For our children

Between the time the first shots were fired at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, and the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, there were differing opinions as to whether the nation should separate itself from the motherland.

It was during this in-between period that Thomas Paine penned "Common Sense" in an attempt to persuade the colonists to see the need of separation. I like one of the points he makes as a reminder of the reason they left the motherland to begin with.

"This new World hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty for EVERY PART of Europe. Hither have they fled, not from the tender embraces of the mother, but from the cruelty of the monster; and it is so far true of England, that the same tyranny which drove the first emigrants from home, pursues their descendants still."

Though I am not suggesting the means in these next points, I do believe the sentiment: "Let's not leave the next generation to be cutting throats." And, "Let us not leave the sword to our children, and shrinking back at a time, when, a little more, a little farther, would have rendered this continent the glory of the earth."

Our own government has become a comparable tyrant. "In order to discover the line of our duty rightly, we should take our children in our hand, and fix our station a few years farther into life."

MIKE JONES, Cape Girardeau