To the editor:
Today, September 9 is Primary Day in New Hampshire and is often the case in September voting, the turnout is expected to be light. That creates an opportunity for principled, dedicated voters to have a heightened income on the outcomes — if we vote on our principles and not the polls or whoever the politicos “pros” and pundits say have the best odds of winning in November. In other words, we ought not confuse the voting booth for the $2 window at the race track.
“A Republic, if you can keep it,” was the storied reply of Ben Franklin in 1787, when asked what the delegates had created at their secret conclave in Philadelphia. If the act of voting is to retain some connection to the preservation of liberty in a constitutional republic, then voters must vote for candidates devoted to the principles of liberty.
Among these, the signers of the Declaration announced to the world, are “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Liberty and the pursuit of happiness become academic when the right to life is denied. At a time when we are rightly revolted and outraged by the beheading of innocent Americans by terrorist overseas, we cannot logically be indifferent to the butchering of babies in the womb here at home. There are ‘pro-choice” candidates in both parties who may boast of their accomplishments in the private sector or in years of public service. But when some 4,000 babies are dismembered and discarded each day in the United States, it is a grotesque mockery of tolerance or moderation to say that while Candidate X, Y or Z may defend the legal “right” to the deliberate, planned destruction of innocent human life, he or she is otherwise a fine upstanding citizen who will make a splendid governor, senator or representative.
“For evil to succeed,” in the memorable words of Edmund Burke, “it is only necessary that good men do nothing.” That is exactly what most Americans will do on Primary Day. Those of us who do exercise the franchise must do it conscientiously in a way that will make a difference.
The right kind of difference.
Jack Kenny
325 Amherst St.
Manchester, NH 03104
