Galen Farrington

“… it was the epoch of belief…”

Charles Dickens

It is often stated that the highest standard that delineates the greatest literature is its lasting human value and we all remember the words beginning the second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence: “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.” And the Great Experiment had been delineated on paper as the moral foundation of the Constitution.

Due to systemic limitations on women’s rights and opportunities, Abigail Adams wrote in a letter to her husband, John Adams, dated March 31, 1776, in which she advocates for women: “… I desire you would Remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors.” She would become disappointed with the Declaration’s final wording.

Thomas Jefferson’s final document as presented July 2, 1776, to the Continental Congress declared United States independence. It was reviewed, and except for the major revision eliminating the slavery grievance against King George III, was accepted; the Congress wanted no mention of slavery due to the document’s position on human rights.

Ralph Trembly’s famous lithograph (1817) placing most of the 56 signers in one location to ratify the Declaration of Independence pictures a fictitious event as the delegates arrived in Washington on horseback during the five months after the actual Aug. 2 signing. The final signature was that of Thomas McKean (Delaware) in January 1777. Now the Declaration was complete with all signatories, and a second printing was commissioned by the United States government with Mary Katharine Goddard accepting the contract. As a result, her name is the only female signature to appear alongside those of the Founding Fathers.

Although not the first to sign the new Declaration, John Stockton was the first of five delegates from New Jersey to put pen to paper. But Mr. Stockton was also the only signer to sign an affidavit to promise not to meddle in the American affairs during the Revolution and align with British interests as a condition for his release from a New York prison (he was a prisoner of war). His five harsh weeks spent in prison resulted in a two-year health recovery.

John Dunlap printed approximately 200 original Declarations that were read to the colonialists. Twenty-six remain today with the most recent discovery as the result of a $4 purchase at a flea market. In 1989 a flea market patron purchased a framed picture. Upon arriving home, he cut out the picture and found an old document that was an original Declaration of Independence. He later sold it at auction for just over $8.1 million.

The Declaration of Independence became the inspirational model document outlining civil rights in America. When Abigail Adams asked her husband to “… Remember the Ladies …” it may be construed that women’s suffrage was born. When a free, nine-year-old Black boy heard the reading of the Declaration for the first time in front of the Philadelphia statehouse, James Forten decided to devote his life to “… uplifting his fellow Black Americans ….” His lifelong goal was to seek equality for all, regardless of color. It may be argued that Forten was this country’s first civil rights activist.

This Independence Day take time to read the first two paragraphs (there are five sections of the Declaration: preamble, statement of human rights, list of grievances, denunciation of the British and conclusion) of the Declaration and decide for yourself if Government is living up to the Founding Fathers’ lofty goal of “… deriving (its) just powers from the consent of the governed …”

There is no doubt that the Declaration of Independence is one of America’s great pieces of literature due to its lasting human value that makes this country the greatest of all the over 200 countries of the world.

May God continue to bless America.

Galen Farrington is a resident of Alto, NM and contributor to the Ruidoso News. He can be reached at gcf88345@gmail.com

Cal Thomas

Last weekend, the Wall Street Journal did a rare story on the Ukraine war, though it was buried on page A 10, after a front-page teaser. That has been the pattern until Russia launched a massive drone attack against Ukraine on Sunday which attracted some media attention. Otherwise, media has seemed generally bored with the war.

In recent weeks the media again has been pre-occupied by celebrities, including the ones attending the Bezos-Sanchez wedding in Venice, and the “news” that it took 900 hours to make the bride’s dress. And yet the killing grinds on between Russia and Ukraine with minimal advances on either side and no immediate possibility of a ceasefire or peace deal.

Ivan Bespalov is a Ukrainian Presbyterian pastor in Kiev, who is temporarily in the U.S. to rally support from churches and the public for his country. In a telephone interview from his New York City hotel, I ask him if he has any hope that a peace agreement with Russia can be achieved and the killing on both sides stopped?

“Our concern is whether the Russians can be trusted,” Bespalov said. “When Russians feel they are powerful it is very unlikely they will seek a compromise.” Bespalov says he thinks the killing will continue “until they establish their supremacy, their control. Only when Russia comes to believe Ukraine is strong and they feel they are paying too high a price to continue this war, then they may come to an agreement.”

Bespalov denies reports of persecution against certain segments of Christian churches in Ukraine. He says even the Russian Orthodox Union, which is largely supportive of Vladimir Putin, faces government restrictions only on its political positions, not its faith practices. But he says while the Orthodox “don’t do it openly, they do encourage people to surrender (to Russian soldiers) and not to resist. They support the narrative ‘we are one people’ and there is no harm with them trying to establish Russian influence and Russian power. So naturally when our government hears these kinds of messages, they warn the priests and others who promote this narrative. And if they continue doing this, some of them wind up in jail or are removed from their positions.”

This apparently accounts for where reports that Ukraine is persecuting certain churches have come from.

How is Bespalov trying to break through the multiple news and celebrity stories in the U.S. that have replaced what is taking place in Ukraine?

“We are speaking to various churches and had the opportunity to speak to the General Assembly of the (conservative) Presbyterian Church in America of about four to five thousand people,” Bespalov said. “We are asking people for their prayers and thanking them for the physical help they are sending us through a charity, Crates for Ukraine.”

Bespalov also says people who contribute are helping Ukrainians who have been displaced from their homes. This reminds me of the CARE packages that were delivered to Eastern European nations occupied by Russia beginning in the aftermath of World War II.

How much longer does Bespalov think Ukraine can hold out if Putin doesn’t come to an agreement to stop the war? He said, “I think that Ukraine will be resisting until the very end.”

By that he clearly means the end of Ukraine’s independent status, not the end of Russia. The key, though, as he told me, is to make Putin pay so high a price that he will seek peace. That is not likely to happen without further military and financial support for Ukraine, especially from European nations. Now would also be a good time to get today’s equivalent of CARE packages shipped to Kiev.

Readers may email Cal Thomas at tcaeditors@tribpub.com. Look for Cal Thomas’ latest book “A Watchman in the Night: What I’ve Seen Over 50 Years Reporting on America” (HumanixBooks).

Victor Davis Hanson

It is hard even to digest the incredible train of events of the last few days in the Middle East.

Iran had been reduced to an anemic, performance-art missile attack on our base in Qatar — the last Parthian shot from a terrified regime, desperate for an out — and a ceasefire.

Iran would have been better off not launching such a ceremonial but ultimately humiliating proof of impotence.

Even worse for the theocracy, Iran’s temporary reprieve came from the now magnanimous but still hated U.S. President Donald Trump.

So ends the creepy mystique of the supposedly indomitable terror state of Iran, the bane of the last seven American presidents over half a century.

For Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, it was hard to swallow that U.S. bombers got their permission to fly into Iranian airspace from the Israeli air force.

A good simile is that Trump put a pot of water on the stove, told Iran to jump in, put the lid over them, then smiled, turned up the heat — and will now let them stew.

As postbellum realities now simmer in Iran, the theocracy is left explaining the inexplicable to its humiliated military and shocked but soon-to-be-furious populace. All the regime’s blood-curdling rhetoric, apocalyptic threats against Israel, goose-stepping thugs, and shiny new missiles ended in less than nothing.

A trillion dollars and five decades’ worth of missiles and centrifuges are now up in smoke. That money might have otherwise saved Iranians from the impoverishment of the last 50 years.

How about the little Satan Israel, to which Iran for nearly 50 years promised extinction?

Israel had destroyed Iran’s expeditionary terrorists, Iran’s defenses, its nuclear viability, and the absurd mythology of Iranian military competence. And worse, Israel showed it could repeat all that destruction when and if necessary.

So, the most hated regime in the world crawled into the boiling pot because it looked around in vain for someone to void Trump’s ultimatum for a cease and desist.

But there were no last-minute saviors to rescue them.

The dreaded decades-long Iranian nuclear threat?

It is either gone for now, or if it resurfaces, it will be again far easier to vaporize at will than to rebuild a lost trillion-dollar investment.

Russia? Its former Obama-Kerry re-invitation back into the Middle East lasted only a decade.

It will now cut its losses like it did with the vanished Assad kleptocracy in Syria. Putin exits the Middle East not entirely displeased that his lunatic Iranian client did not get a bomb — but did get its just desserts. A tense Middle East tends to prop up Russian export oil prices.

Did China come to the mullahs’ aid?

No, they were not shy about ordering their Iranian lackey to keep the Strait of Hormuz open, through which 50 percent of Chinese-purchased oil passes.

For Chinese President Xi Jinping, the Iranians are treated as little more than Uyghurs with oil.

The world decided that it was tired of a half-century of crybully terrorism, empty nuke threats, mindless mobs screaming scripted banalities, cowardly murdering, and medieval theocrats threatening the general peace.

So, the world turned its back on Iran. And with a wink and nod, it let Israel and the U.S. do what they must.

As for Iran’s terrorist appendages, Hezbollah’s commanders are either dead, maimed, or in hiding.

Hamas has fled into a subterranean labyrinth.

The last Assad thug fled to Russia.

The crazy Houthis? They are reconsidering the idea of launching their last missile at the cost of their last port or power grid.

The anti-Trump Democrats and loony left?

Their talk of impeaching Trump for the supposedly “illegal” 35-minute, one-off strike will fade.

The Trump mission equaled less than one day of Obama’s predator drone strikes, targeted killings, or his five-year chaotic bombing in Libya.

Is the incoherent left furious that there is no more Iranian nuclear threat?

Mad that no Americans were killed last Saturday night?

Furious America likely killed few if any Iranians.

Or is it raging because Trump ignored Iran’s last-gasp attack and instead orchestrated a cease-fire?

Of course, in the Middle East, there is never a real end to anything.

We may see freelancing terrorists try to fill the vacuum of Iran’s decline. Or Iran itself may try to let loose a terrorist cell. It may later boast it has hidden away some enriched uranium.

But no matter.

The dimensions of this new Middle East will persist.

The new reality is that either Israel or the U.S. — if they keep their earned confidence within proper limits — can now ensure a non-nuclear Iran by easily blowing up its costly nuclear program as often as it is rebuilt.

Victor Davis Hanson is a distinguished fellow of the Center for American Greatness. He is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and the author of “The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won,” from Basic Books. You can reach him by e-mailing authorvdh@gmail.com.

Sherry Robinson
All She Wrote

During the Great Depression, western ranchers faced crashing commodity prices and the ravages of drought and Dust Bowl. But that wasn’t all. The federal government was creating new national parks and monuments and expanding earlier designated areas. In states like New Mexico many were pleased to have new attractions for their budding tourism trade, but others objected. Unlike national forests, these new carve-outs didn’t allow grazing, mining, drilling or logging.

I came across this information last week while I was researching the Depression and was surprised to learn that we’ve been having pretty much the same arguments over public lands for the better part of a century.

In the latest chapter, Congress has seen a bare-knuckle fight over a provision in the budget reconciliation bill to sell more than 250 million acres of public lands, including 14 million acres in New Mexico. Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, claims he wants to expand the nation’s housing supply by using public lands.

The provision died after the Senate parliamentarian ruled against it, but Lee returned with a new provision requiring the federal Bureau of Land Management to sell hundreds of thousands of acres within five miles of population centers.

Two pretty obvious points about the new proposal: Most BLM land is in the middle of nowhere, and housing developers will only build in places where people want to live. Plus, they want some infrastructure. You know, utilities, streets and sewers.

Lee’s approach all along has fallen short of honest debate. When his Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee finally revealed properties on the auction block, the list had the look of selection by dart throwing. Mt. Taylor? Seriously? Some nitwit in Washington D.C. chose a dominant geologic feature in the state – from the top you can see one-third of New Mexico – and a peak sacred to multiple tribes.

In New Mexico the list of 61 properties was loaded with active recreation areas, including busy hiking trails north and east of Los Alamos, the beautiful Grindstone Canyon Loop Trail near Ruidoso, the Zuni Mountain Trail System that Gallup actively markets to tourists, and the famous and historic Dog Canyon Trail near Alamogordo. Seriously?

Lee and his minions had vast tracts to choose from but went out of their way to poke a finger into the eyes of tourism and outdoor advocates. Further, the now-deleted provision would have hurt the outdoor recreation industry, which the state has carefully cultivated and was good for $3.2 billion and 29,000 jobs in 2023.

The latest change deletes Forest Service lands from the bill, but don’t assume they’re gone for good.

In the new provision, Carlsbad’s La Cueva trail system will probably remain a target. The BLM manages 15 miles of trails through 2,200 acres of Guadalupe Mountains foothills and Chihuahuan desert. It’s been popular for biking, hiking and horseback riding since the mid-1990s. On websites for bikers, it draws praise and tips. La Cueva’s sale would do what for housing?

Last week, I suggested half seriously that since Utah was so anxious to cash in its public lands we let them be a test case. I don’t think they’d sell their crown jewels, but I’m curious how far they would go. Mark Allison, of New Mexico Wild, pointed out correctly that “these lands don’t belong to Utah, they belong to all Americans.”

We’ve already had such an experiment, he says. “The Southern Nevada Public Land Management Act of 1998 provided a legal mechanism for sales of public lands in the national areas. There were 68,000 acres of BLM lands authorized in Clark County. After 26 years, almost two-thirds of that land remains unsold. Importantly, only 562 acres have been reserved for affordable housing – and of that only 30 acres have been sold. The experiment has failed.”

That gets me to the other side of the public lands argument. If we stop pretending this is about housing and take a good hard look at public land, we might have to admit that not every inch is a scenic or environmental gem. If we stop throwing darts at a map and actually ask the land agencies, they would tell us which parcels are difficult to manage or don’t really serve the national interest.

If we had an honest debate, we might also look at the fact that the federal government owns 63% of Utah and 80% of Nevada. That drives the agitation to sell coming from these two states. When the government seems to own everything, their restlessness is understandable, but why are they forcing New Mexico, with federal land ownership of around 32%, into land sales it doesn’t want?

Sherry Robinson is a longtime New Mexico reporter and editor. She has worked in Grants, Gallup, the Albuquerque Journal, New Mexico Business Weekly and Albuquerque Tribune. She is the author of four books. Her columns won first place in 2024 from New Mexico Press Women.