What does the fourth mean to you?
For me it is a chance to mark an incredible event - a group of people chose an incredible idealistic goal, and succeeded. They shed a tyrant and replaced him with a document that states we are all entitled, by virtue of being created, to the same liberty and privilege under the law. In fact, they defined the purpose of law as the service of liberty - mine and yours. They struggled mightily and devised a government large enough to defend us from a foreign invader, while confining our protector (that same Federal Government), to a very small entity.
They Founders, remarkable mainly for their intelligence and role in a critical moment in history, knew that it would be difficult to make a government large enough to be useful in the national defense but constrained enough that it would not become a threat to individual liberty - and they were right. But in spite of the many offenses to liberty that our government has and does practice, we Americans enjoy more liberty than virtually every other nation's citizenry.
Our choice to pursue a life not constrained by poor food quality or physical frailty is a luxury not to be taken for granted. Today, I'll celebrate the circumstances that have allowed me to live as I do.
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