I've run this post almost every July 4th in the 16 years I've been
blogging. There were only two years I didn't and both of those posts
were about problems that must have seemed really big. They not only were
really big but still are (2012, 2014). My lesson is that while they were important, the big picture is to
remind ourselves of the history, and celebrate the achievement of getting to
our semiquincentennial, the 250th anniversary of our Republic, while we enjoy
the day with family and friends. The problems will still be here on the
fifth.
IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776
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, 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. That whenever any form of government becomes
destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to
abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such
principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most
likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate
that governments long established should not be changed for light and
transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are
more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves
by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But 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. --Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such
is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of
government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of
repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the
establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let
facts be submitted to a candid world.
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
meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions
within.
He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose
obstructing the laws for 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 legislature.
He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to
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 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 offenses:
For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring 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 in 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, burned our towns, and destroyed
the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to
complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with
circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous
ages, and totally unworthy 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 endeavored to bring
on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known
rule of warfare, is 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 the 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.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It has been shown mathematically that in a system with multiple parties,
they either converge to two declared parties or through something like a
coalition system they functionally become a two party system. In our society,
we are too broken apart along party lines, despite the idea of one big
“uniparty” now being the subject of millions of jokes and other
comments. In reality, the important choice is a question of whether or
not the politico you're referring to is a follower of our founding documents
or someone else's. Right now, it appears the biggest competing idea is a
tyrannical minority in the name of some form equality, equity or some such
nonsense. The biggest competitor is Karl Marx. People are not, and cannot be
both free and equal. We are either free or forced into subjugation to create
equal outcomes. Opportunities can be equal, like that word that used to be a
goal but is now punishable: colorblind. Outcomes can't be.
Enjoy your day no matter what you do. To those who serve - and have served -
to provide this gift of liberty for us: Thank You from the bottom of my
heart.
