Tuesday is July 4th… the day we celebrate the signing of the Declaration of Independence, perhaps the most consequential document ever written. It made America possible.
Have you ever actually read it?
Before the long weekend is gone, please take five minutes to read the Declaration (3 pages, 1,320 words) and really understand what all the fuss was really all 247 years ago.
The signers list grievances against a government they did not choose that will make many of our complaints pale in comparison; especially since we are also blessed with a constitution that allows peaceful change without violence, rebellion, or insurrection; something that the extremists on the Left and Right of today appear to have forgotten. The signers understood, as many today do not, that the Declaration and the Constitution made it possible for us to have our say, but not always to get our way, and when we don’t, to work for it peacefully.
The signers were the ultimate protesters, rebelling against the mightiest nation on the planet with the best standing army in the world at the literal risk of their lives. As Benjamin Franklin, one of the signers remarked at the time of the irrevocable choice they had just made, “We must all hang together or most assuredly, we will all hang separately.“
The Declaration of Independence was our indispensable American moment. Read it start to finish and you’ll probably be one of the few Americans who have.
It’s what makes us Americans.
Please forward it, especially to the young people in your life.
