Accountability to Duty

With the election for our nation's executive leaders approaching rapidly, it is important that we as voters determine what we are looking for in our candidates. Some of us look at the issues. We want to determine how the candidate will react to a national security situation, or how they will react in a national economic crisis, such as the one we find ourselves currently embedded in. Others look at the moral issues. How does the candidate view abortion, same sex marriage, or stem cell research? Each of us has our different criteria that we seek in a leader, and most of the time, we don't find a perfect match on the ballot.
While I consider all of these to be important, I also consider the character of the person. I feel that honesty, respect, integrity, and perseverance are important in leaders these days, just as they have been in the past. However, one character trait that is often overlooked in our day in age is a sense of duty and accountability to that duty. As president, the future leader of our country must be committed to the task given him by the people of this nation, and he must be prepared to guide our country to the best of his ability. The following is an excerpt from a letter written by Robert E. Lee to his son Custis during the Civil War.

"In regard to duty, let me in conclusion of this hasty letter, inform you that nearly a hundred years ago there was a day of remarkable gloom and darkness, still known as the dark day, a day when the light of the sun was slowly extinguished as if by an eclipse. The legislature of Connecticut was in session and as its members saw the unexpected and unaccountable darkness coming on, they shared in the general awe and terror. It was supposed by many that the day of judgment had come. Some one in the consternation of the hour moved for an adjournment. Then there arose an old patriotic legislator, Davenport of Stamford, who said that if the last day had come, he desired to be found in his place of duty, and therefore moved that candles be brought in so that the house could proceed with its duty. There was quietness in that man's mind, the quietness of heavenly wisdom, an inflexible willingness to obey his duty. Duty, then is the sublimest word in our language. Do your duty in all things, like the old puritan. You cannot do more, you should never wish to do less."

Davenport of Stamford knew that he was being held accountable by the people who had placed him in that office to carry out his duty, and he felt that nothing should stand in his way of carrying out that mission. I now ask you who read this to always hold those in power over us accountable to the duty with which we have charged them: protecting the rights of the people. So often in politics, accountability is thrown aside and disregarded as an import factor in one's deportment. However, with a loss of this accountability and sense of duty, a politician has no need to act in a manner befitting one who represents the people of this great country, nor protect those people or their rights.