suppression, it was now time to right these wrongs. As Samuel Adams declared at the State House in Philadelphia on August 1st,
"Contemplate the mangled bodies of your countrymen, and then say 'what should be the
reward of such sacrifices?' Bid us and our posterity bow the knee, supplicate the
friendship and plough, and sow, and reap, to glut the avarice of the men who have
let loose on us the dogs of war to riot in our blood and hunt us from the face of
the earth? If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than
the animated contest of freedom - go home 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 you were our countrymen!"
King George was furious at the colonial upstarts and sent his army and navy to bloody the nose and break the will of the rebellious once and for all. General George Washington, having resigned his commission with the crown and taken up the cause of freedom, and with authorization of Congress, began to mold these farmers and merchants into a fighting force. It began as a horrible disaster. There was a severe lack of discipline in the ranks, compounded by rampant drunkeness, with little money to pay the soldiers (who were also away from their families and livelihoods, knowing the hardships placed on their families by their service). They were soundly defeated in battle after battle as the British Army showed its resounding superiority in defeating the colonial mongrels. It was often times through the sheer force of will of General Washington, and the tremendous respect that his men had for him, that this rag-tag band was kept together.
After continued defeats the army began to be demoralized, and thousands upon thousands of men were dying not from wounds sustained in battle, but from exposure and disease. Washington pleaded with Congress for more men, more food, more arms and more money, but that was often a near impossible request to fulfill. Yet Washington fought on. Having in May captured Fort Ticonderoga from the British by Ethan Allen, Benedict Arnold and small contingent of Green Mountain Boys, Washington sent Henry Knox (whose idea it was) to retrieve artillery pieces from the fort and bring them to Boston, in the dead of winter and in deep snow and across frozen lakes. The success of this expedition was crucial not just for the weaponry, but for the morale of a discouraged army. As would occur on a number of occasions throughout the war, Knox succeeded against impossible odds. Yet the American army would continue to be beaten down at every turn, capable most times of only harassing the enemy and not often able to do real damage.
That would change on the night of Christmas Eve 1776. In a display of unmatched brilliance and daring, Washington had planned a surprise attack on the Hessian troops stationed in Trenton, New Jersey. It would be a 3-pronged attack which would begin at 6AM on Christmas morning. The failure of this attack, however, would likely mean the failure of the cause of independence. The American army could not sustain continued losses much longer.
This battle would become one of the most compelling stories of the intervention of divine providence in the cause of American independence. Washington, commanding the main assault force, struggled mightily. A brutal northeaster storm had blown in, inundating the army, many without shoes and leaving bloody trails in the snow behind them, with ice and snow and rain. This would swell the banks of the Delaware River, making the crossing more dangerous and time consuming. The troops finally crossed the river at 3AM, three hours behind schedule. Washington briefly considered calling off the attack, but realized that the storm which had hindered them had also masked all sounds of their crossing, and that there was no way to mask the sounds of retreat and they would surly be caught, so he decided to press on. Had he known that the the two flanking forces which were to accompany him in the battle had been unable to reach their assigned posts until two hours after the battle was to have begun, he might have attempted a retreat anyway. He was also faced with the fact that many of the rifles had been soaked during the crossing and would not fire, which mean that these men would have to rely on the bayonet.
The Battle of Trenton would last less than 45 minutes. The American Army, under cover of the storm, half frozen, with bloody hands and feet and malnourished bodies, would defeat the opposing forces at Trenton. Only four Americans were injured and the only deaths of American soldiers would be two that died from exposure. This would be a turning point that would give renewed hope to the American forces, and that hope would culminate in 1781 with the surrender of Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown. The Americans had won their independence. David had risen up to defeat Goliath, and a nation was born.
Many stories would be written of the history of this war, of the officers who led it, the men who fought it, the women who gave indispensable support and encouragement to those men, and of the faith and courage necessary to prevail against overwhelming odds. Yet these great men, our Founding Fathers, gave credit and praise above all to one source...their God. Whether under the name of Creator, Heavenly Father, Almighty God, Divine Providence, it was the same. The source of their victory was the same as the source of their inalienable rights, and by faith in Him and the prayers lifted in His name were we established as a nation. Over the next 200+ years, the United States would become the most dominant military and economic powerhouse in the history of the world. Yet, possibly because we had a deep understanding of the source of our blessings, we used this might not to conquer and dominate, but to uplift the downtrodden, to free the oppressed, to succor the needy and to spread the cause of freedom and liberty throughout the world. The United States, despite many faults, has done more good than in other nation or civilization in the history of mankind.
So as we prepare to celebrate another anniversary of our nation's independence, it is my hope that we will look back with gratitude at the courage and resolve of our Founding Fathers, with gratitude for the men that fought that war, and the men and women who have served this nation in the cause of freedom for generations before us. It is my hope that we will take the time to become reacquainted with our nation's noble heritage, and again be proud of who and what we are. It is fashionable in some circles today to blame the U.S. as the source of the world's problems, but I declare to you that this is not so. The world would be a much darker place without the beacon that is America, that "shining city upon a hill". But most of all I pray that we, as a nation, awaken to remember the true source of our freedom, our wealth, and our very lives, that we will in humble gratitude once again as a people petition Almighty God for his blessing upon us, and most importantly, that we live worthy to receive those blessings.
May God bless this nation, and each one of you and your families on this special day. May He soften the hearts of our leaders that they may be humbled by the magnitude of the problems facing this nation and seek His guidance in all things. This is my prayer for this great nation.
Happy Birthday America!
May God Bless Us All,
Louis DeBroux
Vice Chairman of Communications
|
|
|
Reading for Extra Credit
Keeping Up With the World of Politics, Government, and the Social Issues of the Day
This is usually where I have links to articles about current events in the world of politics. This time, I would simply encourage you to go back and read the inspired documents that have been the cornerstones of our nation's government for over two hundred years; The Declaration of Independence and the United States Constitution. Take time to savor the words that first declared that man's rights come not from a king or a government, but from Him who created us, and the subsequent document that created a form of government that has been the template for all free peoples ever since.
The Declaration of Independence
The United States Constitution
| |
|
May God Bless You,
Louis DeBroux, Vice Chair of Communications
Bartow County Republican Party
Michael W. Huneke II, Chairman
Bartow County Republican Party |
|
|
