The Declaration of Independence of, what would become, the United States of America imposed on its signatories the pledge in dedication to their cause of “our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred honor.” These last words of the revered text that launched an entire people into warfare, death, and conflict are momentous for the history of the world.
The text of the Declaration begins by informing the intended recipient of what they intend to do:
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.
Then follows a statement of values:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal . . .
Then the indictment:
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. . .
And then twenty-six more paragraphs of the indictment follow in a barrage of accusations unequaled since the 97 theses of Martin Luther. Finally, the aforementioned pledge of life, liberty, and sacred honor indicates the length to which the signatories and supporters felt it necessary to go.
The ensuing bloody, vicious warfare underlined the serious intent of the Declaration. Divorce was acrimonious and occurred with enormous loss and suffering. Yet, the great document is for the ages and its sentiments endure to this day. Though the United States is a country that still struggles to make all men and women equal, it cannot be doubted that the pledge of the founding fathers endures to this day. The ideals, which it could be argued the founding fathers did not fully understand, and certainly did not implement, constitute a roadmap to the future from the past for the present.
Those who fought and died to liberate the people suffered the worst conditions of man and nature. It is not a myth that they trudged through snow in bare feet, starved in the woods, encamped in the depths of winter on a frozen patch of ground, and then faced a paid Hessian army that took no prisoners. Atrocities against the people embittered the opponents against the Crown, and alienation from families and friends during service to the promise of democracy cut deeply into the spirit of the revolutionaries.
In the end, the luminaries boldly leading the country into statehood found that success only posed a long list if challenges to the founders. Some would have reverted to monarchy and exchanged one King George for another. George Washington would have none of it, and neither would the rational leadership of the day Having defeated the Crown, the challenges grew. The intellectual champions of the day argued like brothers, and there was no clear winner among the intellectual giants. Hamilton and Jefferson, imperfect vehicles for the task, nevertheless, set the course. The Articles of Confederation, conceived as a loose binder of hope, failed. The country found that it had more in common than it had differences and the Benjamin Franklin reminder that they would hang together or hand separately, echoed beyond the past war and into future nation building. The failure of the weak Articles taught an important lesson about working together as individuals as well as states. What they organized set a standard for the rest of the world to follow. With the immediate addition of the 10 first amendments, they made the statement that The United States of America was a work in progress. And the rest is more history.
Consequently, the United States continues to evolve based on its constitution, amendments, and Supreme Court decisions. There is a sense that today, the country can detach itself from the constitution that has been fought for in bloody wars at home and abroad. Some advocates believe the courts are a tool of untethered political will. Yet the Declaration of Independence teaches a strict lesson. A people cannot use the logical traditions, amended as they are, to oppose the will of the founders whose constitutional wisdom was born from the womb of experience with tyranny. If the United States is to survive the rigors of the twenty-first century, It must resolve to the following:
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to resolve the political bands which have disconnected them from each other, 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 for the opinions of each member of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to their repatriation in honor of those who sacrificed and died before them.