Editors note: This is the fourth in a series of six pieces exploring the ideas behind America’s founding. Each piece will accompany one of five master classes on the Declaration of Independence from Utah Valley University’s Center for Constitutional Studies. The classes are free and open to the public. Read more about and access the classes here.
“America isn’t worth celebrating.”
“This country was created by white men — for white men. We need a new declaration.”
These arguments are common on social media, in classrooms and on podcasts. And they are all based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the Declaration of Independence and the cause of America.
Let’s start with Line 3 of the engrossed (handwritten) Declaration: “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.”
Those words are among the most important to ever grace a piece of paper. They aren’t merely logic to justify a revolution. In fact, the declaration didn’t really need this grand philosophical statement. Those few lines were inserted to define the purpose for a country unlike any ever created. Let’s unpack what that sentence means.
First: “We hold these truths” suggests that, unlike Indiana Jones, we aren’t just “making this up as [we] go” — a new theory of government — because it sounds good. These things are true whether societies recognize them or not.
Second: “To be self-evident” means two things at once. These truths are our foundational axioms. In order to get to the good stuff, we all need to agree that these things are indisputable. More importantly, these truths are so obvious that you don’t need a Ph.D. to understand them. They are accessible to every human being.
Third: “All men.” Did the Declaration mean just “white men” or just “men”? No! It included all human beings. But wait, didn’t Jefferson own slaves? Yes, but the truths of the declaration don’t depend on the moral perfection of one Thomas Jefferson. Indeed, Lincoln himself challenged Stephen Douglas in their 1858 debates to produce a single artifact from the revolution that proved the Founders meant only “white men.” No such evidence existed then or since.
Fourth: “Are created equal.” This is a stunning departure from the ancient Greek understanding of natural inequality. It is the product of Judeo-Christian teaching, secularized through the Enlightenment. But what do we mean by “equal”? Surely, it is not that all are equally intelligent, athletic or capable of leadership. Instead, it is that all humans have equal moral dignity and are endowed with rights. With the exception of parents who guide their children to maturity, no human has the right to rule over another without their consent.
Finally, “Endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.” Each human being has the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The “pursuit of happiness” is not the fever dream of a 19-year-old college libertarian. It is best understood as the pursuit of moral excellence. Every human has the right to fulfill their nature and become excellent. Humans have a right to liberty because liberty is the prerequisite for becoming morally excellent — to becoming happy.
Again and again, the nation has been confronted by the doctrine proclaimed in 1776 and compelled to reform, to repent and to widen that circle of liberty.
What a doctrine! We became a people on the sure foundation of this civic religion. It is our purpose statement, our destination, our goal. Eleven years after the Declaration, we created the U.S. Constitution as a superior vehicle to our previous form of government to get us on our way. That doesn’t mean it’s been an easy journey. Lincoln, our greatest expositor of the Declaration, understood this well:
“They did not mean to assert the obvious untruth, that all were then actually enjoying that equality, nor yet, that they were about to confer it immediately upon them … They meant simply to declare the right, so that the enforcement of it might follow as fast as circumstances should permit. They meant to set up a standard maxim for free society … constantly looked to, constantly labored for, and even though never perfectly attained, constantly approximated … and augmenting the happiness and value of life to all people of all colors everywhere.”
America’s history is one of striving toward the declaration’s self-evident truths. From abolition to women’s suffrage to the civil-rights movement, each generation has been called back to that promise. Again and again, the nation has been confronted by the doctrine proclaimed in 1776 and compelled to reform, to repent and to widen that circle of liberty.
Yes, America is worth celebrating so long as we remain a Declaration of Independence people.