Watching the drama in Washington lately has made me realize we all need to mind our business. It was famously said years ago “the business of America is business”. I think we need to state another truth. The business of America is American society. I say that because the American government is a government of the people, by the people and for the people. All of us are that people. All of us are that society. The government established by the Constitution of the United States is only a subset of that society. Both the government and the Constitution can be changed when the collective wisdom of “we, the people” agree to do so.
When I asked a group of people who had grown up between 1930 – 1950 why they spoke of that time as the good old days, they said it was because then it seemed every one cared for their neighbors. That was the period of The Great Depression and World War II but they were still good old days for them because they felt everyone cared for one another.
Of course, if you were not subject to internment camps as a Japanese American, to the harsh conditions brought on by racial discrimination, etc., then you could experience a society where everyone cared for their neighbors.
Advances in telecommunications have forced us to expand our understanding of who our neighbors are. “We, the people” can no longer be defined only by those who are in our racial, religious and economic subset. Society has not really expanded but, hopefully, our understanding of it has. Society has always had many diverse subsets.
Minding our business has become more important than ever. We need to work at it to keep it from being shrunk down to economics, politics, or religion. All those are only parts of a greater whole. Everyone caring for one another cannot be confined to a political party, economic status or belief system. Every person is a part of society and caring for them is our business.