National Medal Of Honor Day

“For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.”

“Greater love has no one than this, to lay down one’s life for his friends.” (John 15:13)

On March 25th, we celebrate National Medal of Honor Day, an opportunity to recognize the recipients of our nation’s highest military award and to honor their extraordinary service and sacrifice on behalf of their brothers in arms, in keeping with their oaths “to support and defend” our Constitution and the American Liberty it enshrines.

It marks the anniversary observance of the First Medals awarded on March 25, 1863.

Since those first medals were awarded, American presidents and military commanders have, in the name of Congress, presented 3,535 Medals to 3,516 recipients, a very elite few among the almost 40 million American veterans who have served our nation since 1861. During that time, there have been 19 double recipients.

At the dawn of our nation, Thomas Jefferson declared: “Honor, justice, and humanity, forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity have a right to receive from us. We cannot endure the infamy and guilt of resigning succeeding generations to that wretchedness which inevitably awaits them if we basely entail hereditary bondage on them.”

As for those who today enjoy these freedoms with no acknowledgement or respect for those who paid the ultimate price for them, I invoke the words of Samuel Adams: “Contemplate the mangled bodies of your countrymen, and then say, ‘What should be the reward of such sacrifices?’ … If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animating contest of freedom, go from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands, which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen!”