The Mount Vernon Statement

Conn Carroll / February 17, 2010

Today at 2:30 PM at the Collingwood Library and Museum portion of George Washington’s original Mount Vernon estate, a Who’s Who of the conservative movement’s leaders unveiled and signed The Mount Vernon Statement: a document defining the movement’s principles, beliefs and values in light of the challenges facing the country. The full statement is below, and you can add your name in support here.

The Mount Vernon Statement

Constitutional Conservatism: A Statement for the 21st Century

We recommit ourselves to the ideas of the American Founding. Through the Constitution, the Founders created an enduring framework of limited government based on the rule of law. They sought to secure national independence, provide for economic opportunity, establish true religious liberty and maintain a flourishing society of republican self-government.

These principles define us as a country and inspire us as a people. They are responsible for a prosperous, just nation unlike any other in the world. They are our highest achievements, serving not only as powerful beacons to all who strive for freedom and seek self-government, but as warnings to tyrants and despots everywhere.

Each one of these founding ideas is presently under sustained attack. In recent decades, America’s principles have been undermined and redefined in our culture, our universities and our politics. The selfevident truths of 1776 have been supplanted by the notion that no such truths exist. The federal government today ignores the limits of the Constitution, which is increasingly dismissed as obsolete and irrelevant. (more…)