Tomorrow is America’s birthday. It’s a good time to think about where we are as a nation. Are we still the land of the free and the home of the brave, even though a terrorist attack nearly a decade ago still has us taking off our shoes at the airport, and even though an economic downturn has us running away from our heritage of economic freedom? Or, despite our problems and backsliding are we still pretty much the country our founders envisioned? Have we so abandoned our founding ideals, whether because they have failed or because we no longer value them, to the point that we might as well go groveling to England, begging the Queen to accept us back? Or is there still hope for our constitutional system of self-government and personal liberty? If so, what is the basis for that hope?