THE 4TH IS OUR SOUL
All people are created equal is the soul of this nation.
It was proclaimed to an astonished world on the 4th of July, 1776. People were astonished because those words were uttered into a world ruled by kings and emperors. Slavery was everywhere. Universal suffrage was unheard of and most of the world toiled in a grinding poverty that was only one step up from total bondage.
All people are created equal.
Those five words exploded. Americans of every stripe cheered when they heard them[1], and the consequences carried far across the seas. The Declaration of Independence not only ushered in our fight for Independence, it ignited 250 years of continuous national struggle. It set off centuries of passion and sacrifice that have given us every bit of the social, political and economic progress we hold dear. The Constitution came from those words, and the end of slavery, and voting rights for women. So did the 40-hour work week, and Social Security, and the fight for clean air and safe water to drink. Every bit of it.
All people are created equal
The power of those words can be summed up in one simple phrase—Freedom, Justice, and Opportunity for all, the dream that has made America exceptional. We haven’t achieved it fully, and it’s under unrelenting attack by dark forces, but these words represent the underlying desire so many of us feel, this nation’s true North Star: a just society.
All people are created equal.
Lincoln stood behind these words. He proclaimed them at Gettysburg. He acted on them time and time again, relentlessly, an endless struggle to move this nation forward.
FDR took these words one step farther. He made them the basis for government. This, too, was revolutionary. Up to that point, government had always been little more than caretaker of the system, the guardian of the powerful. Roosevelt proposed something radically different: that the purpose of government was to serve the people, to make our lives better. And he acted on it. Against violent opposition from the wealthy, he brought about so much we now take for granted—yes, the 40-hour work week and Social Security, but also things like an end to child labor and a firm belief in the rights of the working man. Today, we take these things for granted, but they owe their existence to FDR and to the power of those words first spoken in 1776.
All people are created equal
It’s time to celebrate the 4th of July for what it really means. That day so long ago did, indeed, sound the official beginning of the American Revolution, but those opening words did far more. They set off centuries of struggle to bring about a just society. The turmoil we experience today, the threats to what we hold dear, are merely the latest round in this endless quest for that just society. And we are merely the latest to be faced with the challenge.
There was no Democratic Party in 1776, and those immortal words do not belong to us. They belong to every freedom-loving American who believes in democracy. But we are their champions. In this time of renewed threat, we are the standard bearers who are destined to take up the fight. We, the Democratic Party. All people are created equal is the soul of our party, every bit as much as it is the soul of our nation. As the holiday approaches, it is up to each and every one of us to embrace what all this is really about—creating a just society .. as long as it takes.
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[1] It's fun to mention here the beheading of the statue of George III in Bowling Green, NYC.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/a-toppled-statue-of-george-iii-epitomizes-the-ongoing-debate-over-americas-monuments-180979463/
