Although there were sporadic attempts all over the world to change the tragic course of bondage of human beings, it was the American Revolution that took the first large-scale step in that direction. Like a contagious disease, that revolution energized the freedom-loving peoples starting with the French Revolution. The ultimate goal of this movement was power sharing and placing the people rather than the governments in the driving seat in controlling their own destiny.

Briefly, some 250 years ago only a handful of American Revolutionaries-extremists managed to free the American colonies from the yoke of the most fearsome colonial power on earth. Nothing short of complete victory of good over evil weakened the resolve of these colonized men, not even the brutal massacre of their innocent fellow citizens, destruction of their libraries, hospitals and even burning the White House by the brutal colonial power they deposed. Another almost forgotten fact is that prior to its humiliating defeat, the colonial power arrogantly called the revolutionaries “terrorists” and had set price on their heads!  Yes, heads of people like Thomas Jefferson for saying, “Enlighten people and tyranny of body and mind will disappear like evil spirit in the dawn of a day” ; Thomas Paine for saying, “The mind, once enlightened, cannot again become dark,” his ushering the people from the bondage of organized religion into the age of ration and reasoning and for considering religion as a private matter, and even advocating one's mind as one's church!

Jefferson, Madison and Paine are, but a few of a handful of the America's founders in the eighteenth century who advocated universal rather than tubular view of the world as prescribed by multitude of religions and tribes. John Locke's “self-evidence principles”that supported James Madison's Constitutional guarantee of freedom of conscience and separation of  church and state. To these men legislating morality and creation of state religion would violate the people's freedom of choice and would not serve the best interest of either church nor the state!

The greatest single contribution of the American Revolution was its First Amendment-I call the jewel of the American Constitution that made America the first safe haven in the world for the people of all religious persuasion to coalesce and make the Nation of Immigrants. Here is that jewel:

“ Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. ”

Many foreigners who found it futile to tolerate their repressive regimes flocked to America in drones in search of freedom of speech, opportunity and pursuit of happiness denied to them in their homelands.

The founders of America received their inspiration from liberal scholars of Western and Eastern world who had overtly and covertly opposed tyranny with minimal or no success. They were a handful of highly educated and well-versed men, who steadfastly believed that when educated and informed, the people are capable of governing themselves. I attribute this achievement first and foremost to the founders' relatively much deeper belief in education, ethics and exemplary life- I call 3e's. More importantly even though they were mostly self-taught and home-schooled their sense of responsibility,  ethics and their ability to integrate knowledge into wisdom are still unmatched by products of our “modern” education system. As a natural science educator and advocate of love of nature, I also believe a major reason for the founders' healthy outlook and their defense of the rule of law was their direct inspiration from nature. Recall that these men were full-time farmers, more in tune with nature and part time politicians and relatively far less inclined to be corrupt like most of the  succeeding generations of politicians from more urban environments with more dazzling , but relatively less meaningful lifestyles. As Joseph Campbell said, “Life is without meaning. You bring meaning to it,”- obviously by being informed and educated.

There are at least two valuable historical lessons to be learned from this major event. First; all great changes are initiated by a small number of people. Second; the few men effecting the change are called extremists-a source of fear for the public that, by default prefers status quo. However, the truth is that like coin, extremism has two sides-good and evil, depending on one's depth of education, ethics and conviction. When Samuel Adams said, "It does not take a majority to prevail ... but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men," he meant that we should never underestimate the power of the minority extremists with evil intention who keep bombarding the minds of the unaware public with sugar-quoted falsehood.

The great founders of America knew that an enlightened and informed public was the best antidote and  buffer against the return of colonialism and replacement of government of the people with the government of a few. This was also the founders' idea of laying the foundation of the cheapest and most effective Homeland Security.

Obviously, both the ideals of the American Revolution and the Public Education spread throughout the world like a lightening. That indicated that the world then and now has a great thirst for education. I, myself, am forever indebted to America and Thomas Jefferson for my public education and becoming a lifetime advocate of it.

The founders of America called their new and unique republic “An Experiment in Democracy,” meaning that their words were not final and were subject to the test of time and questioning, interpretation, revision and upgrading, in an environment of freedom of expression. In fact, the word democracy is not even  mentioned in American Constitution because America's founders feared that  democracy, too, had the potential of leading the nation into chaos by the extremists. In fact, devising Electoral College on top of popular vote was from the fear of mob rule that was inevitable in free society. That was the reason that American system of government has always been a compromise between oligarchy and democracy or a republic, as is known. This was a compromise between the Jeffersonian philosophy of believing the people to govern themselves with minimum government control and the Hamiltonian philosophy of maximum government interference.

Of course, America committed some atrocities while building itself as a nation. As an example, no impartial person would forgive America's massacre of non-yielding and “hostile” Native Americans and other forceful means of capturing more territories. However, for all practical purposes such delving on that history is considered as exercise in futility. We can only reduce that guilt feeling by remembering that most of the founders like other nation builders in world history were not expected to be prefect human beings in every respect. All in all, it it seems fair to say that as long as the algebraic sum of a nations' behavior is positive we are on a right track. Based on that perspective, it would be fair to claim that the algebraic sum of America's influence on the world events gradually became negative with the growth of extremists who placed this nation on a destructive path especially during the most recent years. There are also those who fault the founders for not eradicating  the slavery and racial inequality, not granting equal rights to men and women and religious tensions. The truth is that the founders were far ahead of their time and the Constitution they devised required the passage of much more time to resolve these issues. The validity of this wisdom becomes clear because we have not been able to resolve these issues after some 250 years.

What is important is that most unique feature of the America's revolutionaries or the secret of their success was their relatively far more reluctance in getting involved in other countries' affairs and the fear of becoming another colonial power. We should never refrain from admiring George Washington's refusal to be named a king or Thomas Jefferson's humility in handling his presidential responsibilities even though many believed that he qualified to be the “philosopher king” that mankind had always dreamed of and never achieved.

Nevertheless, the prerequisite of an educated and informed public was never disputed for preservation of America against repression of any kind. Here are some of the most energizing and most powerful basic tenets of that noble revolution:

“Resistance to tyranny is obedient to God”-Motto on Thomas Jefferson’s ring

"The condition upon which God has given us liberty is eternal vigilance."
-J.P. Curran, 1790

"Those who expect to be ignorant and free, expect what there never was and never will be."-Thomas Jefferson

Page summary: The American Revolution in spite of its imperfections was the largest and the most successful attempt against colonial rule, tyranny and terrorism and an excellent example for the freedom-loving people all over the world.

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