The Five Thousand Year Leap by W. Cleon Skousen

The Five Thousand year Leap

28 Great Ideas That Changed the World

W. Cleon Skousen

Published 1981

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

The Five Thousand Year Leap is a compelling manual for all Americans to study, learn, and understand the ideas that make our nation unique and exceptional. It is the true account of our story, an essential examination of our history, and an analysis of the structure of our government. It is a thorough exploration on the origins of the distinctive American government, which gave birth to the writing of the U.S. Constitution. The Five Thousand Year Leap explores the twenty-eight founding principles that shaped the United States of America. 

As per the author's opening statement:

The American people are now two centuries away from the nation's original launching. Our ship of state is far out to sea and is being tossed about in stormy waters, which the Founders felt could have been avoided if we had stayed within sight of our initial moorings.

They also felt that each ingredient set forth in their great success formula was of the highest value. They would no doubt be alarmed to see how may of those ingredients have been abandoned, or have been allowed to become seriously eroded.  

America had a "hard beginning," as far as Jamestown was concerned; but it was a good lesson, and a lesson well-taken for the Founders who wrote the Constitution. It was the greatest comprehensive experiment in liberty and self-government ever taken in the history of nations.

But, as Skousen warns: "...when we don't teach the rising generation those cultural and moral lessons that keep society healthy and safe, the people end up making all the same mistakes..." 

Americans are in danger of losing their Republic. 

We have no reason to be in this position because these twenty-eight principles have been clearly laid out for us; except that if we fail to teach them to every generation, and practice them, then, yes, we will continue to make the same mistakes that man has fallen into over and over again, out of selfishness and slothfulness. 

These principles or great ideas took over 180 years to be assembled, as they had already existed in history, and were brought together through the Founders who studied the same concepts and arguments of the past.

There are two parts of the book, and both sections are direct and precise in their statements and supporting examples, which include countless quotes from history, documentation, letters, and speeches, many from the Founders.

Part I includes: The Founders' Monumental Task

This section covers political spectrum, political parties, and the importance of the People's Law. It follows the Founders knowledge of Anglo Saxon Common Law, which leads to the new order of self-government. Most power is in the hands of the people or individual, then power becomes diminished as you climb upward: family, municipal (city), provincial/state, and ends with the least amount of power in a national/federal head. (A similar structure can be found in Exodus 18:13-26.)

The Founders sought to create a balance of power between tyranny and anarchy. They kept power close to the individual (self-government); the states focused on internal affairs; and the federal covered issues not effectively handled by the state or individual. This was also aided by a balance of and check on powers within legislative, judicial, and executive branches.

They also warned against a welfare state (redistribution of wealth) and of the need for an educated electorate.

If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be. ~Thomas Jefferson

Part II: The Founders' Basic Principles:

1. The only reliable basis for sound government and just human relations is Natural Law.
2. A free people cannot survive under a republican constitution unless they remain virtuous and morally strong.
3. The most promising method of securing a virtuous and morally stable people is to elect virtuous and moral leaders.
4. Without religion the government of a free people cannot be maintained.
5. All things were created by God, therefore upon Him all mankind are equally dependent and to Him they are equally responsible.
6. All men are created equal.
7. The proper role of government is to protect equal rights, not provide equal things.
8. Men are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.
9. To protect man's rights, God has revealed certain principles of divine law.
10. The God-given right to govern is vested in the sovereign authority of the whole people.
11. The majority of the people may alter or abolish a government which has become tyrannical.
12. The United States of America shall be a Republic.
13. A constitution should be structured to permanently protect the people from the human frailties of their rulers.
14. Life and liberty are secure only so long as the right to property is secure.
15. The highest level of prosperity occurs when there is a free-market economy and a minimum of government regulations.
16. The government should be separated into three branches: Legislative, Executive, and Judicial.
17. A system of checks and balances should be adopted to prevent the abuse of power.
18. The unalienable rights of the people are most likely to be preserved if the principles of government are set forth in a written constitution.
19. Only limited and carefully defined powers should be delegated to government, all others being retained in the people. 
20. Efficiency and dispatch require government to operate according to the will of the majority, but constitutional provisions must be made to protect the rights of the minority.
21. Strong local self-government is the keystone to preserving human freedom.
22. A free people should be governed by law and not by the whims of men.
23. A free society cannot survive as a republic without a broad program of general education.
24. A free people will not survive unless they stay strong.
25. Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations - entangling alliances with none.
26. The core unit which determines the strength of any society is the family; therefore, the government should foster and protect its integrity.  
27. The burden of debt is as destructive to freedom as subjugation by conquest. 
28. The United States has a manifest destiny to be an example and a blessing to the entire human race. 

My copy includes bonus material: a copy of the United States Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, the essay Common Sense by Thomas Paine, and 101 Constitutional Questions to Ask Candidates (or yourself!).

As Glenn Beck writes in the Forward: 

You, me, all of us were born for this day, to stand responsible before God and future generations to keep this torch of freedom lit, and bear it away from ruin. 

Remember those minutemen in the days of our Revolutionary War? Do you remember their job, to be ready to defend the encroachment of the Redcoats with a minute's notice? 

Well, that is where we stand today. 

The power is ours to blast our horns and shake those rotted scales off our freedoms, shake them to rubble and get our country back.  

* * *  

I would suggest this as an excellent resource for high schoolers, in addition to the Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution.