On the anniversary of the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, my thoughts turn to the legacy of liberty left to us by great men who left home and family to defend it. They fought across the entire Pacific Ocean, and through the continent of Europe, defending also the liberties of strangers. I think also of the great women who left home and family to work in factories, and of the sacrifices made by every American to support the war effort.
Grandma stayed at that job for 37 years, and taught her descendants that the foundation of prosperity was hard work and perseverance.
One of my most prized material possessions is a little porcelain piggy bank in the shape of a Mack bulldog. My grandmother gave it to me as a child, because she worked on an assembly line at the Mack truck factory. It started as a wartime job. She was a Rosie the Riveter, a Tillie the Toiler, filling in while the men were away at war.
Grandma stayed at that job for 37 years, and taught her descendants that the foundation of prosperity was hard work and perseverance. (Grandma’s defense against sexual harassment in the work place was a sharp tongue, hard fists, and a steely determination to use both of them and anything else that came to hand.) That piggy bank is an iconic reminder of the sacrifices she made to support a family through decades of my grandfather’s poor health.
Tom Brokaw called the people who fought for liberty during World War Two the greatest generation. They called themselves ordinary Americans. None of them felt like heroes, they just did what they had to do. They were driven by duty, honor, and sacrifice; and that was the norm.
Can You Step Into the Same River Twice?
With the passage of time, we are a different country. First-year philosophy students delight in posing the question, “Can you step into the same river twice?” They explain that the water flows by so quickly that the second time you step into it, you’re stepping into different water. The water you stepped in a moment ago, or a year ago, has rushed down to the sea.
The question really being asked, of course, is what actually constitutes a river? Is it the water, the river bed, or other characteristics? In the same vein, we could ask what constitutes a nation. Is it the geography, the boundaries, the people, the history, the values?
Most of us would answer that a country or a nation is defined by its people. But like a river, the people change – and so do their values.
Japan Is Not the Same Country – Nor Are We
Reflecting on Pearl Harbor Day, I can’t help thinking also about Japan. There is a country that has changed radically in the past 76 years. My wife’s grandfather was a Marine who fought his way across the Pacific. When we first visited the Marine Corps War Memorial in Arlington, Virginia – the Iwo Jima memorial – we walked around it while she pointed out the battles that he had been in.
His impressions of Japan and the Japanese were formed as a rifleman during World War Two.
His impressions of Japan and the Japanese were formed as a rifleman during World War Two. He made a career of the Marine Corps. A gifted musician, he retired as a Master Sergeant, the conductor of the Marine Band at Camp Pendleton.
He would not recognize the Japan of today, one of our strongest allies, an economic powerhouse, and a nation that stands for liberty just as we do. It’s a different nation, filled with different people. They have not forgotten their history, but have learned from it and changed. Same river bed, but completely different river.
A Legacy of Liberty
America’s World War Two generation received a great legacy from their forebears. It was a legacy of a drive for human liberty. (True, it was stained by America’s original sin of slavery, but that sin was washed out by the blood of 620,000 soldiers, more than half of whom were fighting to free the slaves.)
What epithet will our generation receive?
Our grandparents died and sacrificed for liberty, and then they came home and went back to work. Only five years later, they went out again to fight, to defend the liberty of strangers on the other side of the world. That was ordinary behavior among them. They received the torch of liberty, kept it alight, and passed it to us, asking only that we preserve it.
Neither we, nor Japan, nor most other countries are the same “river” as we were 76 years ago. What are we? What will our grandchildren say of us, of what we have done with that legacy of duty, honor, and sacrifice, before we pass it on to them? What epithet will our generation receive? May God bless America, and may we always live worthy of God’s blessing.
