Declaration of Independence

Dear Friends,

Today is the Fourth of July.  We are celebrating the 234th anniversary of the publication of our Declaration of Independence.  It is an awesome document.  I read it again today (here).  The first amazing thing I noticed about the Declaration of Independence when I reread it, was that it was a unanimous declaration by the thirteen united States of America.  Do you think that there is anything that we could get the States to agree on, much less the members of Congress or the Governors or any group of people that is not selected solely on the basis of having the same point of view on a particular subject?

The Declaration starts by saying that if you are going to sever the political bands that have bound you for a period of time that you need to articulate why you are doing so.  That makes sense.  Wouldn't it be great if we forced our politicians to explain why they were taking the positions that they do and include in that explanation the facts that support their decisions?

The Declaration then sets forth the truths on which the new government is founded. 

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.

What a great enumeration of basis truths! When I read them today, it was easy to forget that they perhaps really did mean "men" and not men and women and to forget that they really meant white men and perhaps even only those who owned property.  Just for the record, I am going to continue to forget those inconvenient facts and read "men" to mean all human kind.

If all of us would live our lives in accordance with those truths and if all our governmental and non-governmental institutions governed themselves by those truths, just think what a wonderful world this would be. 

I heard a wonderful statement the other day at a panel discussion of torture.  The woman said that if you have empathy, you cannot torture.  If you recognize that we are all created equal and we all have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, there would never be torture or many other heinous things that go on in the world today.  If our government is based on these truths, how can there be any debate about the use of torture, how can there be any debate about rendition, how can there be any debate about unlimited detention of people declared to be enemy combatants without charges, or evidence of wrongdoing or judicial review and how can there be any debate about the assassinations by our government of our citizens without due process of law?  President George W. Bush instituted these policies, and President Obama is continuing them.

So today, I am thinking about how I can live my life in a way that recognizes that all humans are created equal, and how I can live my life to be certain that all humans really do have an opportunity to pursue a life of liberty and happiness. 

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal