It is vital to every individual interest of the average American that he _should_ know these things which he does not know. Happily for him, _his_ ignorance is not as that of the public leaders of his generation. _Their_ concept of the American and his relation to governments in America is one which contradicts the most definitely settled and clearly stated American law. On the other hand, the average American merely has a mind which is a blank page in these matters. As a result, it is the greatest danger to his individual interest that _their_ concept largely guides his attitude in public affairs of the utmost moment to him. The Americans of an earlier generation, who created the American nation of men and all governments _in_ America, accurately knew the status of the American citizen and his relation to all governments. Their accurate knowledge was an insistent thing which guided their every act as a people in the period between 1775 and 1790, in which latter year the last of the Americans became citizens of America. Their knowledge came to them from their own personal experience in those fifteen years. They were a people, born subjects of government, who died citizens of a great nation and whose every government, _in_ America, was their servant. This great miracle they themselves had wrought in the fifteen years between 1775 and 1790. Their greatest achievement, as the discerning mind has always realized, is what they did in the last four of those momentous years. They brought to its doing their valuable experience and training of the previous eleven years. That is why they succeeded, so far as human effort can secure human liberty by means of written constitutions of government, in securing to themselves and their posterity the utmost measure of protected enjoyment of human life and happiness. That we, their posterity, may keep their legacy intact and transmit it to the generations to come, it is necessary that we, the average Americans, should share somewhat with them their amazingly accurate knowledge of the simple but vital facts which enabled them to create a nation and, by its American Constitution, to secure to themselves, its citizens, protected enjoyment of life, liberty and happiness. When they were actually engaged in this work of creation, it was truthfully said of them that “The American people are better acquainted with the science of government than any other people in the world.” For over a hundred years the history of America attested the truth of that statement. As they were a simple people, their knowledge of the science of government was derived from their accurate understanding of a few simple facts. It is a certainty that we can keep their legacy by learning those same facts. Let us quickly learn them. The accurate knowledge of them may best be acquired by briefly living again, with those simple Americans of an earlier generation, through their days from 1775 to 1790.