Thank you to Linuxhippie.
No, hold is not ‘apprehension’. That treats hold as though it means simply to grasp intellectually. But in the Declaration, the phrase is ‘We hold these truths…’ not We ‘apprehend’ these truths. Historically, hold certainly includes the idea of maintaining a judgment or conviction - but crucially, it carries a much stronger fiduciary and custodial sense that my work emphasizes because those fiduciary and custodial failures (which are at root pedagogical ones) are why the Republic is in its current state, with its defences taken out. Think about ordinary English: We hold office. We hold property in trust. We hold the line. We hold a commission. We hold a position. We hold someone to their oath. None of these merely describe a mental event. They describe a continuing obligation of stewardship. The significance is that the Declaration is not merely reporting an opinion - a historical consensus. It is declaring ahistorical constants which are the ground upon which political authority is to be exercised. That ground under those constants is what provides political legitimacy. Political orders which violate those constants are illegitimate because they have not remained bound to those truths. The pedagogical sequence (which needs to inform education for public office/service) is this: Reality presents truths that are knowable. Those truths are recognized. They are then heldNo, hold is not ‘apprehension’. That treats hold as though it means simply to grasp intellectually. But in the Declaration, the phrase is ‘We hold these truths…’ not We ‘apprehend’ these truths. Historically, hold certainly includes the idea of maintaining a judgment or…
— CJ the palmer worm; wife,mother, researcher. (@thepalmerworm) July 30, 2026
maintained as binding
“I do solemnly swear”…..”I pledge my life, honour etc” And because they are held in fiduciary trust, they are the standard by which government is judged. Thereby public office remains a fiduciary trust ordered toward preserving and conserving (not redefining and rejecting) those truths. And you can see the relationship of that to the constitutional language that follows. Public officials don’t receive authority to renegotiate first principles; they receive authority under them. Activists and revolutionaries however……and the political apparatus and organs of state have been under revolutionary occupation for over a century.
Recognition receives the truth. Holding binds the person to it. Isn’t it both astonishing and appalling that Education and Professional Training has failed to teach this basic principle and practise of national defence
and of professional integrity, not to mention the civic responsibility of self governance for all citizens.
Nobody says a judge ‘apprehends’ his office. He holds it, meaning he bears an ongoing fiduciary obligation. Likewise, the Declaration’s ‘We hold these truths…’ are much more than an intellectual acknowledgment. The moral obligation of self governance in the upholding and defence of civic liberty. It is a public commitment that these truths will remain (We Hold) THE governing standard against which political action is measured. It’s why academia and education abandoning/confounding self-evident truths is not simply making an ‘intellectual mistake’. It is a breach of fiduciary trust and a dereliction of duty. Once those truths are no longer held, office itself changes its purpose; from stewardship under antecedent reality to usurping and revolutionary authority over reality. That is precisely the jurisdictional inversion the Founders stated explicitly must be guarded against through ‘vigilance’ (George Washington) regarding enemies ‘foreign and domestic’. To ‘hold’ is the utmost obedience to duty, not to self. I think I need to prepare an article on the fiduciary nature of ‘We Hold’.
