The abstract principle that human beings are born with dignity is too difficult for a person to formulate on her own. It had to be formulated by many minds in concert over generations and then enshrined in philosophical texts which shape worldviews and governments. Though the idea of human dignity is at least as old as the Bible, it was not set down in a political philosophy until millennia later. Liberalism is the word we use to refer to the systems of belief and the politics which are buttressed by this principle. It instructs that human dignity endures even when it is abused. And as a political philosophy, liberalism constrains the power of government in service to this inalienable human dignity. Liberalism hectors, and long may it do so, that might does not make right. Might can ignore the truth, but it cannot annul it. In a liberal country — and America is the only country founded explicitly on that philosophy — our leaders serve at our behest. Power does not confer dignity: humanity does. We are blessed to be born late, after this tradition had been developed, and after the government formed upon it has grown fat and sophisticated.
America Giveth
