America at risk: can we survive without moral values?

• Author: Bennett, William J.
• Position: Cover Story

NOVELIST Walker Percy once was asked what concerned him most about the future of America. He responded: "Probably the fear of seeing America, with all its great strength and beauty and freedom gradually subside into decay through default and be defeated, not by the Communist movement but from within by weariness, boredom, cynicism, greed and in the end helplessness before its great problems."

The social science data confirm Percy's concerns. They are uncomfortably close to becoming reality.

Since 1960, the U.S. population has grown 41%, the gross domestic product nearly has tripled, and total levels of social spending by all levels of government (measured in constant 1990 dollars) have risen from $143,730,000,000 to $787,000,000,000--more than a fivefold increase. During the same 34-year period, there has been a more than 500% rise in violent crime; a greater than 400% hike in illegitimate births; a tripling of the percentage of children living in single-parent homes; a threefold increase in teenage suicides; a doubling in the divorce rate; and a drop of almost 75 points in SAT scores.

No institution has suffered more during this period than the American family. Today, 30% of all births and almost 70% of all black births are to unmarried females. By the end of the century, according to the most reliable projections, 40% of all births and 80% of minority births will be out of wedlock. In a few years, illegitimacy will surpass divorce as the main cause of fatherlessness in the U.S.

These figures have frightening social implications, but should not cause Americans to despair. Instead, they should stir the nation.

There are three brief explanations for what accounts for America's social regression. The first has to do with a marked shift in the public's attitudes. According to social scientist James Q. Wilson, "The powers exercised by the institutions of social control have been constrained, and people, especially young people, have embraced an ethos that values self-expression over self-control."

During the last quarter-century, the American people increasingly have abandoned time-honored moral codes. The U.S. now is seeing the results being played out on urban streets and in hospital emergency rooms, the courts, and classrooms.

A second is that a number of pernicious ideas made their way into the mainstream of American life. It became unfashionable to make value judgments. The nation witnessed an expansive notion of "rights" and an attenuated sense of personal responsibility. "If it feels good, do it"; "Do your own thing"; and "You only go around once in life, so you have to grab all the gusto you can" became...