Signs of the times? The Spokane TEA Party
Are they signs of the times, just a picture of frustration, or are they the first fruits of something much bigger than we can now understand?
On Tax Day 2009 about 2000 people came together on the south shore of the Spokane River in downtown Spokane, Washington to protest taxes, government spending, and to just vent personal frustrations. In conservative Spokane even the television media attended, even though their reports stated hundreds present, which as a decidedly lower report than the 4000 stated by organizers. This respectful and pretty much happy group, at least in the sense of protesters, joined with as many as 600 similar groups across the country and reportedly around the world.
The question remains will this TEA Party, when combined with the others, amount to something or just become a remembrance of a decent spring day in Spokane, after a record setting winter snowfall?
Protestors were pretty much of the conservative tone, but to say that these were a Republican or even Libertarian groupies is a gross simplification. Perhaps better descriptions would be Traditionalists or Populists, run of the mill American working people.
If there was a central theme in the speakers, it focused on the founding documents of the American Republic and the universal rights that these documents give to the American people, and the limitations they impose upon government at all levels. What was not apparent to those present was just how deep their views collide with the prevailing evolving enlightenment of the power structures of big government, big business, and big special interests.
The success of these TEA Party endeavors probably most closely link with the battle of the Alamo in 1936 and the original TEA Party in Boston in 1773. Both center on American Independence and individual rights, but the first TEA Party was an overt confrontation with religious ramifications. The American Revolution was a battle between human created common rights given and sustained by the Creator, contrasted with the Divine Right of Kings. King George lost.
This battle can be also seen in The Reformation, this time the battle was between common grace human rights and the Supreme Catholic Church. The Pope lost. It should be noted however that the Roman Catholic Church of the Council of Trent was and is a much more humble version of the Church of the Renaissance. That is especially true also of the British monarchy after the American Revolution.
If this truly develops as a reformation based upon Divinely given and sanctified common human rights contrasted with enlightenment evolutionary egalitarianism, the TEA Parties will be remembered as a date inline also with Luther’s 95 Thesis. If God is for us who can be against us?
This vision also was really the dominate empowerment behind the American Revolution, even though many of the Founding Fathers were more Deists rather than committed Christians. This allowed for a uniquely American Religious freedom and hence common public freedom. Baptists wanted to be Baptists, and not Presbyterians, and neither wanted to be Congregationalists. The Papists enjoyed just being on the sidelines.
The Reformation and the American Revolution were of a much different scale than the one faced by these twenty-first century TEA Parties. Those two could be envisioned as a couple of pimples on the back side of an elephant. However these potential changes are on a similar scale to a number of common nation recreations of the last century, the fall of the Soviet Union being the most homologous. This American version however, has a much different free expressive heritage than Mother Russia.
If this recreation scenario is true we will begin to see pretty much ex nihilo creation of gumption in those selected to be leaders in this developing movement. For now we can look at some pictures of these Spokane signs of change.