E Pluribus Unum

To say that the U.S. is a ceaselessly evolving, multicultural nation – and always has been – is not a put-down of WASPs.E Pluribus Unum is a Latin phrase meaning “Out of many, one.” This phrase was the de facto motto of the United States until 1956 when the Congress adopted “In God we Trust” as the official motto. But E Pluribus Unum is still emblazoned on the seal of both Houses of Congress, the seal of the Supreme Court, the seal of the Vice President, the seal of the President, and the great seal symbolizing the country. This phrase originally stood for the coming together of the Thirteen Colonies into one nation but it has come to mean “out of many peoples, races, religions and ancestries has emerged a single people and nation.” (1) That we are one nation is not questioned by hardly anyone – no matter how disproportionately unjust is the treatment of some sectors. I know of no one who is seriously contemplating any U. S. national dissolution; I do not consider the tens of thousands of secession petition signers from Texas and other states (after the reelection of Obama) serious. But, truth to tell, we are not one nation; we are “blue states and red states,” liberal coastal areas and conservative middle areas; we are races, genders, generations, and have many more serious differences.

So the only way forward is to do the work of finding and fashioning a knowable, workable, just unity. Very few of us can hold an accurate conception in our psyches of what E Pluribus Unum really means for the United States. Written descriptions of our unity are more often misleading blather than indications of reality. We are hugely and in many ways divided. We are not “out of many, one.” We are out of many, many. We are essentially functioning together through weakening forces, wispy illusion, and deteriorating habits. We are manipulated to function together because of forces outside ourselves.

Clearly, who makes up “the many” has changed much over the hundreds of years of the existence of this nation and the proportions of the multiplying demographic categories are rapidly trending in a direction that is contrary to the false visions that are in the minds of the media, the historians, and those who dominate the presentation of U.S. culture. For not too much longer will they be able to legitimately picture us as a WASP (White, Anglo Saxon, Protestant) nation in primary coloration and culture. This nation is becoming something that I do not believe ever existed before on the earth.

Because I am, therefore we are; because we are, therefore I am.

I think our collective challenge to envision unity stems from a too shallow understanding of to what the phenomena E Pluribus Unum is attempting to speak. Latin is a philosophical language. Much of what we know as philosophy is still expressed in Latin terminology. Many still revere ancient Latin philosophers. However, language – for all that it can do – is still an imperfect carrier of thoughts. The understandings of individual word meanings must precede the receipt of combinations of words that attempt to express something new. But word understanding is made more difficult by the loss of context, translations between languages and cultures, and the passage of time. Meanings and understandings change and new learning sometimes affirms, sometimes corrects, and often makes the meanings of words more complex. Lastly we must recognize the Eurocentric nature of our philosophical understandings that leave us bereft of the insights and genius of other cultures – those cultures brought to this place by peoples from non-European origins and the indigenous cultures of this land.

I think it is this process of complexification that must be attended to with the phrase E Pluribus Unum if it is to have a true meaning in symbolizing what the U.S. must become. Let us start by admitting that many of the political phrases and much of the meaning that is handed down to us from the 1700s were thoroughly influenced by the thinking of the so-called European and American Enlightenment or Age of Reason. Our so-called Founding Fathers were children of the Enlightenment. Without recognition of the influences evident at the time their words were first spoken, we can get captured by the deductive, mechanistic analysis and false perspectives that the Founders passed down to us. These Enlightenment misunderstandings lead us astray in so many arenas and make it harder for us to see what is right in front of our eyes.

Language – for all that it can do – is still an imperfect carrier of thoughts.There are two Enlightenment concepts I will touch on here: the possibility of pure objectivity and a total reliance on deductive reasoning. “Out of many, one” comes out of an atomistic, additive, linear understanding of the nature of reality that has been found to be false – even the deductive scientific method has concluded that the atomistic view is wrong. That atomistic view held that there existed a pure, separate objective position from which The Other could be contemplated. We now know – from that apex of science (Physics) especially – that the observer’s subjectivity affects what is knowable. Therefore we must begin by accepting that the view of the many is already inseparable from the subjective understandings of the observer. Our Founding Fathers stepped on this land with a belief that they were objective and separate from the people that were already here; so that is what they saw.