The Declaration of Independence is the backbone of our nation: The Museum of the American Revolution CEO
Will Cain and Dr. Scott Stephenson, president and CEO of the Museum of the American Revolution, highlighted the Declaration of Independence as America’s most important founding document. Stephenson emphasizes its historical influence in more than 100 nations. He argues that the Declaration provides an enduring creed that unites America, an assessment of the diverse people who make up a body politic that continues to thrive.
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The fireworks are gone, and the red, white and blue have been removed. America’s Fourth of July celebration of our 250th anniversary is now just a memory. But this summer’s celebration of our founding will not be the last. The party will go on, and it might just get bigger.
In future years, celebrations will mark the Revolutionary War battles in Boston, New York and Yorktown that came after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Americans will get a chance to hear about patriots they may never have known.
As a Southerner, I look forward to seeing patriots like Francis Marion, the Swamp Fox, and Thomas Sumter, the Gamecock, celebrated in South Carolina. Long-forgotten battles like Kings Mountain, Guilford Court House, Camden and Eutaw Springs — where Americans bent history in the South and ultimately won — will also be remembered.
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We would do well to remember our revolutionary heritage. Historians describe the second sentence of the Declaration of Independence, beginning with the word, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal …,” as the most important sentence not only in American history, but in nations around the world. The American Revolution inspired people all over the world to get rid of depots and kings.
Jefferson’s words created a new understanding of government based on equality, natural rights and the consent of the governed. They were the spark of change in the whole world. Ultimately, 100 nations will incorporate the principles of the Declaration. From France to Mexico, Chile and Haiti, and decades later to Czechoslovakia and Korea, this text was copied and imitated.
I learned about this legacy at the Museum of the American Revolution, which has a wonderful exhibit about the Declaration’s journey around the world. If you are in Philadelphia, I highly encourage you to go.
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Here at home, the Declaration of Independence strengthened efforts to gain independence. The colonies set up their own governments, which violated the authority of the monarchy. The newly organized states agreed to unite under one central, elected government.
But as Jefferson’s words encouraged, the Declaration was only a text. It announced our determination to be a free people. But it did not protect that right. It would take five years of war to make the Declaration’s promise of a new nation a reality. At that time, the Americans would face the most powerful army in the world.
Britain had just risen to the position of the world’s most powerful empire. Its fleet of 400 ships controlled the seas. The tried and tested British forces had defeated their rival, France, and captured Quebec, Havana and India. Spain, another longtime enemy, had lost ground to the British. At the end of the Seven Years’ War, the sun never set on the British Empire. In retrospect, the American rush for freedom seems suicidal.
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But the American army, quickly assembled, underfunded, underarmed and underfed, would overtake and defeat the king’s larger forces. We would lose our share of wars, maybe more than our share. School children know about the amazing American victories at Saratoga and Yorktown, but also the devastating American defeats at Long Island and Charleston.
After the British defeat at Yorktown, the secretary of state for the colonies, Lord George Germain, argued against continuing the war, explaining America’s long-term weakness in Parliament. He cited the patriots’ fragile economy and runaway inflation. He was not wrong. The purses of the Continental Congress were empty, and the soldiers starved; others defected in the last years of the war. There were rumors that Ethan Allen would announce Vermont for the British. Germain believed that Britain could still win, but Parliament was unmoved by his arguments. Its members saw the futility of continuing the war.
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The indomitable determination of the American people allowed us to win. What we had was an inability to quit, a tenacity that the British could not match. We wanted to protect our future that the British interest in expanding their empire would not be the same. Nathanael Greene, George Washington’s top military officer in the Southern Department of War, summed up this important aspect this way: “We fight, we are beaten, we rise, and we fight again.”
Cover of “Lincoln’s Lady Spymaster: The Untold Story of the Abolitionist Southern Belle Who Helped Win the Civil War,” by Gerri Willis.
As much as we celebrate the Founding Fathers, including Washington and Jefferson, they alone did not guarantee America’s promise. It took the strength and patience of tens of thousands of Americans to do that. Their blood, sweat and tears allowed the most important sentence ever written in American history to become more than an interesting footnote. Rather, it became not only a pillar of the new republic but also an inspiration to people all over the world, who believe in freedom and liberty like us.
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There is no better way to celebrate America’s founding document and its remarkable people than to visit the battlefields and historic sites where the promise contained in the Declaration of Independence became a reality. I look forward to seeing you there!
Gerri Willis’ book, “Lincoln’s Lady Spymaster,” was nominated for a People’s Choice Award by the Library of Virginia. He is a native of North Carolina.
