As a Nation, we celebrate our independence on July 4th, the day the
Declaration of Independence was signed. However, the decision to assert
our independence from Great Britain was the culmination of years of
grievances–in 1775, these finally became intolerable.
The King’s government had begun to require the colonists to pay taxes to London in the 1760s, but had not granted the Americans due representation in Parliament. The colonists began to protest, and tensions grew. Five colonists died in 1770 at the Boston Massacre, which occurred when British soldiers fired into a crowd of Bostonians who were heckling them.
In 1773, the colonists protested a new tea tax by dumping dozens of boxes of tea into Boston Harbor, an event that became known as the Boston Tea Party.
However, open hostilities did not break out until April 19, 1775 with the Battles of Lexington and Concord, the opening battles of the American Revolution. On June 7, 1776, the Second Continental Congress voted for a resolution, stating “these United Colonies are, and of right out to be, free and independent states.”
A committee of five delegates, including John Adams, a delegate from Massachusetts, and Thomas Jefferson, a Virginia delegate, were chosen to draft a declaration of independence. Jefferson was picked from the group to write the first draft. He finished a draft within three weeks, and, after a few revisions, Congress adopted it on July 4, 1776.
It says, in part:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, and they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. — That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…
This document is incredibly important because it acknowledges that fundamental human rights are granted solely by God, no men; it is the people who then grant legitimacy to govenment for the protection of their rights. In this model, the Creator is the ultimate authority. Next are the people as the beneficiariesof the Creator’s generosity. Consequently, a government holds only as much power as the people are willing to yield.
There is great importance in these “self-evident” truths. First, all men are created equal. That means that we all have equal value at birth. It does not say that all men, regardless of whether they work, shall end up equal. We are created equal and given equal rights by our Creator. We are a nation of believers in God. This provides us with optimism, a belief in the future, and solace and strength in times of crisis.
Our rights are “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” We are not guaranteed health care, education houses, or even happiness. Our founders acknowledge that life and liberty came from God and that he gave us the ability to pursue happiness, not a guarantee that it would be achieved.
The end of the American Revolution came six years after it began, when British General Charles Cornwallis formally surrendered at Yorktown on October 19, 1781.
However, our new country still had a lot of work to do. Our freedom from colonial rule was won, be we had yet to learn how to govern ourselves, or how to practice the high ideals we had asserted in the Declaration of Independence. As a young nation, we argued over the structure of government, how much government we should have, and how we would determine its limits.
The thirteen colonies’ initial attempt to create a government was reflected in our first constitution, the Articles of Confederation, drafted in 1777 and fully ratified in 1781. The Articles of Confederation gave very little power to a federal government. So litte that, as a nation at war, we had challenges raising troops and paying them. In 1787, the Constitution was written and the Articles of Confederation were repealed as the new Constitution was ratified state-by-state.
On April 30, 1789, we inaugurated George Washington as our first president. This was a move toward order and stability: our freedom had been declared and won, and our government was being created peacefully according to the guidelines set out in the Constitution.
Our model was designed for the people, not the government, to hold power. Our Declaration reduced the status of government from master of the people (as under English rule) to servant of the people. In the years since our government came together, we have learned that the government must continually be held accountable and continually reminded that it derives its powers from the consent of the governed (the people).
Today, our unalienable right of liberty–the power to make individual choices–is coming under attack from our own government. Congress is passing legislation that the people do not agree to, ranging from mandated health care to intrusive bailouts.
While we might be pessimistic about the current path our country is taking, we should remind ourselves that our country has the ability to build on our past and create a bright future. We, the people, still retain the power to elect a government that listens and responds to us.
–Extracted from “The Essental American: 25 Documents and Speeches Every American Should Own” by Jackie Gingrich Cushman and Newt Gingrich
The King’s government had begun to require the colonists to pay taxes to London in the 1760s, but had not granted the Americans due representation in Parliament. The colonists began to protest, and tensions grew. Five colonists died in 1770 at the Boston Massacre, which occurred when British soldiers fired into a crowd of Bostonians who were heckling them.
In 1773, the colonists protested a new tea tax by dumping dozens of boxes of tea into Boston Harbor, an event that became known as the Boston Tea Party.
However, open hostilities did not break out until April 19, 1775 with the Battles of Lexington and Concord, the opening battles of the American Revolution. On June 7, 1776, the Second Continental Congress voted for a resolution, stating “these United Colonies are, and of right out to be, free and independent states.”
A committee of five delegates, including John Adams, a delegate from Massachusetts, and Thomas Jefferson, a Virginia delegate, were chosen to draft a declaration of independence. Jefferson was picked from the group to write the first draft. He finished a draft within three weeks, and, after a few revisions, Congress adopted it on July 4, 1776.
It says, in part:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, and they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. — That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…
This document is incredibly important because it acknowledges that fundamental human rights are granted solely by God, no men; it is the people who then grant legitimacy to govenment for the protection of their rights. In this model, the Creator is the ultimate authority. Next are the people as the beneficiariesof the Creator’s generosity. Consequently, a government holds only as much power as the people are willing to yield.
There is great importance in these “self-evident” truths. First, all men are created equal. That means that we all have equal value at birth. It does not say that all men, regardless of whether they work, shall end up equal. We are created equal and given equal rights by our Creator. We are a nation of believers in God. This provides us with optimism, a belief in the future, and solace and strength in times of crisis.
Our rights are “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” We are not guaranteed health care, education houses, or even happiness. Our founders acknowledge that life and liberty came from God and that he gave us the ability to pursue happiness, not a guarantee that it would be achieved.
The end of the American Revolution came six years after it began, when British General Charles Cornwallis formally surrendered at Yorktown on October 19, 1781.
However, our new country still had a lot of work to do. Our freedom from colonial rule was won, be we had yet to learn how to govern ourselves, or how to practice the high ideals we had asserted in the Declaration of Independence. As a young nation, we argued over the structure of government, how much government we should have, and how we would determine its limits.
The thirteen colonies’ initial attempt to create a government was reflected in our first constitution, the Articles of Confederation, drafted in 1777 and fully ratified in 1781. The Articles of Confederation gave very little power to a federal government. So litte that, as a nation at war, we had challenges raising troops and paying them. In 1787, the Constitution was written and the Articles of Confederation were repealed as the new Constitution was ratified state-by-state.
On April 30, 1789, we inaugurated George Washington as our first president. This was a move toward order and stability: our freedom had been declared and won, and our government was being created peacefully according to the guidelines set out in the Constitution.
Our model was designed for the people, not the government, to hold power. Our Declaration reduced the status of government from master of the people (as under English rule) to servant of the people. In the years since our government came together, we have learned that the government must continually be held accountable and continually reminded that it derives its powers from the consent of the governed (the people).
Today, our unalienable right of liberty–the power to make individual choices–is coming under attack from our own government. Congress is passing legislation that the people do not agree to, ranging from mandated health care to intrusive bailouts.
While we might be pessimistic about the current path our country is taking, we should remind ourselves that our country has the ability to build on our past and create a bright future. We, the people, still retain the power to elect a government that listens and responds to us.
–Extracted from “The Essental American: 25 Documents and Speeches Every American Should Own” by Jackie Gingrich Cushman and Newt Gingrich
