Thinking and Leadership Training

We have arrived at the eleventh and final principle of Marine Corps Leadership: seek responsibilities and take responsibility. The idea of responsibility asserted in this leadership principle is comparable to the ideas of duty and obligation, but there is another, compatible meaning one may attach to “responsibility” that can cast some light on the idea…

In September, we published “On Honor, Courage, and Commitment” as the first essay for the Al Gray Marine Leadership Forum at Carolina Museum of the Marine. Last month, we followed with “Self-Possession” which is intended to describe this important quality to be developed in people who are able competently to govern themselves and to contribute…

In September, we published “On Honor, Courage, and Commitment.” The piece was written in two parts: the first describes the natures of honor, courage, and commitment, identifying them as virtues, and the second discusses the nature of virtue in general, how virtues may be acquired, and how they guide conduct. This is a first step…

United States Marines are distinguished for many achievements, and we may reasonably say that their accomplishments follow in a direct line from the kinds of people the Marine Corps seeks to develop: men and women marked by the core values of honor, courage, and commitment. These values provide a firm foundation for the three important…

In our American colonial period, the colonies were populated over time by people from various parts of England, from Scotland and Ireland, and there were people here from France, Spain, and elsewhere. For quite some time, however, the majority of the inhabitants of the colonies of British America were from Britain. Of course, there were…

 In the last issue of “Front and Center,” we introduced the two understandings of political order that comprise the general structure of American political history. The earlier political order, which may be called “Jeffersonian,” lasted from 1776 to 1861. The later political order, which may be called “Lincolnian,” was firmly in place in 1865 and…

There is a story one hears occasionally about Benjamin Franklin strolling along a street in Philadelphia after the convention of 1787 when a lady, concerned about the future of our country, asks Franklin what kind of government the delegates to the convention had given to Americans. Franklin’s reply to the lady was, we are told,…

Basil L. Gildersleeve was born October 23, 1831 in Charleston, South Carolina. He was among the first Americans to earn a German doctorate in Gottingen University. In 1856, Gildersleeve was appointed professor of Greek, and later of Latin, also, in the University of Virginia. During the war of 1861-65, Gildersleeve taught classes in the fall…

On May 31, 1775, the citizens of Mecklenburg County, North Carolina seceded from the British Empire. They did this through a series of five resolutions called the Mecklenburg Resolves that were published in the North Carolina Gazette in New Bern on June 16, 1775. (At the time, New Bern was the capital of North Carolina.)…

The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union is the first constitution of the United States. When the colonies of British America secured their independence from Great Britain, each colony became a free, sovereign, and independent nation, a fact that is expressly recognized by the British government in the Treaty of Paris in 1783. Americans at…

With the publication of the Declaration of Independence, we may say that we come to the beginning of the United States as a union of mature political societies. Of course, we could have an interesting and probably interminable conversation about the origins of the United States if we look for what we might call the “seeds” of the people from England…