Do You Like the Results of the Mid-Term Election?

The liberty principle for this Freedom Friday concerns the responsibility that citizens carry in the fight to maintain freedom in America. At this point [late on election night], it looks like Democrats will control the U.S. House of Representatives in January. It also looks possible for Democrats to control the U.S. Senate. The policies and environment of America will change.

If you like the results of the mid-term election, will you like them next year? In two years?

Under Democrat congresses, lots of bills were signed into law and policies were passed that did not put America and Americans first. A well-known example is President Joe Biden’s policy to open the borders and invite 10+ million people to enter the United States illegally. This affected the housing situation in the United States as well as cost of supporting such people.

America is in this terrible situation today because liberals led America down the hill to destruction. Those who voted for Democrats –those who are also known as socialists, communists, and radical Islamists -- either support those ideas or they did not vote responsibly. They voted for members of Congress who will pass laws that will take America down to destruction. That is their stated aim.

It is possible – and likely – that some voters voted against Trump policies simply because they hate him and would never give any support to him. One of those people is former President George W. Bush and his family. It is likely that some voters voted Democrat because they do not like the economy as it is right now. Do they not remember how terrible things were under Biden? It is also possible that some voters voted against Republicans because of the war in Iran. Do they not remember that America has been involved in the war between Russia and Ukraine for at least six years, a war that has cost billions of American dollars?

Whatever the reason for people to vote Democrat, the consequences of electing socialists, communists, and Islamists will be the same: All Americans will suffer with less freedom under tyrannical politicians.

It is also possible that many Republicans stayed home – and they probably had different reasons for doing so. America needs patriots – not socialists, communists, and Islamists – to remain strong. Anyone who does not support America first candidates – no matter their party – vote for the destruction of America.

The bottom line: American citizens have the responsibility to vote responsibly. The important first step of voting responsibly is to inform oneself of truths. The second most important responsibility is to VOTE.

In her article published in the Deseret News, Heather Gerken wrote on the topic “Your Choices Matter.” Her article begins with a story about a teacher in Salt Lake City. 

On Valentine’s Day, 1870, a young Salt Lake City teacher, Seraph Young Ford, made a stop on her way to school.

Two days earlier, Utah’s territorial Legislature had unanimously passed a law extending the franchise to women. So, on this cold winter’s morning, as a brass band played outside City Hall, Seraph cast her ballot in a local election – and became the first woman in the United States to vote under an equal-suffrage law. [Emphasis added.]

Today, it is all too tempting to assume that the forces controlling our civic life are too formidable, too distant and too entrenched for any ordinary person like Seraph to influence an election. There is no doubt we are living through an era of degraded public discourse, shattering our shared recognition of basic facts, let alone our sense of shared responsibility for our communities. In the face of our polarized politics, many throw up their hands and conclude: “What difference can my vote make anyway? And yet, as American citizens, we owe ourselves and each other better.

This is not because politics need be everything in our lives. It is because, in a democracy, we, the people—to paraphrase Abraham Lincoln – will be either the authors or the finishers of our fate. It is on us, and only us, to decide whether government will make our families, schools, neighborhoods and communities stronger.

As a scholar, I spent much of my career studying the power we exercise through the institutions closest to our lives: school boards, city councils, sheriffs, prosecutors and judges. Leadership in Washington is important, especially now. But it is the local leaders who decide how to invest taxpayer dollars and determine whether our communities feel vibrant, welcoming and full of possibility.

A vote for a local official or initiative is an expression of self-government. It is a declaration that the people who live in a community have both the right and the responsibility to shape it. It is an affirmation of that sacred ideal to which Thomas Jefferson and others gave voice 250 years ago: Government derives its power from the consent of the governed, not the other way around….

At a time when so much in public life spurs us to look away or tune out, election seasons ought to remind us that we must be more than passive bystanders of our politics. We are citizens – with a voice, with a vote and with mutual obligations to our neighbors and our children. We all can learn who and what is on the ballot. Ask the candidates what they hope to build. Check potentially false information before clicking “like” or “share.” Volunteer at the polls – and encourage others to respect election officials as they carry out a critical, difficult job.

            And remember Seraph, who blazed a trail for untold millions of women to follow. She went to                the polls, and then she went to work. We honor her American story – and our own – by doing no            less.