Tema: Orestes Brownson and the Truth About America.

Brownson is becoming more of a fascinating figure to me because of his Catholic interpretations of the U.S. Constitution. He was born and raised as a Congregationalist (i.e. Puritan) and later became the most outspoken apologist for and defender of the Church in the middle part of the 19th century America. He was heavily influenced by European Catholics like John Henry Newman and Juan Donoso Cortes- and later went on to influence them as well.

What I've learned are a few interesting tidbits:

* The U.S. system of federal constitutionalism, whilst founded by political atheists (Brownson's terms for politicians who believe in separating Church and State), it was ultimately founded on Divine Principles- God, as King of Nations, wouldn't have willed the American Revolution to succeed if it didn't serve some higher purpose.

* The principles contained in the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution- whilst authored by Protestants, Masons, and Deists- are still principles that can be harmonized with Christianity- but only when brought into harmony with the teachings of the Church. To Brownson the U.S. system of republicanism, federalism, constitutionalism is entirely compatible with Catholicism and exists in a potential state- which is why he was so outspoken for the Catholic evangelization of the U.S.- and has suffered from erroneous and purposeful political heresies based upon the ideations of modernistic philosophers like Humes, Locke, Marx, and Voltaire rather than upon appropriate philosophers like Aristotle, Platon, St. Thomas Aquinas, and so on.

* Brownson was a realist who saw that not every nation could have the same constitution and government. So the U.S. system, republicanism, was suitable to the U.S. within its own territories. Outside of this it's inappropriate and ungodly to expect other nations to conform to American political expectations because, as God ordained the U.S. republic into existence, he also ordained into existence the commonwealths of other lands. Brownson recognized other forms of government: feudalism (which he equated to barbarism), aristocracy, monarchy, and so on. These governments, as divinely-ordained, were appropriate for the lands in which they existed. As a nation that had never known a native aristocracy and an absentee monarch it is inappropriate for America to govern itself under aristocratic or kingly government.

* The best U.S. citizens will be Catholics because, with proper instruction, only Catholics can understand the implications and potential of the political documentation of the Founders of America, who were unaware of what they had done for the world as a providential act: codifying natural laws within a political context.