Independence Day
Today is a day of celebration and a day of remembrance.
It is a day of parades, barbeques, beaches, family and fireworks. It is also a day to cherish the values we hold dear as Americans and to appreciate the sacrifices many generations have given to make this day possible.
I want to wish you a Happy July 4th. If you have a moment on this festive occasion to reflect on the meaning of Independence Day, please read the following passage beneath my signature. It was written 230 years ago and is quite a powerful reminder of what it means to be an American.
If you have a comment about what Independence Day means to you, please post it here. I look forward to reading your thoughts.
The Declaration of Independence of the United States of America
Action of Second
Continental Congress,
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen United States of America
WHEN in the Course of
human events, it becomes
necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected
them with another, and to assume, among the Powers of the earth, the separate
and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them,
a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare
the causes which impel them to the separation.
WE hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that
among these are Life,
HE has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for
the public good.
HE has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing
importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be
obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
HE has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large
districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of
Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable
to tyrants only.
HE has called together legislative bodies at places unusual,
uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the
sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
HE has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with
manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
HE has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others
to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have
returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the
mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions
within.
HE has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that
purpose obstructing the Laws of Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass
others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new
Appropriations of Lands.
HE has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent
to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
HE has made judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their
offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
HE has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of
Officers to harass our People, and eat out their substance.
HE has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the
Consent of our legislatures.
HE has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to
the Civil Power.
HE has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to
our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their
Acts of pretended legislation:
FOR quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
FOR protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders
which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
FOR cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
FOR imposing taxes on us without our Consent:
FOR depriving us, in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
FOR transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
FOR abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring
Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its
Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for
introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
FOR taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and
altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
FOR suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested
with Power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
HE has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection
and waging War against us.
HE has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and
destroyed the lives of our people.
HE is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to
compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with
circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most
barbarous ages, and totally unworthy of the Head of a civilized nation.
HE has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to
bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends
and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
HE has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to
bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose
known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and
conditions.
IN every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in
the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by
repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which
may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free People.
NOR have We been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have
warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an
unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances
of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice
and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to
disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and
correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of
consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces
our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War,
in Peace Friends.
WE, therefore, the Representatives of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, in
GENERAL CONGRESS, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for
the Rectitude of our Intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good
People of these Colonies, solemnly Publish and Declare, That these United
Colonies are, and of Right ought to be, FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES; that they
are absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political
Connection between them and the State of Great-Britain, is and ought to be
totally dissolved; and that as FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES, they have full
Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and
to do all other Acts and Things which INDEPENDENT STATES may of right do. And
for the support of this Declaration, with a firm Reliance on the Protection of
divine
Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our
Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.
John Hancock.
GEORGIA, Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, Geo. Walton.
NORTH-CAROLINA, Wm. Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn.
SOUTH-CAROLINA, Edward Rutledge, Thos Heyward, junr., Thomas Lynch, junr.,
Arthur Middleton.
MARYLAND, Samuel Chase, Wm. Paca, Thos.
Stone, Charles Carroll, of
VIRGINIA, George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Ths. Jefferson, Benja. Harrison,
Thos. Nelson, jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton.
PENNSYLVANIA, Robt. Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benja. Franklin, John Morton, Geo. Clymer, Jas. Smith, Geo. Taylor, James Wilson, Geo. Ross.
DELAWARE, Caesar Rodney, Geo. Read.
NEW-YORK, Wm. Floyd, Phil. Livingston, Frank Lewis, Lewis Morris.
NEW-JERSEY, Richd. Stockton, Jno. Witherspoon, Fras. Hopkinson, John Hart,
Abra. Clark.
NEW-HAMPSHIRE, Josiah Bartlett, Wm. Whipple, Matthew Thornton.
MASSACHUSETTS-BAY, Saml. Adams, John Adams, Robt. Treat Paine, Elbridge
Gerry.
RHODE-ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE, C. Step. Hopkins, William Ellery.
CONNECTICUT, Roger Sherman, Saml. Huntington,
Wm. Williams, Oliver Wolcott.
First of all, after seeing our wonderful Morgan Hill Parade and Celebration, which is SO American, I am reminded that I am incredibly blessed to live in the USA. When the crowd spontaneously stood and cheered when our Military men and women marched by, I was reminded of the Patriotism this people possess. And it is my birthday too!
Posted by: Swanee A. Edwards | July 04, 2006 at 02:49 PM
God bless Jerry and his team!
Posted by: Swanee A. Edwards | July 04, 2006 at 02:50 PM
"...That TO SECURE THESE RIGHTS, [not to pay themselves & their friends well] Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their JUST powers [not whatever they feel like doing] FROM THE CONSENT OF THE GOVERNED [not from wealth, power, or secrecy], That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE [not crime, not treason] TO ALTER OR ABOLISH IT and to institute new Government....
Posted by: jane gordon | July 04, 2006 at 03:09 PM
My observations about the Fourth of July are a bit jumbled. When people talk of patriotism, of love of country, of pride in being American, I think what stirs in their memories are the rich feelings for family and friends and neighborhoods. Those memories resonate with thoughts about places they vacationed as children, places they hung out as teenagers, indeed all the places they have belonged to: school hallways, the activities at the center of town, and many other attachments like that.
But I also see those same people seemingly give up those memories in favor of media-driven images that do not express those feelings or memories. Those intimate feelings merge into the images of political entities presented to them through media. When that happens, the sense of community, of how we are all in this together, disappears and they see only symbols and stirring anthems, images of people-like-us suffering, images of people-like-them enraged, on and on. They can no longer distinguish between what they identify with directly and those mediated caricatures of the larger realities that concern the political and business leaders of our nation.
The result is that the natural and noble sentiments that arise from the real experience of direct community become so terribly susceptible to being hijacked by the agendas of those leaders.
I say this because that's what has happened in the case of this Iraq war. If you criticize the government, you are accused of being unpatriotic and that you harm the servicemen. That common sense of community which is the real patriotism has no place anymore in such discussions.
So this day I will celebrate that sense of community that is the real patritoism, but knowing how very ambivalent I feel about patriotism on this July 4th.
Posted by: Jon Beckler | July 04, 2006 at 03:39 PM
It is the VETERAN, not the preacher,
who has given us freedom of religion.
It is the VETERAN, not the reporter,
who has given us freedom of the press.
It is the VETERAN, not the poet,
who has given us freedom of speech.
It is the VETERAN, not the campus organizer,
who has given us freedom to assemble.
It is the VETERAN, not the lawyer,
who has given us the right to a fair trial.
It is the VETERAN, not the politician,
Who has given us the right to vote.
Posted by: Bob Handy | July 04, 2006 at 05:36 PM
In how many ways is our current "King George" like the one this responded to? I saw quite a few!
Independence Day for me is about remembering those who made our Independence possible and honoring the people who make it possible today. Bringing home those who are being put in harm's way for the wrong reasons would be a fine way to honor our Founders, our Veterans, our Nation, and our Heroes. Let's make America beautiful in our eyes and in the eyes of the world again.
Posted by: Joy Montgomery | July 04, 2006 at 07:00 PM
"We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately" - Ben Franklin, at the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
Our founding fathers knew what it meant to have the courage of their convictions.
Posted by: John Williams | July 04, 2006 at 11:23 PM
july 4th means more than independence from britain. it also reflects the founders profound mistrust of excessive executive authority. the phrase: "we are a nation of laws, not of men" was never more timely nor more trenchant.
Posted by: jay moses | July 05, 2006 at 07:43 AM
Jerry,
Posting the Declaration was a brilliant idea- by helping us see how fast we are moving backwards under our Kng George.
And much thanks for not asking for money this time- very welcome.
Posted by: John Katz | July 05, 2006 at 09:36 AM
THANK YOU JERRY!!! I never tire of reading our nation's foundational documents.
It has always seemed that the key phrase of the Declaration is ....
"... when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."
One example of abuse that our founders then cite is legislative activity performed "... at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures."
This is exactly what Tricky Dick Pombo has done... just in the past few weeks... with his legislation to remove the federal ban on offshore oil drilling. The final language of the bill was not made available until after midnight on the day of the vote. This was clearly meant to force compliance from the people by making it impossible for a reasoned debate.
Pombo and his mentor Tom Delay have used this tactic repeatedly.
As Americans... the sons and daughters of our founding fathers... it is our right AND OUR DUTY to oppose this act of tyranny. We must replace the Despots with representatives who will rule by Consent of the People.
Posted by: iwantcleanair | July 05, 2006 at 10:48 AM
The brave men who declared independence from Britain 230 years ago knew they would have to fight and win a war to win the independence they declared. It was a bitter war, as all are.
Like it or not, Democrats must acknowledge that many independent voters want assurance that they will be as safe or safer in this post-9/11 era with Democrats running Congress. Democrats unwilling to defend themselves vigorously, even angrily, against Republican charges of weakness on terror prove the Republican case that they are too weak to defend the American people against Al Qaeda.
Pombo has been a rubber stamp for the Bush-Cheney Chicken Hawk War, the war started by people who ducked combat during the Vietnam War. Republicans show their courage these days by sending other people's sons and daughters to the killing fields. This is cowardice, not courage, and Democrats who have the guts to say so in just these terms will win in November.
Democrats cannot avoid the issue of the war, nor should they. For once, they should trust the voters with unvarnished truths about Bush, Cheney and their rubber-stamp Congress. It won't be pleasant, but Leo Durocher was right: Nice guys finish last.
Posted by: Glenn Becker | July 05, 2006 at 04:49 PM
Jerry - the Declaration harks back to a time when allegiance to ideals prevailed over protection of the status quo. Funny how this battle rages on today, with "Who Killed the Electric Vehicle" chronicling how Yankee ingenuity and market freedom were stifled by fear of change among wealthy, powerful stakeholders. I like the way you are striving to renew people's faith in government to tackle the big issues we face, rather than to just let a cauldron of uncoordinated, tactical maneuvers of economic actors dictate the path we will take. I look forward 10 years from now to seeing solar panels on most buildings, a fleet of electric vehicles taking over the roads, a population policy in place that commits us to a sustainable living density, an economic system that panders to the wellbeing of the American household as its core institution, an evolved system of international governance and peacekeeping that combines effectiveness and accountability, and a legal-judicial framework that has been re-engineered to keep pace with technological change, and to actually anticipate the need for regulation as opposed to
constantly playing ketch-up.
The major change ahead is to awake from the mass-media-driven narcosis of distractions and diversions, and return a sense of probity and determined purpose spiced with idealism to public life. Our ability to conduct civilized debate in measured tones, and asking well-formed questions of each other must somehow overtake the calculated, behavior-manipulative, strident babble that makes people want to tune out politics. We need a new generosity of spirit, and willingness to endure the moral ambiguities of modern living while we figure out which freedoms are truly sustainable, and which are fleeting excursions of self-gratification at others expense. No diety is going to hand these answers to us on a silver platter, so we had better figure out how best to govern ourselves going forward. A new sobriety is needed to fully absorb the challenge of preserving the Earth as living quarters into the indefinite future. And, as we begin to finally accept the finitudes of energy and nutients in our midst, and subordinate our theories of economic growth and political governance to these realities, we stand on the crest of a vibrant future where growth and progress realign to the unbounded surge of the intellect and unconstrained the flow of the spirit. Such energy as was let loose July 4 1776.
Posted by: Pierre Bierre | July 05, 2006 at 10:15 PM
This 4th of July I wanted to give you something to think about.
What happened to the 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence?...
Five signers were captured by the British as traitors, and tortured before they died.
Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned. Two lost their sons serving in the Revolutionary Army; Another had two sons captured.
Nine of the 56 fought and died from wounds or hardships of the Revolutionary War.
They signed and they pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.
What kind of men were they?
Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists. Eleven were merchants, nine were farmers and large plantation owners; Men of means, well educated.
But they signed the Declaration of Independence knowing full well that the penalty would be death if they were captured.
Carter Braxton of Virginia, a wealthy planter and trader, saw his ships swept from the seas by the British Navy.
He sold his home and properties to pay his debts, and died in rags.
Thomas McKeam was so hounded by the British that he was forced to move his family almost constantly.
He served in the Congress without pay, and his family was kept in hiding. His possessions were taken from him, And poverty was his reward.
Vandals or soldiers looted the properties of Dillery, Hall, Clymer, Walton, Gwinnett, Heyward, Ruttledge, and Middleton.
At the battle of Yorktown, Thomas Nelson Jr, noted that the British General Cornwallis had taken over the Nelson home for his headquarters. He quietly urged General George Washington to open fire. The home was destroyed, And Nelson died bankrupt.
Francis Lewis had his home and properties destroyed. The enemy jailed his wife, and she died within a few months.
John Hart was driven from his wife's bedside as she was dying. Their 13 children fled for their lives. His fields and his Gristmill were laid to waste. For more than a year he lived in forests and caves, returning home to find his wife dead and His children vanished. A few weeks later he died from exhaustion and a broken heart.
Norris and Livingston suffered similar fates. Such were the stories and sacrifices of the American Revolution.
These were not wild-eyed, rabble-rousing ruffians.
They were soft-spoken men of means and education.
They had security, but they valued liberty more.
Standing tall, straight, and unwavering, they pledged:
"For the support of this declaration, with firm reliance on the Protection of the divine providence, we mutually pledge to each other, our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor."
They gave you and me a free and independent America.
The history books never told you a lot about what happened in the Revolutionary War.
We didn't just fight the British. We were British subjects and we fought our own government! Some of us take our liberties For granted, forgetting they were won by the "militia" against an overbearing central government bent on robbing individuals of basic rights to speech, self-defense, and personal property.
Be sure to take a few minutes while enjoying your 4th of July holiday to silently thank these patriots and resolve never to Give away the freedoms they died to secure. It's not too much to ask for the price they paid.
Remember: freedom is never free.
Posted by: Marguerite Fraga | July 05, 2006 at 11:04 PM