On July 4, 2026, tomorrow, we Americans will be celebrating our freedom, remembering how the Founding Fathers created one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
"Under God" is the key to our greatness.
Prayer to God led our Founders to create the most enduring document ever created by man: The Constitution of the United States.
Those same individuals had, in the same way, created the Declaration of Independence.
And they told us to pass our story to each generation, otherwise the torch of freedom and liberty may flicker and go out.
Some thoughts as we celebrate 250 years of freedom.
Be informed, not misled.
Ronald Reagan said this:
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it on to our children in the bloodstream. The only way they can inherit the freedom we have known is if we fight for it, protect it, defend it, and then hand it to them with the well-fought lessons of how they in their lifetime must do the same. And if you and I don’t do this, then you and I may well spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it once was like in America when men were free. – 1961
And he said this:
If we lose freedom here, there is no place to escape to. This is the last stand on Earth. And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except to sovereign people, is still the newest and most unique idea in all the long history of man’s relation to man. This is the issue of this election. Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American Revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves. – 1964
And this:
It is time for us to realize that we’re too great a nation to limit ourselves to small dreams. We’re not, as some would have us believe, doomed to an inevitable decline. I do not believe in a fate that will fall on us no matter what we do. I do believe in a fate that will fall on us if we do nothing. So, with all the creative energy at our command, let us begin an era of national renewal. Let us renew our determination, our courage, and our strength. And let us renew our faith and our hope. We have every right to dream heroic dreams. Those who say that we’re in a time when there are no heroes, they just don’t know where to look. – 1981
America is great because America is good.
There's been a lot of conversation about whether or not our country is a "Christian" nation.
I believe it is, not because a cleric runs the country, but because it was founded on Judeo-Christian values and principles. And a dependence upon God.
The Washington Examiner published this, titled "Why America remains the world’s greatest nation."
I recommend you read the article. Here are some highlights:
- From economic dominance to technological leadership, the U.S. continues to outperform every competitor.
- English is now the world’s reserve language. Of course, English colonialism was essential in the linguistic colonization of the world, but the United States expanded and completed the process. Roughly 1.35 billion people speak English, and another billion or so speak English as a second language. By comparison, roughly 1.1 billion people speak Mandarin, almost all as a first language.
- Just as English is the world’s reserve language, the dollar is the world’s reserve currency. Despite everything else, the United States is the most economically powerful and dynamic nation on the planet. Our economy is so large that our poorest states have higher per capita gross domestic product than most nations in Europe. Of the 10 largest companies on the planet, eight are American.
- How about education? Of the top 10 universities in the world, seven are in America, and the other three are in England. There are about 1.2 million foreign students in American universities; about 300,000 American students are studying abroad. More than 70% of Nobel Prize recipients have been Americans. Since 1901, Americans have won 106 Nobel prizes for medicine. The nearest country is the United Kingdom, with 31.
- As difficult as it may be to imagine now, in the 1950s and 1960s, many people thought the Soviet Union was going to overtake the United States. In the 1970s, Arabs were going to run the world because of their perceived oil hegemony. In the 1980s and into the 1990s, the U.S. was fixated on the idea that Japan Inc. was destined to run the world.
In each instance, American optimism, vision, and willingness to change where and when necessary led us to a better place. Think about our origin story: the Pilgrims at Plymouth. For good reason, the Pilgrim celebration remains the dominant narrative of Thanksgiving in our society. In 1621, in the wake of a bountiful harvest after a year of terrible sickness and unimaginable hardship, the Pilgrims set aside a day to give thanks to God for all of it — the good and the bad.
Snopes says he didn't say it. I don't know if he did or not, but he has surely been given a lot of credit for saying it.
And regardless of who said it, it's true:
I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her commodious harbors and her ample rivers, and it was not there. I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her fertile fields and boundless forests, and it was not there. I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her rich mines and her vast world commerce, and it was not there. I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her public school system and her institutions of learning, and it was not there. I sought for the greatness and genius of America in her democratic Congress and her matchless Constitution, and it was not there. Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power. America is great because she is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, she will cease to be great.---Alexis de Tocqueville?
Be Grateful. Be Thankful. Celebrate the greatest nation in the history of the world.