The voice of the American people
Carolyn Hileman
The Voice » Asking the questions, demanding the answers

I hold no stock in major corporations, I own no big farms or motel chains, I am not a big political leader, I am not a big leader of a church and I have no voice. I am just your every day American who works daily trying to earn money to put my kids through school and later college. I wake up each day just like they do, I put on my clothes just like they do, I think about the poor and the innocent just like they do, but I have no voice.

I may not be a big shot like those other guys who have the ears of our leaders, but there are a lot more of me than there is of them. We don’t wear the fancy suits or drive the fancy cars; people don’t follow us around just to hear what we might have to say, they think we don’t matter, we aren’t the rich and affluent. I am an American citizen, my family built this country, served this country and somehow that is not good enough, because I still have no voice.

I remember my Dad and Mom who spent every single penny they earned not on themselves but for us kids. We were never rich because there is always someone who has more than you do, but we never went without. We may have had patches on our clothes but they were not raggedy and they were clean, we may not have bought the school lunches, but the food my Mom made with love was much better than anything I saw on the trays of the other kids. We were raised to respect our elders, our president whether we liked him or not and when he was speaking we had to sit down and be quiet and listen.

Today it is becoming very evident that unless you are rich or own some big motel chain or are some big religious leader or own a big farm your voice no longer matters. It does not matter how long your family has contributed to this country or what they contributed, because none of that matters anymore, the voice of the American people has been silenced. You know it never occurred to me that in order to be heard in the halls of congress you must be some big shot, I thought that hall belonged to me and every American citizen.

I thought that the laws passed in that hall were supposed to be what the people of America wanted, not what some lobbyist wanted. I thought that the American people would at least have some say as to where their money was going, but those who run the big businesses and churches are the ones who get that decision. While I applaud the churches for wishing to help the poor of any race, creed and color it occurs to me that one stained glass window from those churches would feed many families for years.

The big business people who I agree should have some say because they are the ones who give us our jobs and keep this country going, are refusing to listen to their own people who might work a little harder if just once they felt like they were valuable. But once again the people are voiceless, their input is not needed, but their tax dollars are. I know we don’t have the money and power that they have, but I was raised that it did not matter. I was raised that if you were an American, you were someone important; you had a voice, your opinion made a difference.

That an American was judged by what was in his heart not by what he drove or the company he owned, I never dreamed that, that was the measure of an American. I thought that it was the mother who sits in her living room watching her kids fighting over the newest toy wondering how she would pay her electricity bill. Or the man with paint on his face and camouflage clothes stopping a car that might be filled with insurgents, or the man who wears the uniform and pulls over the kid who borrowed Daddies car and had a little to much to drink at that party. Or the single Mom who works day and night just to survive, because she didn’t qualify for help from our government.

America is a spirit; it is not a price tag. It is a way of life, not a title. It is the voice of every single American, not just a select few. It is my voice, and your voice, it is not the lobbyist’s voices. Our founding fathers did not fight so that the voices of Americans could be silenced, far from it they fought and gave their lives so that each voice, even the smallest one would be heard. But if by today’s standards this no longer applies, if you must be some big business owner or church leader I just won’t qualify. We the American people have given them our voices and for what? What have they given us in return for the most precious thing an American can own our voices?

I would love to stand in the halls of congress and read this, to make them hear that they have left out the most important thing in their debates, that while they are deciding our fates and spending our money, they have forgotten something, the voice of the American people.