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The Spirit of Liberty

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Submitted By paigerosee
Words 613
Pages 3
Paige Elsaesser

Period 7

Mrs.Rivelli

19 February, 2015

What Is Liberty?

“The Spirit of Liberty” was a speech presented by John Hand in 1944 on “I AM an American Day”. When John Hand gives his speech he is speaking to a group of people that all have something in common. They are people that came to America looking for the same things, they were all looking for freedom and liberty. But what John is trying to get them to understand is that you can only find liberty with in yourself, he is also trying to tell them what he believes liberty is.

In paragraph 1, lines 9-11 John says “I often wonder whether we do not rest our hopes too much upon constitutions, upon laws, and upon courts. These are false hopes; believe me, these are false hopes. Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it.” What he means by this is that even though there is laws and constitutions that entitle us to freedom and liberty it does not really mean we have freedom and liberty because it is only something you can allow yourself to have because it comes from within yourself and if you don’t have it than the laws and constitutions are not gonna help you in anyway.

After John tells the audience where he believes freedom and liberty comes from he tells the audience his opinion of what liberty is. In paragraph 1 lines 14- 18 John says “Liberty is not the ruthless,the unbridled will; it is not freedom to do as one likes.That is the denial of liberty and leads straight to its overthrow. A society in which men recognize no check upon their freedom soon becomes a society where freedom is the possession of only a savage few.” What he is trying to make the audience understand that when you are given something like

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