Chapter 2 - Courage

Chapter 2

Courage

               Courage is not a virtue if it is not exercised for righteous reasons.

               What good is the courage of a criminal when conducting criminal activities except excessive brute force?  What good is the courage of a bad person when doing bad except to make a bad situation worse?

               Courage in order to be a virtue must be exercised in righteous fashion.  American courage as an ideal is expressed as a righteous act often against long odds.  That is – it is an action taken against common sense or realistic appraisal of the situation in order to achieve a righteous goal.

               There is no shortage of tales of American courage.  I could fill up a book about American courage.  In fact, many people have.  One book in particular is ‘Profiles in Courage’.  A book by President John F. Kennedy.  That is a book about statesmen in the government of the United States who took positions on issues that were unpopular – but which were righteous and ultimately proven to be right.

               President Kennedy had this to say, “The true democracy, living and growing and inspiring, puts its faith in the people – faith that the people will not simply elect men who will represent their views ably and faithfully, but also elect men who will exercise their conscientious judgment – faith that the people will not condemn those whose devotion to principle leads them to unpopular courses, but will reward courage, respect honor and ultimately recognize right.”

               Of course there is always the danger that popular opinion will condemn someone no matter what their virtues or stance.  One of the purposes of this book is to bring your attention to the fact that you, as an American, may have an opinion but it need not be a ‘popular’ opinion.  Consider that old retort used by parents around the world when a child is asked why they did some foolish thing.  The child says, ‘My friend did it, that’s why I did it.’  The parent responds wisely, ‘If your friend jumped off a bridge, would you do that too?’

               Obviously the ‘popular’ opinion is not always right and it is never right if it is accepted merely because it is popular and everyone else thinks that way.  As an American your independent and individual consideration of the issue at hand is the most important point.  What do YOU think about the issue at hand?  For example, if everyone else in the country is making a mistake, do you have to make that mistake too?

               The story of the Emperor’s clothes and how one little boy sees the obvious while all the adults and other people of ‘quality’ and ‘position’ go along with the popular view that the Emperor is not naked and they actually believe that he is clothed.  Of course there is a more ominous and negative aspect of that story and that is that there are many among the crowds that view the naked Emperor strutting around in ignorance who know that he is not wearing any clothes but they go along with the popular view for their own selfish reasons or because they are afraid.

               As an American, first of all, you don’t have to be afraid.  Even if you are you are allowed to and expected to express your views.  In the second case it would be morally wrong to take advantage of the ignorance of your fellow Americans in order to exploit the situation.  These things happen but you should know they do not last.  As we know the wheels of Justice turn slowly but they do turn because of the living expression of American Courage.

               American Courage is displayed by astronauts, jet fighter pilots, soldiers, marines, sailors, police officers, firefighters, doctors, lawyers, teachers… all sorts of people in all sorts of activities across our nation – across your nation.

               What is American Courage?  It is the same courage you would see in any nation dedicated to freedom, justice, equality and fair play.

               In some countries it is unpopular or even illegal to take part in the government unless expressly sanctioned to do so.  In the United States this is not the case.

               President Kennedy again, “In a democracy, every citizen, regardless of his interest in politics, “holds office”; every one of us is in a position of responsibility; and, in the final analysis, the kind of government we get depends upon how we fulfill those responsibilities. We, the people, are the boss, and we will get the kind of political leadership, be it good or bad, that we demand and deserve.”

               This means that sometimes it will be necessary to go to public meetings to see what is being discussed.  It means expressing your opinion on things in the public eye.  It means bringing out issues that may be hidden or ignored.  These are your responsibility in this nation and they are expressions of your own American Courage.

               Let us hear from President Kennedy one more time, “Without belittling the courage with which men have died, we should not forget those acts of courage with which men have lived.”

               “…those acts of courage with which men have lived.”  After all, isn’t that the reason for good government and a nation founded on morals and behaving in a righteous manner?  American Courage is needed to ensure that might does not make right and that the popular thing, though it is popular, does not destroy what is good and right for today and our future.

               Who is to say what is good and right for today and our future?  That would be you and the way to express that would be through own particular type of American Courage.

               American Courage cannot be bought.

               It is an expression of good and valor. 

               Sometimes American Courage requires that all must be risked in order to gain the greater good, but often that is merely gambling.  The true American Courage is expressed when you, as an American, move to do the right thing even if others do not believe as you do or even know that it is necessary.  What is required is that you do it because being a free nation there is a possibility that you may be the only one with the knowledge and ability to do what is right.

               Maybe I am not expressing this right.  I have talked about the courage of astronauts, soldier, politicians and powerful people.  People we are all accustomed to expecting to see display courage whether actually or in stories.

               The American Courage I am talking about hope you will take heart in and express yourself is the human courage of your own spirit.  It is the courage of the mother who gets up every morning in some poor neighborhood and prepares breakfast and sends her children off to school before going to work herself.  It is the courage of a man who dispirited in his career aspirations or frustrated by some business setback continues to work hard and strive for something better.  It is the courage of a farmer who faced with drought or other hardship continues to care for his farm and his family because he rightly knows that things will improve in time.

               It is the courage of believing in the future and the fruit of your labors.  It is believing with the same belief and expectation of success that your forbears had if you are a native born American and the same belief and expectation of success that brought you to this nation in the first place – if you have just arrived.

               It doesn’t matter if you have been here for five minutes or your family has been here for five hundred or even five thousand years – the courage I am talking about as American courage is the courage in your own heart to do what is right.  To bear up under hard times.  To smile in the rain.   To whistle at the wind.

               It is not a cavalier or careless kind of courage.  Any fool can have that sort of courage.  Any fool can risk their life or throw it away.  It is the courageous and the brave that honor life by living it even when it is hard.  When it is hard to do that is when the thing becomes honorable.  This is not to say that one should accept without reservation hard times and always expect them.  I do not say that.  This is America and being American it is right that you expect things to change and improve.  It is right that you expect that things improve for your family and friends.  It is necessary that you take a hand yourself in spurring on or causing that improvement and betterment.

               The courage is in your heart.  The way to express that courage is in your mind.  The means to carry out that courage is in your hands.  The will to do it is in your spirit.

               The United States has sometimes been called a melting pot.  I have heard it said that we are not melting so well.  I do not believe that.  I think we are moving along just fine.  There are historical references to it in the stories that we tell our children right now.  As new people come to the United States and take on the rights and responsibilities of being American their own stories will blend into these so that our children’s children will be infused with what is good and right and will be able to enjoy their own lives through the fruits of their labor by the expression of their own American Courage.

               Pecos Bill is a good example of the union of good hearted feelings and expressions of human courage that have become entwined and are now expressed as American Courage.

               Pecos Bill is the story of a man from the Western States in the United States.  Stories told about him are often referred to as ‘Tall Tales’.  Are they true or are they not?  It does not really matter – though I suppose it would have mattered to Bill.  What matters are the topics told about and the responses Bill had to his difficulties.

               Pecos Bill stories contain a mixture of super human (American) feats of courage and strength.  Like roping and riding a tornado whirlwind like a wild bronco and using a dangerous rattlesnake for a lasso.

               According to the legend Pecos Bill was born in the Western United States  in the 1830's.  As a baby he was being carried in a covered wagon when he bounced out and into the desert wonderland.

               His family did not notice and luckily Bill was raised by a pack of coyotes.

He became a legendary cowboy and his horse Lightning was literally as fast as lighting.  It was said you could tell Pecos Bill had gone by if you saw a flash of light and the sound of Lighting’s hooves rang out like thunder.

In some of the stories Pecos Bill saddled a mountain lion and rode him through the hills carrying out extraordinary deeds of strength, speed and courage.

This particular story and many others like is the result of the ‘melting’ or combination of several cultures, all of which make up America.  There are the tall tales from Western Spain and Portugal along with the storytelling of Mexico and the Native American Indians, combined with the Northern European habits of telling tales and, of course, those tales and beliefs held by Americans in general.

American Courage is not a standalone feat.

The ideas combined together in the legend of Pecos Bill like his riding a cyclone or roping an entire herd of wild longhorn cattle at one time or using a rattlesnake as a whip and harnessing the Rio Grande River to water his parched ranch are all tall tales indeed but they speak about American Courage in a unique way.  They allow us as adults to impart the importance of strong action in the face of danger or difficulties to our children.  They give us a way to express to people of other nationalities that what we are doing, though strange to them perhaps, is indeed marvelous and remarkable.

Each of the feats that is ascribed to Pecos Bill were repeated over and over again by Americans across the Western United States.  For example : continue to work a farm ravaged by a tornado.  Putting it back together and making it work.  Using the natural resources of the area, even if it was dangerous to harness them – like a rattlesnake, and benefitting from them for the good of the family.  As for harnessing the Rio Grande River – why that act has been repeated all across the United States by Americans intent on gaining the benefits of electricity from water power and to water croplands and turn barren desert into fruitful fields and orchards.

               This is the sort of American Courage I am talking about.  I can’t make it any more clear than to say that if you feel it strange to you that all you have to do to correct that is accept it as your own even though it may have a different name.

               What wild and tall tales do you have to tell us so that we can share in them as much as we would like to you to share in ours?

               Some tall tales have a direct relation to the American character and history.  For example – the State of Delaware is known as ‘The Blue Hen State’.  Why is that?

               The story goes that a Delaware man went to war during the American Revolution and joined the militia from his state. For entertainment, he brought with him two fighting cocks.

When asked about the chickens by soldiers from other state militias and the Continental Army, the soldier is said to have replied, "Why, they are the chicks of a blue hen I have at home."

               It is said that these game birds could fight like no others!  They were so fierce that no other could stand against them.

The Delaware troops took to boasting to the troops from the other states that they could out-fight anyone, just like those famous blue game birds.

"We're the Blue Hen's Chicks. We will fight to the end!" became their theme and of the bravery of the Delaware troops stories are told to this day.

Eventually other troops took to calling the men from Delaware "The Blue Hen's Chicks", and that is why Delaware is known as the Blue Hen State.

               There are many wonderful stories like this.  Each containing in them fact and fancy.  Each containing some hint of the people that they are told about and more importantly, about the people that tell them.  The ‘Blue Hen’s Chicks’ – the uniform of the Continental Army was blue – and the fact that the  Mother Hen  had sent them on such an errand as to fight for the freedom of their country shows two things.

               First, that even the mild-mannered hen showed strength and vivacity enough to send her own brood out to fight the mighty British Lion.  Secondly – that the same mild-manner hen sitting at home was on another brood and she would send them out too if need be.

               A small story with a funny twist.  Of course the truth is that the Delaware men and women and children all fought for their freedom and achieved it.  The outcome of the story is the outcome provided by their expression of American Courage – Delaware Style.

               Just as each segment of the country has their own speciality in food or dress or custom – they also each express American Courage in their own unique, endearing, fierce and lasting way.

              

American Courage is expressed quietly and with vigor.  It is sometimes performed in a day’s work or expressed in spoken words at a public meeting or in the words of a letter written to support or defy some notion taken up by government or society that is unseemly and harsh.  American Courage is the type of thing that does not surrender easily.

In the even I have not properly expressed what American Courage is by telling you what I believe it to be let me also tell you what I feel it is not and you can arrange it in your mind for yourself what rightly is American Courage.

               American Courage is not thrill-seeking.

American Courage is not a violent acts to satiate some blood lust.

American Courage is not bullying.

As Ralph Waldo Emerson, the great American poet has written :

‘I think no virtue goes with size;

 The reason of all cowardice

Is, that men are overgrown,

And, to be valiant, must come down

To the titmouse dimension’

American Courage is not expended for a trifling or trivial matter because once engaged it will be seen through to the end.

Lastly – American Courage is not something held by just one person or type of person.  It is not kept in just one Church or Temple or Synagogue or in the heart and brain of just one kind of reasoning man or woman.  It is not locked away for special use by special superhuman people.

Thucydides, ancient Greet poet and philosopher wrote, “The secret to happiness is freedom.  The secret to freedom is courage.”

Harper Lee wrote about courage in ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ - "I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when you know you're licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do."

To finish on a positive note – American Courage is your courage.  The courage that you express as you face difficulties in your life or help people you love or know to face theirs.

American Courage is a good thing and it belongs to you.

Expressing American Courage is done in many ways – not just in ways of war.  It is these other ways that American Courage is expressed that I will address next as we talk about American Goodwill and Kindness.