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Diana Page retired to Blue Hill after a career in the Foreign Service, promoting democracy, rule of law and human rights.
To celebrate the 250th anniversary of American democracy, when it has been badly wounded, is just as ridiculous as going to the hospital to party while critically injured patients fight for their lives. This is not the time to look back on lifetime achievements, it’s time to find the cure.
Democracy requires rule of law and guaranteed rights, yet for the past 18 months, the Constitution has been ignored, as justice has been politicized, while basic rights to life and liberty are violated.
The future is even more uncertain because the security of our election process is threatened by federal intervention. And we’re supposed to parade, sing patriotic songs, and picnic?
Look at what weakens our democracy: lack of trust, no agreement on facts, corruption on a scale never seen before. Yet the “doctors” we have — politicians, parties and political action committees — keep asking for more money to save the nation. They ask for donations as if spending on campaigns will solve all these problems.
Imagine what will happen after the elections are held. There’s no way to immediately end the constitutional battle between Congress and the president, who controls all government agencies. Judges will keep on trying to overturn Justice Department atrocities in court, while billions of tax dollars go to financing illegal wars.
In 2026, as in 1776, I believe it has become necessary to “dissolve the political bands which have connected” us under a tyrant king. Let’s declare the causes for secession.
As our Declaration of Independence said, “whenever any form of government becomes destructive” of our unalienable rights, it is “the right of the People to alter or to abolish it.”
I believe each state should elect a delegation to a new constitutional convention to restore a government that will guarantee the Bill of Rights, equal justice and proportional representation. Reforming the Constitution by using the 18th century version won’t work. The original Constitution was flawed from the beginning because it was designed to protect the power of the slave states, not the will of the majority of the voters.
Our Constitution has outlived all others in the world; 250 years is a long life. Let it rest in peace. May a new government be born soon.