Dr. Alan Keyes
Manchester, New Hampshire

Part 3 (Conclusion)

IBut finally, the most important thing of all, I've got to tell you. I put it last, not because it is least important, but in fact because it is most significant. If we wish to achieve all of these things, then first and foremost we must regain control of ourselves. It's very simple. The essence of freedom is not doing what you want; it is having the capacity to do what you ought to do.

And as we forget this -- as we accept this lying notion that freedom is all about choice, regardless of what choices they may be -- we accept a demoralized, a denatured, a dehumanized understanding of ourselves, that lowers us beneath the beasts, when we stand, in fact, higher than the angels. What is the matter with us?

Partly, I think, it's that when you say "regain control of yourself," I mean, this does imply some limits. It does. You can't do everything you feel like doing. You can't claim, or accept, every right somebody comes along and offers to you, because there are some rights incompatible with the idea of any right at all.

That's why I spent so much time in the last campaign talking about the abortion issue; everybody wished I'd shut up. "Alan, why do you always have to bring that up?" Some people might think it particularly odd that I would talk about the pro-life issue to a group of gun owners. But I'll tell you something: the people who insist that we should maintain the means to defend our lives from those who wish to destroy our liberties, to prey upon our property, are people who understand the difference between those who are criminals and those who are not. Those who are innocent and those who are law-abiding citizens, the people who insist that we maintain the means of self-defense are, I believe, some of the people who have the greatest respect for life of any people in this country.

There is no contradiction whatsoever between saying that I should have the means to defend my life and the life of my children born, and saying that I will have the decency to defend the lives of those children not yet born -- it is the SAME impulse. It is the same principle.

But it especially amounts to the same thing because what are they offering you, with all these new rights? They started out with the right to kill your children in the womb: "Ladies, you have the right to kill your babies." We accepted that right. Now they come along and they tell us that we have the right to kill ourselves. Actually, you know, they are the same thing. They say "Our bodies, our selves"; I say "Our children, our selves." And it is true in the literal sense. So when they offered you the right to kill your children in the womb, they were offering you the right to kill yourself -- now they've just made it explicit.

But, hasn't anybody paused to think for a minute? When they offer you the right to kill yourself, you might do well to stop, just for a second, and consider: are they offering you a right, or are they making a suggestion? I was interested to see, for instance, the outcome of the elections out west, where in one state, the state of Oregon, they unhappily, I think, verified this notion that there was some right to assisted suicide, and right next door in Washington, they verified the notion that you have the right to keep and bear arms. Put those two things together, and there seems to be this odd agenda: you can keep your guns, so long as you use them on yourselves. Frankly, I don't like those terms, myself.

But what does it mean, somebody comes and offers you the right to kill yourself. Well, I have to tell you that it actually contradicts the most fundamental premise of our liberty. In the Declaration of Independence it says "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." I always like that word, "unalienable." Yet, I think we don't understand it well enough. Some people think that the word "unalienable" means that these rights cannot be taken away legitimately.

That's not what it means. No, see, the word "unalienable" is not a restriction on others; it's a restriction on us. The word "unalienable" comes from that aristocratic tradition which was based on the notion that when you got a title -- in this case, the title of "humanity" -- certain lands and privileges went with that title. And though you could sell other things, and you could give other things away, you could not sell or give away the lands and privileges that went with the title. They were unalienable.

And that's what it means in this context. It doesn't mean they can't be taken away; it means you cannot legitimately surrender them. You are obliged to hold on to them, and to respect them. The word "unalienable" does not restrict others in their assault on their rights; it restricts US from EVER surrendering those rights. And tell me -- I can't imagine it -- it seems to me kind of illogical, then, if somebody offers you the right to kill yourself, and you take it, then it seems to me that you have surrendered your most fundamental right. And that means that you are abandoning the principle that rights are unalienable.

See, we don't have the right to kill ourselves. The great philosophers who came up with our freedom actually explained most importantly why this is so, and I think point us, in the end, to that basic truth which we try to deny, these days, but which was so much in the minds of our Founders, and which ought to be on our own minds as we consider the agenda of vigilance for our liberty.

To be ever awake -- that's what vigilance means. How many of you in this room can stay awake all the time? It's not possible, is it? Sleep is essential. What does it mean, then, to be ever vigilant? Well, the truth of the matter is, there's only one eye that's open all the time. Our Founders understood this, and when they wrote the great Declaration of Independence, and marched out to do what they had to do to claim their liberty, they did so with a firm reliance upon DIVINE Providence. Knowing that there are times when we shall sleep; there are times when we shall flag; there are times when, in our weariness, we shall fail; there are times when, in our temptation, in the face of the seductive offers of tyrants and despots, we shall be tempted to turn away from the disciplined true path of our liberty, but that there is One who will remain awake, and that is the same One from whom, in effect, all our rights are derived.

Because they did not say, contrary to what we often try to assert, that our rights come from the Bill of Rights; and they did not say that our rights, in the end, come from the Constitution. Because before the Constitution was written, they had fought and died for these very rights which, in the end, it was structured to preserve. They told us unequivocally that those rights we claim, those rights we love, those rights we defend, come not from ourselves, but from our Creator, God.

And some people want to tell me: "Alan, can't say that; that violates the separation of church and state." I've got to tell you something: you look back at the history of this country, throw away all that mythology, because when you understand the truth about America, you will understand that without faith, there is no freedom; without God, there is no claim to liberty, whatsoever.

So if we want to hold on to those things which are our heritage; if we want to keep, first and foremost, a confidence that will allow us to stand up and assert our right to keep and bear arms, because we are responsible to use them only in defense of ourselves and our liberty; if we want to keep the strength of our families; if we want to regain the right control of our money, knowing that we shall use that money for our prosperity, and out of compassion we shall help each other, too; if we want all those things to be true, then I think we shall have to return, as a people, to that same humble subjection to the authority from which all these things derived, that characterized our Founders, that characterized every generation of Americans, until now. We must regain control of ourselves.

But the key to that, my friends, is to regain respect for the God who made us. I say that not just as some religionist, but as an American, who firmly believes that this nation has a great destiny ahead of it. (brief break in the tape; perhaps: "not just for the people of this nation, but for") all humankind. If we are to fulfill that destiny, then we shall have to fulfill the promise that was made when this nation was founded, the promise of a nation that, because we understand the source of our rights, are able to sustain the character and the wisdom needed to preserve them for ourselves, and for our children, and for the hope of all the earth.

God bless you.

KEYES 2000!!!!!!

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Alan Keyes Showroom