The Nine Stages of the Rise and Fall of World Powers
 
"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse, that is excessive gratuities from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always vote for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the results that a democracy always collapses under loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship.

The average age of the world’s great civilizations has been 200 years. These nations have progressed through this sequence:
 
From bondage to spiritual faith
From spiritual faith to great courage
From great courage to liberty
From liberty to abundance
From abundance to selfishness
From selfishness to complacency
From complacency to apathy
From apathy to dependency, [and] back to bondage"
-- Professor Alexander Tyler, a Scottish historian, writing in 1787 about the fall of the Athenian republic over 2000 years earlier
 

Similarly, Edward Gibbon, the English historian who in 1776 published The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, gave five significant reasons for Rome's fall:
 
 **The rapid increase of divorce, undermining the dignity of the family, which is the basis of a stable society.
 
 **Higher and higher taxes, and the spending of public money
 
 **The mad craze for pleasure, public sporting events becoming more exciting and more brutal every year
 
 **The increase in armaments for war; piling up weapons when the real enemies of the nation were within
 
 **The decay of religion, with faith fading into mere forms that were empty and useless for guiding life. [Birmingham News, 3 July 1992] 

America Pre- and Post-Roe
 
Since 1973, abortion advocates have hailed Roe v. Wade as a cure-all for social ills.  Has Roe been a solution or part of the problem?  Consider these facts:
 
Social Concern                      1960           1970            1990
 
Illegitimate Births                 5.3%         10.7%         26.2%
 
Children with Single Mothers   8%          11%             22%
 
Children on Welfare             3.5%           8.5%         11.9%
 
Teen Suicide Rate                3.6%           5.9%         11.3%
 
Reported Violent Crime Rate  16.1           36.4           73.2
 
(per 100,000)  [from Index of Leading Cultural Indicators; Empower America, William J. Bennett]

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"A general dissolution of principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their virtue, they will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader."
 
-- Samuel Adams, one of our nation’s Founders