Barbara Crow of Gray wrote: “I am weary of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan espousing their statements, ‘God gives us rights, not government.’ This is just another gimmick to appeal to the religious voters. Do they believe what they preach?”
Preacher Thomas Jefferson wrote and 55 others subscribed to the following:
“When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the Earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them ...
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. ...”
God given rights are unalienable. Government “rights” are not. She then concludes with a question:
“Didn’t the colonists revolt against aristocrats?”
Space does not permit, but the answer to her question is found the same place as the above quotes. The Declaration of Independence.
I urge that she and all others familiarize themselves with that document.
GARY SKIDMORE
Johnson City
