Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.” Ronald Reagan said those words in a 1961 speech. Is this the generation when that finally happens? Will freedom only live on in stories from our past? I think the evidence supports the possibility that this is true.

Of all the famous speeches Ronald Reagan delivered during his political career, I can think of none other that is so needed and important to Americans today than his Encroaching Control speech. This is an excerpt from that 1961 speech, and should be replayed and heard 65 years later.

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But freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it on to our children in the bloodstream. The only way they can inherit the freedom we have known is if we fight for it, protect it, defend it and then hand it to them with the well thought lessons of how they in their lifetime must do the same. And if you and I don’t do this, then you and I may well spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it once was like in America when men were free.

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Why do I think revisiting this speech is so important? For the simple reason that by observing society, politics, and the news today, I have to wonder if this is the generation Mr. Reagan was warning us about. Will this be the last generation in America to live free? I’m sure many people reading this may think I’m being hyperbolic or exaggerating to generate clicks. But I beg you, follow along and see if my question is as outrageous as you think.

As I look back, seeking the source of our abandonment of freedom, I think I see its origins in how we educate our children.

The first public schools in America were created in the New England colonies in 1647. In 1779, Thomas Jefferson promoted the idea in Virginia to shift education from private to public schools, arguing that without an educated populace, kings, priests, and nobles would arise. By the 1930s, public schools had become entrenched in America, paid for mostly by property taxes and expanded by mandatory attendance laws. The mid-20th century brought increasing federal involvement in public schools, starting with the 1965 Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which brought federal dollars to public schools. And where federal dollars go, federal influence is right behind. Then, in 1980, the United States Department of Education was created, bringing not only money but federal regulation to education. During this time, our“public schools” were transformed from locally controlled institutions of education into government-run entities. Education became less and less about teaching the child, and more and more about government indoctrination.

Source: SGT Report