Every American has read this,
Every American has read this, at one point or another. We all manage to get exposed to these words to a greater or lesser degree. How well we remember them depends, perhaps, on how interested we were in history when this document first came our way.
It is this declaration's civilized, reasonable statement of principle, and its firm announcement of the objectionable facts of oppression, that continues to define Americans not by blood or soil, but by an interconnected set of ideals that form a philosophy of life and governance. It is here that who we are as a people is spelled out, premise by premise. And it is the deliberate, methodical intent displayed here that sets these words and sentences apart and makes them powerful--unlike certain other words, isolated and devoid of context, which some people treat as magical talismans of oppressive discomfort that must be eliminated from the public sphere.
Today, on this day, read these words again. All of them. It won't take long.
