Classification Essay: Where to? What next?

We can summarize the American dream in seven assumptions, some of them where present
from the beginning but some started to become evident as the nation grew and stablish itself.
The American Dream remains alive, but how much and how well depends on where it’s has
been. The American dream must now take place in a global village. Living in isolation is no
longer a possibility, and therefore makes it important to consider the following suppositions:

 The American Dream will continue to emphasize new beginnings

The United States is much more conservative than it was in the 1960s and 70s the only sure
thing about social attitudes is that people change though not necessarily for the better, it
seems clear that the United States has lived through the transition from optimism to a realism
that often turned into disillusionment. Today's Americans condition is more ambiguous and
ambivalent. The American self images is still confident and yet Americans have plenty of
reasons for uneasiness about the future. This condition can be track to some of the earliest
American dreams, the first pilgrims dreamed of establishing a new Israel, the idea of America as
a promised land were chosen people could begin life anew has been part of the dream ever
since these early settlers.

Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine were two influential spokesmen who focused awareness
on America's potential to provide an example and leadership for the world they promoted
dreams that still inspired. Franklin's autobiography encourages people to seek personal
improvement, to find the road to wealth and consequently to power. Franklin's inspirational
advices for the individual were supplemented by Paine’s encouragement to the colonies as a
whole, linking the cause of America to the cause of all mankind. Later as Americans prospered
materially, expanded geographically and gain confidence with their democratic ideals it was
natural for them to preserve and to extend these visions of America. It wasn’t long before they
realized that the talk about new beginnings is easy but actually to make them is far more
difficult. The sense of new beginnings is vital to the American dream.

 The American Dream is base on the declaration of independence and the constitution,
but it can’t be assumed that democracy can meet every expectation placed upon it

Second the American dream rests upon the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution
but no longer can it be assumed that American democracy can meet every expectation that
may be placed upon it. Americans have always harbored something of a suspicion of
government if not of each other but even when suspicious most of them have believed that the
political institutions of the United States are unrivaled these institutions most Americans are
convinced help to fulfill the promises of human nature by providing equal opportunity freedom
and justice for all too. Many Americans think that the declaration and the Constitution are
virtually sacred texts, specifying independence and representative democracy to safeguard and
extend individual liberty they seem to bear well the high expectations placed upon them, in fact
that dream is partly truth and partly fiction. The founding father: Hamilton, Madison, Jefferson
and the others, were convinced that the origin of the United States did constitute a landmark in
political achievement, they saw the declaration and the Constitution not as guarantees of
everyone's happiness but only as giving people a chance for fulfillment. Too often later
generations learn the difference, in recent times, however the existence of that difference has
become clear again. The difficulty is to see whether the American dream can orient itself
between expectations that are too much or too little.

 The American Dream will still place the individual’s pursuit of happiness as the most
important value, but it can’t be assumed the communal good will be thereby
enhanced.

The third assumption that I think maybe worth thinking about is that the American dream will
still place a premium on the individual's pursuit of happiness but no longer can it be easily
expected that the communal good will be enhanced. Emerson believed that a man must be a
nonconformist and Thoreau insisted that the only obligation which an individual has is a right to
assume that what he or she thinks is right, these teachers encourage America by teaching self-
reliance and personal integrity. In doing so they encouraged, unintentionally as well as
intentionally, the individual pursuit of happiness that is so fundamental to the American dream,
they recognized the variety of goals to the universe that they sought for American life if every
person truly pursued his or her own way, they thought the result would not be chaos but rather
creativity calm and serene. Emerson and Thoreau added a self-critical cutting view to the
American dream they warned against the selfishness passive acceptance, corruption and
slavery that could wreck their aspirations for the United States. Nonetheless they may not have
emphasize enough that even if those defects can be removed, there is no assurance that
pluralism and diversity will not be costly.

 The American Dream will Continue to insist that there are open frontiers and vast
opportunities in the future, but no longer can the future be regarded as unlimited

1. Success led to complacency about the cost factors that transactions carry with
them
2. Nothing is free, scarcity is real, and economic instability erodes wealth.

Forth, the American dream will continue to insist that there are open frontiers and vast
opportunities to be seized but no longer can the future be regarded as unlimited big business.
The American dream encourage the idea that the sky was the limit. The United States industries
and business seemed able to produce wealth enough to make it clear that the path to upward
mobility was open to all, enrichment was a good, moreover with hard work or little luck and
special privilege it was available to anyone. It was thought America's position, resources,
technology, and trade would enable Americans to shatter the myth of scarcity and to eliminate
poverty. America’s success sometimes was leaded to complacency if not blindness about the
cost factors. The social cost, as well as the financial that their transactions carried with them
has sometimes remain hidden. Nothing is free, now that fact has become obvious, with the
realization that scarcities are real and the economic instability, much of it fueled by greed, can
erode wealth as fast as individuals can created it. Today's costly demands for energy make it
clear that almost everything Americans want to do is going to cost more and thus it is going to
be harder and harder to do everything they want to do. That realization necessitates urgent
decisions, and history is conspiring to put to the test America’s ability for innovation and
altruism.

 The American Dream will still stress both material success and the possibility of moral
progress, but no longer can it assume the two easily nurture each other.

Fifth, the American dream will still emphasize both material success and the possibility of moral
progress but no longer can't assume that the two easily nurture each other. George Santayana
wondered whether materialism or idealism was at the heart of American character, most
Americans might answer that both are, and in doing so they would make the point that material
success and moral progress, can and often do go hand-in-hand. That perspective is not entirely
false, the United States has used its material prosperity as well as any other human society to
promote education, to ensure a democratic government, and to make opportunity more than a
cliché. But American systems of education and government have obviously not eliminated
inflexibility unresponsiveness and inequity. Moreover, whereas American ingenuity industrial
productivity and technological expertise have raised standards of living for many people an
increasingly exploited environment both rural and urban may prove to high a price to pay.
Material success does not guarantee the highest qualities of life, although it may be impossible
to have a high quality of live without a good measure of material success. The connections
between the way to wealth and a rich life in its moral and spiritual dimensions are difficult to
located or control. If it is correct to say that materialistic and idealistic desires can be found at
the base of American character, the dilemma of their relationships and priorities still presents a
problem to the American dream.

 The American Dream will continue to proclaim that all people are regarded as
fundamentally equal, but no longer will Americans be ignorant of the irony and
complexity introduced into their lives by that claim.

Sixth, the American dream will continue to proclaim that all persons must be regarded as
fundamentally equal, but no longer can Americans be innocently unaware of the irony and
complexity that that claim introduces. American ideals promised an open land and a lot of
people crossed oceans to seek opportunity, these new arrivals, millions of them brought as
slaves kept building the country, but when Americans began to see the newcomers as threats
there was great effort to restrict them. Nonetheless the nation grew facing many conflicts
between ethnic and religious groups. Added to these complexities are ongoing and even
intensified concerns about the elderly, women, and children not to mention the thousands of
Mexican citizens who enter the United States illegally every year.
The current issue about abortion in the United States is an example of this. Americans are
divided at times violently between those who believe that abortion violates a right to life and
those who believe that to make abortion illegal, is to deny a woman her right to liberty and the
pursuit of happiness. We must not forget that the American dream originated in the debate
over human rights and it seems that the dream keeps that struggle as important as ever. Once
separate but equal was thought to be sufficient to guarantee the rights of African-Americans.
The dream helped prove that believe insufficient, also women did not have the right to vote the
dream help them obtain it, and it will continue to promote their struggle for opportunity and
equality. True, laws do not automatically change attitudes or alter social and economic realities
the voices protesting the dream deferred attest to that. Paradoxically though the very
persistence of such voices suggests that the American dream is still alive and potent.
“I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed
we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal”. That was Martin Luther
Kings hope. He helped to show the multiple ways in which attitudes of superiority, mistrust,
and selfishness undermine American proclamations about the equality and create division
instead, in doing so however their voices did not abandon the dream, instead its inspiration
continues to nurture hope that by sharing and understanding differences spirit of openness
respect and equality can still be found

 The American dream will still assert that human rights must be real, but can no longer
assume that the dream, including the value it places on freedom of choice and human
rights, is guaranteed a future, yet alone fulfillment in the world

Seven and last the American dream will still assert that human rights must be real, but no
longer can it assume that the dream including the value it places on freedom of choice and
human rights is guaranteed to future, let alone fulfillment in the world speaking about
American experience the historian James Truslow Adams wrote that “the epic loses all its glory
without the dream” the dream has placed a premium on the rights to life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness and from time to time Americans may have had intimations of their
dreams immortality within human history however no nation seems to last forever and the
threats that engulfed the world make us all, Americans included, acutely aware of how fragile
and vulnerable life liberty and the pursuit of happiness can be it was prodigious, said Nat
Turner, that we come as far as we did that we nearly took Jerusalem what shall become of the
American dream in the 1990s and perhaps beyond. Power holds one of the keys to answer that
question but everything depends on who controls it what ends it serves and the means
employed to pursue them answers to those questions must be awaited anxiously meanwhile
the American dream hangs on