This Fourth of July, I think it is critically important that we all pay very, very close attention to what the Fourth of July is really all about. Please take the time to not just read the Declaration of Independence, but the history behind the great struggle that was the American War For Independence.
It really is staggering when you read the Declaration of Independence just how many of the same grievances that existed then exist today in a new form. Back then we were fighting against Imperial England and the king, but just take out a few of the phrases, change them around a little bit and you can see just how similar our fight is today.
What will you do to protect and defend your country? What will you do to try and right the wrongs that are occurring in this country every single day?
Just read through this little free flow mash up below and consider what it means based on where we are as a country today….
The Declaration of Independence of the Thirteen Colonies
In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the People of The United States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for THE PEOPLE to dissolve the political and economic 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 of 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 shewn, 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 the common American People; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter this existing system of Government.
The history of the present domestic state and federal government, in concert with political and corporate governments around the world is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over the Common American People. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
Our government–local, state and federal has become so corrupted, so untrustworthy, so utterly unable to serve the common good.
Our existing political parties have become so divisive and polarizing that they are unable to serve the interests of the common good.
Our existing government is so corrupted and beholden to corporate interests that it can no longer serve the common good.
Our government has refused Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
Our government has failed to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, placing unnecessary and impossible conditions upon the common man while failing to exact any conditions upon the corporations.
Our government has refused to consider meaningful budget reforms and has refused to address both out of control spending and tax policies that do not serve the common good.
Our government has created legislative bodies and endless agencies and bureaucracies then used them to stifle and crush the innovation of the American people.
Our government, through laws and enforcement actions has grossly and pervasively invaded the privacy of the common people.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
Our government has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing to pass laws and ensure proper funding for our state and federal court systems.
Our legislatures have made Judges dependent on the will of the legislative branch, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
Our government has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.
Our government has engaged in a campaign of gross and systematic lies to justify senseless military conflict.
Our government has engaged in warmongering for improper purposes and has systematically lied to the people to provide false justification for the wars.
Our government has conspired to restrict the free flow of information and ideas, controlling and manipulating our formerly free press to spread lies, misinformation and conflict.
Our government has conspired to persecute attorneys, activists and patriots who dared to speak out, speak the truth and protest.
Our government has conspired to destroy our formerly vibrant and robust economy through overregulation and by enforcing policies and laws that favor the corporations over the good of the American people.
Our government has allowed multinational corporations to plunder the treasure and innovation of the American people, sending this property of the people off to other nations and enriching the corporations at the grave expense of the American people.
Our government has conspired to enslave entire segments of our population and make them entirely dependent upon handouts and government programs to meet the needs of basic survival.
Our government has enslaved the working class, forcing them to pay for the benefits and the sins of those who do not deserve charity or support.
Our government has militarized our civilian police force and given them powers which exceed those necessary to ensure the safety of the common people.
Our government has criminalized so many acts that every man, woman and child could suffer imprisonment.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the consent of our legislatures.
Our government has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
Our government has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution and unacknowledged by our laws; giving our government’s 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 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 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 attentions 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 Common People of the United States of America, 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 this country, solemnly publish and declare, That these people are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the current governments, and that all political connection between them is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent People, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent People 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.
The signers of the Declaration represented as follows: