Restoring America's (and Oregon's) Soul

A Campaign Essay for Russ McAlmond's U.S. Senate Bid in Oregon

In an age when individual rights are under relentless assault by ideologies that prioritize group identities, collective entitlements, and government control over personal liberty, Oregon Republicans must reclaim the philosophical bedrock of our nation. No thinker shaped the American experiment more profoundly than John Locke, the English philosopher whose ideas directly inspired Thomas Jefferson's immortal words in the Declaration of Independence.

For Russ McAlmond—a U.S. Marine veteran, businessman, and common-sense conservative running for U.S. Senate in 2026—understanding Locke's triad of natural rights is not abstract history. It is the battle plan to defeat the creeping collectivism that threatens Oregon families, farms, and freedoms.

Republicans must stand unapologetically for individual rights rooted in God-given reason, or watch America become just another failed European-style experiment in class warfare and group grievance.

John Locke (1632–1704) was a devout Christian, raised in a Puritan household and deeply influenced by biblical teachings on human dignity as God's creation. Yet Locke did not rely on blind faith alone. He taught that God, in His infinite wisdom, endowed every human being with the gift of reason—the "law of nature" written in our hearts—to discern the proper form of governance that promotes true human flourishing.

As Locke wrote in his Second Treatise of Government, the state of nature is governed by a law of nature "which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind... that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions."

These rights flow directly from our Creator: "men being all the workmanship of one omnipotent, and infinitely wise maker... they are his property." Government exists not to grant rights or engineer outcomes for favored groups, but solely to secure these unalienable protections for every individual.

Locke saw reason as the divine tool enabling us to pursue happiness—not as fleeting pleasure, but as the "careful and constant pursuit of true and solid happiness" aligned with virtue and God's moral order. At the heart of Locke's philosophy stands the sacred triad of individual rights: life, liberty, and private property (which he often called "estate" or "possessions," including the property each person has in his own body and labor).

Life is the right to self-preservation, protected from arbitrary harm. Liberty is the freedom to order one's actions without dependence on another's will. Property is the fruit of one's labor—"every man has a property in his own person: this no body has any right to but himself. The labour of his body, and the work of his hands... are properly his."

These are not government inventions or collective grants; they are natural, pre-political, and universal. Individuals enter society via a social contract based on consent, surrendering only the minimal power necessary to protect these rights. If government becomes tyrannical and violates them, the people have the right—and duty—to alter or abolish it.

This was revolutionary: rights belong to persons, not classes, races, religions, or collectives. Every soul stands equal before God and the law.Thomas Jefferson distilled Locke's vision into the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

Jefferson, drawing directly from Locke's Second Treatise and Essay Concerning Human Understanding, substituted "pursuit of Happiness" for "property" to emphasize the broader flourishing Locke described—yet the foundation remained identical.

The Continental Congress echoed Locke almost verbatim in earlier resolves: colonists are "entitled to life, liberty and property." Locke's justification for revolution against abusive power became the moral justification for American independence. The United States was the first—and only—nation in history explicitly founded on this Lockean triad.

No divine-right kings, no hereditary classes, no state-imposed group privileges. Just individuals, equal in the eyes of God, free to pursue their God-given potential.This philosophy produced the most successful, prosperous, and productive nation the world has ever known.

America's unparalleled innovation, wealth creation, and opportunity flowed from protecting individual rights to life, liberty, and property. Millions of immigrants came not for government handouts but for the chance to own their labor's fruits.

Contrast this with the collectivist experiments of old Europe—feudal classism, Marxist socialism, and ethnic scapegoating—that repeatedly collapsed into tyranny and poverty. Socialism replaces individual rights with group "entitlements" and state redistribution, treating people as cogs in a class struggle rather than sovereign souls.

Antisemitism, like other forms of collective prejudice, mirrors this European disease: it judges individuals not by their character or actions but by group identity, violating Locke's core teaching that rights inhere in persons, not collectives.

Both are un-American abominations that echo the very classism and tribalism our founders rejected. Republicans must oppose them fiercely, for they erode the individual dignity that made America exceptional.

Today, these founding values are being systematically replaced. Progressive ideologies push "group rights," equity over equality, and collective identities that pit Americans against one another by race, class, gender, or grievance. Socialism promises security through state control of property and liberty, while identity politics fragments the "one people" Jefferson envisioned into warring tribes.

In Oregon and across America, this shift has brought rising crime, stifled enterprise, eroded family farms, and cultural decay—precisely the failures Locke warned against when government forgets its sole purpose: securing individual rights.

Russ McAlmond understands this. As a Marine who defended individual freedom abroad and a principled conservative fighting for common-sense solutions at home, he embodies the Republican commitment to Locke's vision.

McAlmond rejects the radical left's collectivism and the extremes that divide us. His campaign calls Oregonians back to first principles: government exists to protect life, liberty, and property—not to redistribute wealth, enforce group quotas, or redefine rights as privileges for favored classes.

By electing McAlmond to the U.S. Senate in 2026, Oregon Republicans can send a clear message: We will not surrender the Declaration's promise. We will defend the God-given, reason-discerned rights that made America the envy of the world.

The choice is ours. Will we honor the Christian philosopher who taught us to use God-given reason for human flourishing, or let collectivism replace individual liberty with European-style class warfare? John Locke, Thomas Jefferson, and every patriot who signed that Declaration demand we choose rightly.

For the sake of our children, our prosperity, and our republic—stand with Russ McAlmond. Reclaim the triad. Restore the Republic. America’s founding values are not relics; they were the most unique ideas a nation was ever founded on that allowed every individual the right to pursue their happiness.