Communist dictator Mao Tse Tung was fond of quoting Laozi, who said, “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”
Dennis Collins is neither a Taoist philosopher nor a dictator. The physician’s assistant, husband and father from Jacksonville, Illinois, is fine with that. “I’m just a private citizen,” says Collins. “I saw something that I thought wasn’t right and needed to be righted and it worked out for us.”
What Collins saw was a ballot referendum that would have raised the sales tax in his county. With his area facing a tough economy and job losses, he didn’t think raising taxes made any sense.
So he took the first step; he called some neighbors and, together, they formed “Morgan County CARE.” CARE stands for Citizens Acting for Responsible Education.
“We knew we were outgunned from the start, but we just did the best we could,” Collins recalls in a video produced by the Illinois Policy Institute.
On a budget of just $3,100 and shoe leather, group members went door-to-door and made countless phone calls. “We went out and gave an honest message,” Collins explains, “and ended up making a change.” They defeated the tax hike.
“When I go to the store and see the sales tax receipt it feels very good,” Collins explains after the victory at the polls. “I’m thinking about the less fortunate and the elderly that are on fixed incomes and knowing they aren’t going to have to struggle any more than they currently are.”
“Individual citizens do need to step up and try to make change,” says Collins. That’s not the voice of a history-making dictator or a philosopher, but a community-protecting American citizen.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
Men are rather reasoning than reasonable animals, for the most part governed by the impulse of passion.
On July 11, 1804, U.S. Vice President Aaron Burr [pictured] shot former Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, who died within days. The shooting was a duel of honor in which Burr had challenged Hamilton. But in a sense Burr lost, for Hamilton had left a letter that made him seem almost a martyr. The letter may have been less than veracious, but it was effective, and popular opinion quickly turned on Burr.
Nothing is wanted to overthrow the whole delusion which has been imposed upon the American people as a wise and judicious course of policy, but a dispassionate and unprejudiced examination of its real character, when divested of the false theories upon which it is built. 
On July 10, 1832, President Andrew Jackson vetoes the Second Bank of the United States, ending central banking in America until the establishment of the Federal Reserve in 1913.
General George Washington ordered the Declaration of Independence to be read alout to the troops of the Continental Army in New York, for the first time, on July 9, 1776. In 1793 on this date, Upper Canada passed the Act Against Slavery, prohibiting important of slaves into Lower Canada. In 1816, Argentina declared independence from Spain. In 1876, the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified.
When the tempest rages, when the thunders roar, and the lightnings blaze around us it is then that the truly brave man stands firm at his post.
Since the very beasts, although made for the service of man, cannot become accustomed to control without protest, what evil chance has so denatured man that he, the only creature really born to be free, lacks the memory of his original condition and the desire to return to it?