Freedom's Holy Light

IN 1831, just about a half-century after this nation was founded, Samuel Francis Smith wrote the song we know by heart:

My country, ‘tis of thee, sweet land of liberty,

Of thee I sing;

Land where my fathers died, Land of the pilgrims’ pride,

From every mountain side Let freedom ring.

But that would have been a kind of idolatry—and a farce—had he not put under it, in the last verse, the spiritual foundation:

Our fathers’ God, to thee, Author of liberty,

To thee we sing;

Long may our land be bright With freedom’s holy light;

Protect us by thy might, Great God, our King.

That is the foundation of freedom, the secret of a democratic society.

That same year, William Lloyd Garrison began publishing a newspaper openly protesting slavery, calling it a blatant violation of the “unalienable rights” of all persons as stated in the Declaration of Independence and provided for in the Constitution of the United States. The Christian gospel stood at the very heart of the nation—freedom’s holy light.

That same year also, Alexis de Tocqueville was sent by the French government to study the new American nation. He concluded that the genius of America was in the churches where there were “pulpits aflame with righteousness.”

[[@Page:vi]]And that same year, a gangling young man, twenty-two years of age, arrived at New Salem, Illinois. Fresh from the wilderness, he would, just thirty years later, become the symbol of national unity and the champion of freedom for every person. His name was Abraham Lincoln.

This “holy light,” with basic provisions drawn from the Judeo-Christian teaching, is worthy of thoughtful appreciation as our nation observes its Bicentennial.

R. Eugene Sterner