We are just days away from celebrating the 249th birthday of the United States of America! It’s time to fire up the grill, cook some burgers, and roast marshmallows. Let's get ready for fireworks and parades! Just think about how grand our 250th birthday celebration will be next year! 

Amid the burnt burgers, singed eyebrows, sticky fingers, and ears ringing from fireworks displays, we must not forget the true essence of the holiday. We are called to remember the brave men who fought to free us from British rule and colonialism. They crafted a Declaration to King George III that clearly stated our intent to separate from Great Britain and establish a nation that would stand on its own forever. These individuals risked everything they had, everyone they loved, and their very identities to join the fight for our freedom.

In the generations since, many more men and women have volunteered to uphold the principles that those first patriots fought so valiantly to establish. Let us strive to be the people who continue to uphold those principles even today. 

(Click on the image below to read a transcription of the Declaration of Independence as it was written in July 1776.)

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.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

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