David McElroy

The Declaration of Independence is evidence of the ability of powerful men to use beautiful rhetoric of freedom to justify their secession from a political power they didn’t wish to be part of.

The War Between the States less than a hundred years later is evidence that the resulting regime didn’t believe its own rhetoric about secession and self-determination.

Subsequent actions by the federal government are further evidence that following the principles of the Declaration of Independence will get you imprisoned, not freed.

The Declaration of Independence is filled with beautiful, soaring words, but the men who wrote those words couldn’t conceive of letting individuals have real freedom. They could only conceive of groups of powerful white men controlling some specific territory and ruling over those who lived there.

The Constitution is proof that the men of the day imposed their rule on the territory which they seized from Great Britain rather than allowing individuals to rule themselves. It was an experiment in “limited government,” which they believed would somehow be different from all previous attempts at coercion.

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She went to the bridge that night to kill herself. That’s what she said, anyway. All I know is that I believed her.

It was a year ago tonight when I got a text message. She told me that she was on a bridge and was ready to die. She had threatened repeatedly to kill herself during the two years prior to this, and there had been several times when I’d been truly afraid. There were times I talked with her most of the way through the night — on the phone from almost a thousand miles away — just trying to keep her alive until morning would arrive and the suicidal demons of depression would slip away from her. At least until it was dark again.

I loved her. We had a long and complicated history. That part doesn’t matter anymore. But I loved her more than life itself — and I do love my life very dearly. I loved her even more.

She told me in her text message that as she stood there thinking about what she was about to do, I was the only one she wondered about. She was worried about how I would take it. She worried about whether it would affect a film I was working on at the time. She said it surprised her that I was the only one she thought about. She had no reason to lie, so I believed her.

After texting for a few minutes, I asked her if she would talk on the phone. She didn’t reply for a minute, but then my phone rang.

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After a divided Supreme Court ruled today that Hobby Lobby can’t be forced to buy birth control for its employees, the reactions have been predictable.

Social conservatives are hailing it as a great blow for freedom. Progressive leftists are screaming that this is about bosses controlling access to birth control for their employees. At any moment, I expect to see the chant start somewhere that the five justices on the winning side hate women.

I have trouble working up any enthusiasm about this case. Yes, it’s a good decision in a narrow way for religious freedom, but it’s pretty hollow when seen in context of everything else.

The Supreme Court has already ruled that Americans can be forced to buy things they don’t want to buy for themselves. Think about that. If the government believes you should buy hamburgers from McDonald’s or a subscription to National Geographic or a specified array of sex toys, the court has said it’s fine for government to require that of you and punish you if you don’t comply.

The court has already said that it’s perfectly fine to force employers to buy health care for their employees — plans that the government must approve. Whatever government deems to be necessary, companies can be forced to buy for you, whether you want it or not.

The Hobby Lobby decision only says that if a company’s owners object to birth control on moral grounds, they can’t be forced to purchase that particular coverage.

That’s all this decision does. While it’s right in the very narrow sense, it’s so utterly inconsequential compared to everything else that’s already been mandated that it’s hard to believe it matters.

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