In the desire to realize a strong and free community of the American peoples, there is need to take seriously the words of Graça Aranha, the Brazilian philosopher: “All progress is an aspiration toward freedom. This is the true fulcrum, the stimulus, the reason for being of a society…. The search for freedom and its realization as the foundation of community is the end of all existence…. Freedom is like life itself, it is born and grows in pain.”
The concern for the achievement of the fullest realization of the meaning of freedom has been the strongest unifying force within the countries and between the people of the Americas. “We recognize,” wrote the great Venezuelan philosopher and Chilean educator Andrés Bello, “the American spirit, the love of freedom and of humanity.” “Culture,” stated Antonio Caso of Mexico, “is not conceived without freedom. Only in an environment of freedom is the work of civilization able to mature.”