Jeff McAlister

Among the most intriguing fairy tales of Hans Christian Andersen is one called “The Most Incredible Thing.” It tells of a contest held among the men of a kingdom to accomplish just that.

The winner of the contest was to receive the hand of the king’s daughter in marriage, as well as half the kingdom. Numerous projects and stunts were attempted. But soon all the judges agreed that the most incredible thing was a stupendous clock in a case.

“At each stroke of the clock appeared living pictures that depicted the hour. There were twelve performances in all, with movable figures and with song and speech,” Andersen tells us.

All agreed that the fine young man who constructed this piece of clockwork should be the husband of the princess, until a swaggering ruffian came along and smashed the elaborate contraption to bits. The people were suddenly resigned to the fact that the destruction of this marvelous piece of work was more incredible than the clock itself. It now appeared that this lowlife scoundrel would be the one who would marry the princess.

Happily, that is not the end of the story, though I will refrain from disclosing the rest of it for now. But I bring it up because I sense an analogous dilemma regarding the founding of this nation, its subsequent history, and its potential dissolution.

We in America have inherited a nation which, as Lincoln put it, was “conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.” Our flaws notwithstanding, we have had a unique foundation from the beginning, resting on principles such as government by the consent of the governed, separation of powers, and individual rights and responsibilities, all undergirded by “the laws of nature and nature’s God.” But over a period of generations, the bonds which have held us together have frayed enormously.

If our nation is in the throes of collapse, it did not begin yesterday. Our looming catastrophe more resembles the proverbial frog in the kettle than it does Andersen’s bully wielding an axe.

Over time we have seen our society decay on several levels, often nudged in the wrong way by malign forces; yet our complacency is as much to blame as the scheming of communists, the Frankfurt School, or George Soros.

The voluntary associations that once shaped America have been thinning out for decades, as has the family, leaving a diminishing buffer zone between the individual and the state. Public schools long ago abandoned the remnants of classical education, superseded by the doctrines of John Dewey and a thousand fads.

The birth control pill gave way to the positive embrace of abortion, homosexuality and now transgenderism, leading to a crisis in which Americans no longer reproduce above replacement levels. Meanwhile, Biden’s Justice Department is used to persecute (among others) his chief political opponent by way of “lawfare,” once unthinkable in our nation.

Indeed, Alvin Bragg and his ilk seem to have internalized the maxim of Lavrentiy Beria, chief of Stalin’s secret police: “Show me the man, and I’ll show you the crime.”

None of these changes happened all at once; the foundations for the mess were laid long ago. But, going back to Andersen’s story, it is worth asking what about our nation is most incredible. Is it the enduring power of the U. S. Constitution and other institutions our forefathers bequeathed to us? Or is it that the whole marvelous edifice could come crashing down at any minute?

Each of us have the potential to play a role in the answer to that question. The rest is in the hands of God.