Volume 18 , Issue 26

1888 - The Declaration of Independence by C. S. McIntyre

Friends: But rather would I address you as fellow-patriots, as that would surely draw our minds closer and our thoughts nearer to the memory of men whose memory we celebrate this day.

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The men to whom I wish to call your hearts and minds were our forefathers; they were patriots; they were men. We, as citizens of these United States, when we hear the word patriot, think of the men who fought and died for this land's liberty and independence. Liberty, what a blessed word that is. How we Americans cling to it, and turn it over and over in our minds, that we may try, for we can only try, to grasp it in its fullest and broadest meaning. Again, the word patriot, it carries us back into the past more than an hundred years. An hundred years, and how many lives of great men have the fates spun in that lapse of time!

At this season of the year 1776 the colonists - for the people were then colonists of England - were contemplating independence. One by one the colonies followed Massachusetts and Virginia, and at last all joined in the cry for liberty; even New York, Maryland and Pennsylvania, which were undecided, were swept along i the current.

On the 7th of June, in the Continental Congress, Richard Henry Lee introduced three resolutions - one for foreign alliance, one for confederation and the other for independence. Action was postponed, but he appointed committee drafted a declaration, declaring the colonies independence, which was after some deliberation, passed. And on the 4th of July the Declaration of Independence was adopted.

The Declaration of Independence is now ranked as one of the ablest documents ever written, and stands as the most important paper of all modern political history.

When the bell of the State House, which bears the inscription, "Proclaim liberty throughout all the land, unto all the inhabitants thereof," announced the decision of Congress in favor of the Declaration the crowd without took up the tidings and carried them far and wide.

The friends of liberty breathed more freely; the Declaration was made, and the English colonies in America ceased to exist and a new nation was born.

The great men who framed this Declaration for their courage and love of country will ever be remembered in history and our hearts, and the Declaration itself is an everlasting monument to Thomas Jefferson, the zealous statesman and patriot.

As the career of the Untied States since that day has been so noble and progressive in all departments we have reason to believe the system of government just and that the nation will continue prospering. The future, were are told, will be more glorious and grand than the brilliant past.
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