Welcome to Family Policy Matters, a weekly podcast and radio show produced by the North Carolina Family Policy Council. Hi, I'm John Rust and president of NCE Family, and each week on Family Policy Matters, we welcome experts and policy leaders to discuss topics that impact faith and family here in North Carolina. Our prayer is that this program will help encourage and equip you to be a voice of persuasion for family values in your community, state, and nation. Thank you for joining us this week on Family Policy Matters. I'm Mitch Prosser, Vice President here at North Carolina Family Policy Council, joined by our Director of Research and Education, Adamu Monfra.
Welcome to the very first episode of The Truths We Hold. In honor of America's 250th birthday and NC Family's 35th anniversary this year, we're taking a deeper look at the foundational values that have shaped the country and the nation as we continue to shape the work we do here at NC Family. 250 years ago on July the 4th, the Continental Congress gathered in Philadelphia to sign the Declaration of Independence. In this monumental document is the iconic line, we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these rights are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
So, Adamo, as we take a look at those principles, those inalienable rights, and that line that Jefferson gives us in the Declaration of Independence. How then are these inalienable rights that he mentions so important to us today as the framers envisioned them 250 years ago? That's a great question to think about specifically, particularly as we celebrate looking back on our heritage in 250 years as a country and approaching it from a Christian perspective as we do at NC Family. I think The line there, when you look at the Declaration of Independence in particular, the first paragraph, we often think of this as the first line. It's not the first line, right?
The beginning opens talking about appealing to the higher laws and appealing to a divine creator as justifying a cause to call for dissolution of a political real arrangement with the king at the time. And so it's in that context that they feel if we're going to make such a large upheaval and start a new country in a new system of government, it should be based on divine law and it should be somewhat judged almost like as if there's a third party that could sit in judgment of are we righteously creating a new system. I don't want to take us to an elementary level, but I think it is worth exploring what the word inalienable, or as Jefferson writes, unalienable, and we've looked it up, there's virtually no difference. What does that word inherently mean? Right, so as he goes on to say, right, these unalienable rights, because we're endowed by our Creator, so these are rights that we have by sheer existence.
They can be infringed upon, certainly.
So like if you kidnap someone, tie them up, like they're not physically free, so you've sort of taken that from them, but no one gives it to me. Right. Like I'm not prohibited from movement or freedom of action by nature. And so their argument there is that the government's role is not to fabricate these things and start from scratch and somehow grant me freedoms, but the government's job is to come in and protect and defend those freedoms that God gave me that I have by nature of my being.
So they're God-given rights. These rights, these unalienable rights, and he specifically mentions life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are three of those rights. He doesn't say that's an exhaustible list, but he says those are three of those rights. Walk down that road for just a minute of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as the framers envisioned it, and then we'll get to today. Sure.
So I think those three, you're absolutely right. Among them are.
So, this is not meant to be anything that doesn't meet this list, is therefore not included.
However, I do think these three are rightly seen as fundamental in this, and particularly rights.
So, life, so, again, as I said, the unalienable rights, inalienable rights, are those rights that we just have by being, granted by our Creator, in that we are created. And so, I have a right to life and it should not be taken from me. And of course, we would see that as from conception until natural death. Womb to the tomb. That's right.
And then liberty.
So that can get very broad. What do we mean by liberty? And so a free people, what does that mean? And so we would certainly look at that from a particular perspective of a free people and educated people allowed to flourish. And then that leads into the pursuit of happiness.
So even at that time, the language often was the pursuit of property, private property, and rights of that nature. But by changing that to pursuit of happiness, I think really captures it better that we're allowed to pursue what will cause us to flourish. And I think people tend to think of happiness in this much more shallow way. Like what makes me smile and laugh today? Like I have the right to go watch this movie or drink this thing or consume this thing that will be fun and enjoyable in the moment.
But that's not what they're looking at. And that's certainly not what we would look at, which is the pursuit of happiness and fulfillment and flourishing, which we would certainly see as truly founded in pursuing the Lord.
So the pursuit of happiness is the birth of the genesis of the American dream. And we've seen this perversion of that American dream, you know, the white picket. Fence, the house with two stories.
Somebody said something about a chicken, a pot, and a car in every garage. But yeah, I think that's exactly it. The opportunity that we have to pursue the things that God has placed in our lives.
Now, let's go to something, and we'll be very careful how we do this. There are certain people today that would argue that our rights come from the government, that the government is the source or the genesis of those rights. And that flies in the face of what Jefferson wrote, and he writes these things to be self-evident. And that's Jeffersonian for everybody should get this: that these rights come from God.
So what is the difference then between those rights coming from the government and coming from God, our Creator? Sure.
Again, as I talked about, they're sort of appealing to this divine judgment and principle and that that's where they will be seen as virtuously right in their declaration here. But we especially want to hold that rights that are given by the government, that are created from the government, can also be taken from the government. And so that's not a right that inheres inherently in your person, but it's a right that is sort of bestowed on you by the granting agency. And like we would say, since God is the author of life, right, he can take life from you. He calls you home when he's ready to call you home.
He has the prerogative to do that because he did, in fact, grant you that right of life and the gift of life and brought you into this world and can take you out of it. But the government did not bring you into this world, should not have had a voting right in your existence, and so they should not have a voting right in taking you out of existence. But if you think the government does grant you the right to life, then suddenly the government has the authority to take that away from you. And not just in the government rightly real sense. The sword, but in a government as a full-blown deskbot kind of approach.
And we'll get to that in just a minute. Excellently stated. You're listening to Family Policy Matters, a weekly radio show and podcast produced by the North Carolina Family Policy Council. This is just one of the many ways NC Family works to educate and inform citizens about issues that impact faith and family here in North Carolina. Our vision is to create a state and nation where God is honored, religious freedom flourishes, families thrive, and life is cherished.
For more information about NC Family and how you can partner with us in pursuit of this vision, visit our website at ncfamily.org and be sure to sign up to receive our email updates, action alerts, and Family North Carolina magazine. You can also follow us on social media at NC Family Policy. That's at NC Family Policy. We've come a long way in the last 250 years. It's a long time.
And so we're very young on the world stage. In the last two and a half centuries, we've come so far in our existence. Let's talk about the foundational truths, these foundational truths that we hold dearly, life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, and then how our organization, our work here at NC Family, kind of conjoins with those. How would you describe the Jeffersonian language of the framers and then the things that we work on here? How do those things align?
Yeah, it's actually very interesting. We were looking at this quite recently.
So we approach our principles and our policy and our priority issues from a biblical perspective, of course.
So we're primarily focused on Christian principles explicitly and directly and not just sort of a shared perspective that we can get everybody on board with, but what Christian principles would be per se and explicitly.
However, those align very well with specifically these three priorities and include. In among those rights.
So, sanctity of life is one of our big priorities, if not number one. Without that, you don't have the rest, obviously. Exactly. And then we would say that following immediately from that is marriage and parenting, because that's the context in which life comes to be. Sure.
And then following from that, we move into liberty. And so, for us in particular, religious liberty, so the freedom of religion, the freedom of speech that follows from that, and then all the various religious exemptions and accommodations that are built into our legal structure to honor that fundamental freedom. And then that extends very quickly into health and sexuality and education. Again, for religious accommodations and exemptions, but also how we raise our kids. We, as parents, are the first formators.
They are our children. And so, our choice in what is taught in public schools and the freedom to not be in public schools and having some say in what's happening in public schools, even if our kids aren't there, all flows from that liberty to practice those things out. And good governments, the way that we interact with government and those that are called by God to run for office, the way that interacts. And then the pursuit of happiness. Where do we go from there?
Sure, and I think that's where understanding what the pursuit of happiness really means is crucial for us. If you look at our website, you see how gambling and drugs and crime are issues for us. And those libertarian, like strong libertarians, might think, well, pursuit of happiness means I should be allowed to go do those things. And so that must be our priority. But we actually kind of have a different approach because we want to see flourishing and true pursuit of happiness and pursuing the actual good.
And those kinds of behaviors can, in fact, infringe upon a flourishing society, a flourishing culture, and a thriving family. Fostering human dignity, making sure that people have rights. Those rights are given by God and that those rights are well maintained. And that's the work we do here.
So we've talked about the past, we've talked about the present. Let's look into the future a little bit, not ask you to pull out a crystal ball or anything like that. But, you know, we're taking a look at these things that are coming up.
Some things are great, and then some things aren't so great.
Some things that we're concerned about, some things that our organization is focused on, and ensuring that they don't infringe on those God-given inalienable. Rights. One thing that you and I have talked extensively about is parental rights, the parental bill of rights. Tell us a little bit more about that. Yeah, so a couple years ago here in North Carolina, we passed the parents Bill of Rights, and this was a great win for our movement and protecting families and parents in lots of spaces, including school and healthcare and other things.
But that fight is certainly not over. There's still contention over how this will be implemented in particular school districts across the state and how different families will be protected in that. School choice, opportunity scholarships. All of these things come to bear on how families are protected in their God-given rights to raise their family and shape them in. Pursuing the Lord and pursuing goodness in its proper sense.
So that's a huge fight. And then the life battle is another one. It's tempting many people. Wanted to say we won when Dobbs was overturned in 22, but we've only seen that the battle is just beginning because now we need to get hearts and minds in policy. Returning it to the states and returning to the voters means now we need to get the states and the voters to pursue life initiatives.
And so that's a huge fight that's right. We're still fighting. And not just at the beginning of life, at the end of life. We're seeing states now, we've seen states over a period of a couple of decades who have adopted end-of-life policies that are just abhorrent. They're scary.
And then I'm encouraged by what West Virginia did in passing a constitutional amendment to say, no, we're not going to terminate the life of a human being when we deem them no longer worthy of living. Once again, those rights come from God, not from the state. And so what Canada calls made and what Europe calls death pods, I think is something that certainly has no place here in North Carolina. I'd argue anywhere for that matter, but certainly in North Carolina, of course, predatory gambling, proliferation of marijuana usage, a lot of stuff like that. If you're watching this right now and you're thinking, my goodness, they're moving really fast and there's a lot to Cover here, and we wish that you'd give us more.
Good news, we are. In fact, we're going to dive into each of these issues throughout all of 2026 to celebrate the 250th anniversary of holding these truths to be self-evident and our 35th anniversary as an organization.
So, we're encouraged by you and your engagement in what we're doing. I'm just so grateful for our team here who has focused on these issues. Adamo, a great discussion. Thank you so much for this. We're going to keep giving you this great content.
In fact, we invite you to join us as we embrace these truths in the years to come. In honor of America's 250th anniversary, birthday, and NC Family's 35th anniversary, we will take a look and be discussing these all year long. Each month, we'll release another episode of The Truths We Hold, which you can watch on YouTube or listen to on your favorite podcast app. In addition, we'll have several events upcoming in the next year. In fact, the very first of those two.
Events will be in Greenville on Monday, March the 23rd with a well-known American historian, Tim Barton, of Wall Builders, and then in May right here in Raleigh with Chairman Ferguson of the Federal Trade Commission, who was appointed by President Trump.
So we are looking forward to two great events to kick off our 2026 celebration of the 250th anniversary of America and our 35th anniversary here as an organization. You can tune in to more episodes of the truths we hold in the months ahead. Thank you for joining us today on this very first episode and God bless you. Thank you for listening to Family Policy Matters. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe to the show and leave us a review.
To learn more about NC Family and the work we do to promote and preserve faith and family in North Carolina, visit our website at ncfamily.org. That's ncfamily.org. And check us out on social media at NC Family Policy. Thanks and may God bless you and your family.
