Something Else My Daddy Taught Me

I just read an article about the the oak doors at the Supreme Court of the United States which display tablets carrying Roman numerals I-V and VI-X. The article indicated that back in the 1970's the Supreme Court's own documentation said that the tablets represent the ten commandments. Now that any mention of religion coupled with government has become an instant ticket to pariah status, the tablets are described simply as being "symbolic representations".

This brought to mind something that my daddy taught me. One night we had left work at Miller's Garage and were headed home. I needed something from a store along the way, but I was dirty and greasy from having worked in the shop all day. Daddy was gonna stop and let me go into the store and get what I needed, but I asked him to wait and let me go home and clean up first and then come back. He said that a working man should never be ashamed of how he looked. That the dirt and grease on my clothes, face and hands was a sign to the world that I had put in an honest days work. To this he added, as long as you are doing right, don't ever be ashamed of who you are, what you are doing or where you came from. I've always considered this to be the Coosa County version of Polonius' advice to his son Laertes in "Hamlet", "To thine own self be true."

When we, as a nation, begin to modify history to match our current politically correct ideas, we are not being true to ourselves. I don't care whether you believe in a higher power or not. It does not make any difference whether or not separation of church and state is constitutional or unconstitutional. If the tablets represented the ten commandments in the 1970's then they represent them today. If it was a mistake to have them, then it is a mistake that we should live with, not try to cover up. If it is illegal to have them, then take them down. Put up some doors with pictures of Paris Hilton and Madonna or whatever else is currently considered PC, but if someone asks what the old doors represented don't lie. Admit they stood for the ten commandments.