Happy 250th anniversary! But wait, what exactly are we celebrating? Our United States of America, always unique and often revolutionary, surprisingly, is celebrating a piece of parchment. That’s right. It is the anniversary of some words – the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, signed July 4, 1776.
One of the least instructive of children’s verses is “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never harm me.”
Words can harm profoundly. Name-calling, labeling, false accusations, personal attacks are all words that can hurt feelings and reputations, cloud truth and perceptions or clarify. Words, and how we use them, can start wars and end friendships. On July 4, 1776, words established a separate nation with a new style of governing and enumerated the rights granted to the citizens thereof. Exactly 1338 words changed the world for the next 250 years because they made real something many thought impossible.
Among the 1338 were what Walter Isaacson called “the greatest sentence ever written.” What did it say?
“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.”
Is it true what they say?
Is democracy crumbling? Are we bearing witness to the demise of democracy even as we celebrate its founding?
It is next to impossible to understand what is occurring as it occurs. It takes time and distance to gain perspective, but maybe we don’t have much time. Maybe we must vote in 11 months. Maybe, if the East Wing of the White House is metaphor, then we must act swiftly or suffer more loss. If we are out of time and must understand right now, then, how?
Thomas Jeffereson said by reading newspapers.
We are blessed with so many. Not just our two dailies, but with a plethora of local papers from the Sandisfield Times to Stockbridge Updates, the Egremont News to the New Marlborough
5-Town News, the Otis Observer, and more. Those small-town newspapers run like a backbone through our South County towns. Big and small, they all need our support, a kind word, a pat on the back.
Consider:
“Freedom of the press is not just important to democracy, it is democracy.” – Walter Cronkite
“Diversity of opinion is a good thing.” – Thomas Jefferson
“I disagree with what you say but will defend to the death your right to say it.” – Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Maybe we gain understanding and perspective by focusing on our own feelings. Are we quieter because there might be consequences for speaking up, uneasy because our government doesn’t reflect our values, more frightened? Feel like folks used to be nicer?
Don’t laugh — being nice is a mandatory underpinning of sustaining democracy. It is what enables us to recognize and protect the rights of others. It is what makes it impossible to turn away if another is being scooped up and thrown into a black van by masked men. Remember the rights granted were not equivocal rights, the rights were absolute, nonnegotiable, God-given, and unalienable.
So, how do we keep our rights? “That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…” Never forget, just powers are derived from the governed, that’s us..Carole Owens
Executive Editor
