Americans

(Based on an excerpt from a speech I gave at the Houston NORML 420 Fest last night, advocating political action)
When I was growing up, my mother told me to always be nice and not to cause trouble. But when civil rights or liberties are threatened, I have to ignore Momma, and be aggressive, if not downright rude, and cause lots of trouble. Why? Because I am an American.
Americans once had a flag with the picture of a rattlesnake and the motto "Don't Tread on Me". They dressed up as Indians, illegally seized a legitimate merchant ship and destroyed its valuable cargo of tea by throwing it in the harbor. They stood on the Lexington Green and exchanged fire with government troops coming to take their arms.
Americans created a government of "We, The People", destroying kings and other rulers.
Henry David Thoreau was an American when he sat in the Concord jail for not paying a tax to support the Fugitive Slave Act and chided Ralph Waldo Emerson for being outside. His greatest disciple, the American Martin Luther King, Jr., wrote "A Letter from the Birmingham Jail".
American veterans in 1930 marched in the tens of thousands to Washington after the Great Depression destroyed their jobs. They lived in the parks and public spaces, demanding that Congress pay their promised pensions from the Great War and create jobs. They stayed, in spite of a cavalry charge by Douglas MacArthur and the U. S. Army, until Congress met their demands.
In the 1950s and 60s, Americans rode in the fronts of buses, sat in forbidden lunchcounters, crossed the bridge in Selma in the face of police with clubs, dogs and firehoses. In the 60s and 70s, Americans told LBJ: "Hell, no! We won't go!" and surrounded the Pentagon with flowers.
Walt Disney quoted an American (and Texan), Davy Crockett, as saying: "Be sure you're right, then go ahead."
We are sure we are right on marijuana, so, as Americans, we must move ahead. To quote another group of Americans, The Beasty Boys, we must "Fight for our right to party!"