In the first American Revolution Americans roughly divided in three equal groups, Loyalists favored England, Patriots the Colonists, and another third too apathetic to help either side. The Patriots won because the apathetic third would not stand with the Loyalist but also would not support them. In that revolution the enemy, England, was largely overseas.

As a young man I wondered which side I’d have supported as a colonist in 1776. Would I have been at Valley Forge with George Washington during the devastatingly cold winter of 1777?

Would I have have left my plow, grabbed my rifle and raced to the front without command to stop Johnny Burgoyne in the Battle of Saratoga? Would I have supported the Declaration of Independence and eventually the Constitution and Bill of Rights that followed? And still later, would I have risked my life to end slavery for my black brother in the American Civil War? Yes! I know because as an adult I now stand for the same things as they. With which group would you have stood? Is it still so today?

In the current American Revolution the enemy is inside the United States. Basically they are the hate America, the Constitution, the Founders, tradition, statues, religion, law and order, and the police, crowd. Many are anarchists, socialists, and gang thugs like Antifa. They achieve their purposes by intimidation, fear, looting, burning buildings in primarily black neighborhoods they pretend to uplift, and killing policemen. Most probably do not vote, they have a more effective way to destroy America—anarchy; nevertheless, they decidedly favor the Democrat Party.

Amazingly Democrat Party icons: Jimmy Carter, Bill or Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Chuck Schumer or Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden do not publicly condemn their positions or violence. Together they could stop anarchists in their tracts but do not. Because there exists no pushback from Democratic Party leadership—not even when the flag is burned—an intelligent person must conclude that this is now the Democrat Party—a party that would have been rejected by John F. Kennedy and all pre-Kennedy Democrat Presidents.

This 4th of July is very different from all preceding it. America is poised to openly reject everything the Founder’s stood for. Portland recently toppled a statue of even George Washington, the father of this country, placing the flag around his neck before setting it afire. The Abraham Lincoln statue, representing the man who, with 360,222 northerners, gave his life ending slavery, was torn down while leaving untouched the statue of Steven A. Douglas who ran as the Democrat Presidential nominee for president supporting continued slavery. Logic is upside down and inside out.

Democrats have historically been the party of slavery and the Ku Klux Klan. Today they run America’s 20 largest cities, most wanting to defund their police leaving poor blacks unprotected, but blacks still vote for the party that historically betrayed them. In this they remain under slavery. Today it encourages the slaughter of their young through abortion.

There exists a division in this country unlike any since the Civil War. And a threat to individual liberty unlike any since the first American Revolution. As then, only one side can win. The choice is freedom or tyranny, the Constitution or socialist enslavement. But today Internet platforms and the vast majority of media outlets, college professors, and elected officials favor one side of this equation. These are formable opponents every bit equal to England in 1776. But stand we must, everyones’ liberty is at stake.

Imagine a country where its enemies seek first to disarm its citizens (2nd Amendment), remove its border protection (ICE), defund its protectors (police), and threaten religious assembly and free speech. Today the biggest enemy to our liberty is from within. I believe the day will come, when our eyes are opened to the designs of the would be tyrants around us, when no one will admit having been a member of the Democrat Party.

The vast majority of our opponents in the present revolution show bias towards Christianity. They ruled church meetings non-essential in the coronavirus scare. They set St. John ’s Episcopal Church, across from the Whitehouse, afire. BLM leader Shaun King wants Christ statues torn down. Are Bibles next to be burned?

A relationship with deity is mentioned five times in the Declaration of Independence. This document brought on war against the then greatest power on earth, and no European strategist gave the Patriots’ winning a ghost of a chance—yet they stood and won. They could count on no one but God and themselves. We must resurrect the war cry in that document again. “And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.”

President John Quincy Adams said it best. “Posterity—You will never know how much it has cost my generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it.” Let us never forget that liberty is not free. It was purchased and maintained by the blood of those before us and may have to be once again.

Let this be a warning to those who would take freedom from us now. We too are standing “with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence,” mutually pledging “to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.” Again, which side are you standing with?

Dr. Harold Pease is a syndicated columnist and an expert on the United States Constitution. He has dedicated his career to studying the writings of the Founding Fathers and applying that knowledge to current events. He taught history and political science from this perspective for over 30 years at Taft College. Newspapers have permission to publish this column. To read more of his weekly articles, please visit http://www.LibertyUnderFire.org.