The time has come for me to bid farewell to this wonderful university, to The Daily Cardinal, and perhaps to writing opinion pieces. Before I embark upon my final call to action, I just want to thank all the people who have made it possible for me to do this for the past six years: all of my editors, past and present, my parents, my readers and my high school journalism teacher Mr. Matt Johnson. It has been a strange and remarkable journey that I have thoroughly enjoyed and it will always be special to me. I have chosen my final topic with great care.
Franklin Roosevelt is among my favorite politicians in American history, so it is only appropriate that I turn to him for one last call to advance the rights of mankind. In his 1944 State of the Union, Roosevelt made his greatest, but often overlooked, contribution to American political thought as he called for a second Bill of Rights to secure the economic rights of every American citizen. These are not absurd promises that we cannot fulfill. According to The World Bank, we are the richest nation on the earth and we ought to treat our citizens with basic respect and dignity. These economic rights have become central debates in our political discourse, and we must recognize the merit in them. We must make an effort to implement this second Bill of Rights to ensure that all American citizens are treated with the basic respect to live their life as they see fit. A second Bill of Rights is needed because, as Roosevelt argues, the Bill of Rights and the U.S. Constitution have “proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.”
We are a nation founded on the premise of individual rights (although it hasn’t always been legal doctrine). The Declaration of Independence centers on the idea that all men are “endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” President John F. Kennedy reaffirmed this commitment to individual rights in his inaugural address stating that “the same revolutionary beliefs for which our forebears fought are still at issue around the globe—the belief that the rights of man come not from the generosity of the state, but from the hand of God.” If America is about anything, it is this commitment to individual freedom and civil liberties.
Today, certain rights stand compromised by an absurd concentration of wealth among the wealthiest individuals. In the richest nation on earth how can it be that some citizens must work two full time jobs to put food on the table, and other citizens must suffer from long term unemployment? Why must people go homeless when we are perfectly capable of housing them?
People are entitled to certain economic liberties so that they be treated with the basic dignity that every human being deserves. This includes the rights to an education, to health care, to retirement, to housing, to employment with a living wage, to food, clothing and leisure.
Today, American society is regressing into the gilded era of robber barons and worker exploitation. Americans are working more and getting paid less. Wealth is being crystallized in the hands of a select few who are willing to exploit the public to keep their fortunes. They are a powerful few, but together we can, as we did in the time of Teddy Roosevelt, conquer this insane capitalist colonization of our lives. Capitalism is great so long as it does not result in the exploitation of the general public. We are moving toward a society in which our commitment to an ideological form of capitalism is hindering our lives. We must act to reclaim what we have lost.
Demanding a second Bill of Rights is not as radical as it may seem. Every major Democratic politician holds a commitment to at least some of these ideals. President Barack Obama passed the Affordable Care Act and has tirelessly tried to increase minimum wage to $10.10 an hour. I bring this up because we must realize what it is we are fighting for. The world is changing into something terrifying and if we do not act to protect our rights from exploitation they will be slowly eroded. However, if we stop all of this bickering and unite together to protect these fundamental rights, our voices together will drown out those of the powerful few who wish to exploit us. In the words of Bob Dylan, “like Pharaoh’s tribe/They’ll be drownded in the tide/And like Goliath/they’ll be conquered.”
Do you think a second Bill of Rights is the answer to this problem? Please send all feedback to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
