It begins: “The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America.” This is the reason for our 4th of July celebration. It is by this document that we clearly understand the actions needed in order to obtain liberty. Therefore, our celebration should be to recognize what the founders understood independence to be – the building block of a great nation.
Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, Hamilton, Adams, et al, sought to bring about an end to despotism; to break away from the rule of George III and establish individual sovereign colonies.
Americans sought independence not only from Great Britain, after all, but also from military occupation, royal overseers, arbitrary laws, taxation without representation, and—as it says in the Declaration of Independence—everything that “evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism.” But in doing so they also were declaring their unity—or interdependence—as a people, a compact of states, and a new nation. Independence implied at the same time separation as well as the creation of a new and independent country, living and governing by its own means and according to its own ways. [“America’s Founders and the Principles of Foreign Policy: Sovereign Independence, National Interests, and the Cause of Liberty in the World.” Published on October 15, 2010 by Matthew Spalding, Ph.D.]
These men who were willing to sacrifice their lives in the pursuit of the principles of liberty and freedom sought to form an association of individual men who understood that these ideals required belief in one self and in God. That to form a great nation required sacrifice and perseverance. Therefore, let us celebrate the ideals of liberty and freedom. Let us remember and live by the words of the Declaration of Independence: that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
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