The Mayflower Compact turns 400 and A Medal of Honor recipient is remembered on Veteran’s Day.

Four hundred years ago this week, on November 11, 1620, one hundred two men and women landed on the shores of the modern Cape Cod, MA. Most of them were part of a group of Protestant separatists who were members of a church in England from a village called Scrooby. They sailed across the Atlantic Ocean on a ship called The Mayflower.

From the very beginning, not everyone got along with each other. There were sharp disagreements and crimes were committed one against another. They had left behind a land where the King of England dictated his pleasure as the law of the land. When the early Plymouth settlers realized they must have some sort of governance that would provide protection, justice, and order among themselves, they did not reach back to what they knew in the Divine Right of Kings.

Instead, they wrote a charter known as The Mayflower Compact that formed what they called, “the civil body politic.” This new community would be framed by what they wrote in the Compact as “just and equal laws.” These laws would apply to all of them equally and without partiality.

The signers of the Mayflower Compact did not seek a theocracy or some sort of religious test for citizenship in the community. Rather, anchored by a personal and voluntary faith in God, they sought a political consensus that was sustainable and grew over time to allow a self-sustaining economy to take shape. These Pilgrims were among the first to establish a government experiment by the consent of the governed and set the stage for a constitution that would establish a new nation 167 years later.

This week was also the time our country remembers and thanks the many men and women who have served in the armed forces of the United States. Of special note this week was an American hero born in my home state of Louisiana in 1901. From the streets of New Orleans to the United States Naval Academy, Thomas Ryan served with distinction as a member of the Brigade of Midshipmen.

One year after graduation at the age of 21, Thomas was sent to Toyko, Japan to serve as a Japanese Language Officer at the United States Embassy. On September 1, 1923 at 11:58 a.m. the first shock of a massive earthquake hit the island of Japan. Those who heard it said it sounded like thunder. The Great Kanto Earthquake had begun.

Moments later, a 40-foot-high tsunami crashed on the city sweeping thousands to their deaths. Fires began to break out and roared through the wooden houses of both Yokohama and Tokyo burning everything—and everyone—in their path. Thomas Ryan was standing outside The Grand Hotel near the center of the Toyko when he saw a woman known only in history as Mrs. Slack trapped near the top floor.

The young American Naval officer immediately ran directly into the fire, ran up the stairs with flames raging on every side, put the woman on his shoulders and carried her to safety.

Hundreds of Japanese citizens watched him risk his own life for a woman he did not know from a country not his own. His heroic actions resulted in President Calvin Coolidge awarding him the Medal of Honor. His citation reads, “his heroic conduct upon this occasion reflects the greatest credit on himself and on the U.S. Navy, of which he is a part.”