We all grow up with a vision of what is right and just in this world. Many, if not most, of us grow up with the idea of pursuing “the American Dream”. For some that has meant the pursuit, as when it was first enunciated in 1931 by James Truslow Adams, of achieving a “better, richer, and happier life”. In his book, The Epic of America, Adams stated it this way:
that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement. It is a difficult dream for the European upper classes to interpret adequately, and too many of us ourselves have grown weary and mistrustful of it. It is not a dream of motor cars and high wages merely, but a dream of social order in which each man and each woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position.
Oddly, in view of today’s circumstances, Mr. Adams was a banker.