By Joshua Encinias
Published on December 5, 2007
The “American way” stems from the need for dominion.
Freedom from religious power influenced a move from England. The settlers desperately needed help from the natives. After achieving the ability to prosper on their own, the settlers captured the Native American land.
This was the beginning.
Owning what your neighbor owns, stealing it from them or having bigger and better versions of it has always influenced “the American way.”
Thomas Jefferson’s first vice president, Aaron Burr, was notorious for his lavish lifestyle and empty wallet. Burr’s home was in Greenwich Village, but his poor financial sense and lust for upper crust luxury left creditors its actual owners.
Burr descended from famed evangelist Jonathan Edwards. His father and Edwards were the presidents of the College of New Jersey (modern day Harvard). While his family was of famous descendent, it did little to assist Burr. Initially, he wasn’t accepted to the very school his family had been associated with for decades.
This brought Aaron to distrust the hierarchy of the American system. In integrating himself into the American process, he hoped to overthrow it.
Burr’s mindset is reflected in many of our citizens. We hate the political process, complain about the government and refuse to believe that when the mirror is turned on us, we wouldn’t act all that different from those in power.
“With every mistake we must surely be learning,” George Harrison sings, his lyric more of a question than statement.
Unlike in Burr’s time, there isn’t a West for the middle class to conquer. But men like Aaron Burr exist today. Instead of widening the corridors and adding more lanes, Donald Trump turns vertically to own the sky.
Dominion is in our homes. We build them up to be palaces – as shrines to our hard work.
With big screen televisions, theater quality surround-sound and twenty-foot ceilings affordable to suburban homes, “Burrism” lives on.