English High School - Blue and Blue / Record Yearbook (Boston, MA)

Page 16 text:

Our KespomibiHty to the Juture It ' s all over now, the last and toughest year. We saw a lot of things in that year. We saw the continuance of a war that seemed to be only practice for the real thing that ' s to come, we watched a new administration try to remedy the ills of the country, but foremost we witnessed the sight of citizens on trial at- tempting to evade punishment by squeezing themselves through loopholes in the law and shielding themselves by appealing to citizenship rights that they don ' t deserve. This disregard for American principles smears the name of democracy. You and 1 have Constitutional rights too; and since we are going to hcr. ' e more cause to use them now, we should stop to think about their significance. Most of us feel that our rights are just something we received at birth as a mat- ter of course without any obligation. That ' s the way too many people feel: that these privileges are theirs free of charge to disregard or misrepresent as they please. If this idea continues, these privileges will become meaningless and Congress will have to make new restrictions on the rights which are so neces- soTy to freedom. We can help to make sure that this doesn ' t happen, for as we gradually as- sume the privileges of adult citizenship we can make sure that we fulfill our obligations by realizing the importance and necessity of fully appreciating and using these grants of liberty. It ' s up to us — to all high school graduates to see to it that those rights remain. Peter Sweetland, ' 53 Editor EHS