Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Its now 10:36pm on the fourth of July, America's Independence Day. I sit here after having just witnessed the most beautiful fireworks display I've ever seen pondering what that elaborate display stood for. How many people gave a single thought to the penning of the Declaration of Independence on this 234th birthday of our nation's emancipation? Has it really become just another 3 day weekend full of BBQs and fireworks?

I've included the first portion of the Declaration below. Please take a moment to read it and allow yourself to go back to that moment in time when our forefathers stood around a table and looked down upon a piece of paper that signified the beginning of one of the greatest legacies to have ever risen up upon this earth.

Freedom is a term that is used too freely these days. Use the remainder of this day to remind yourself of the sacrifices those men and women, both 234+ years ago and today, have made so that we can have "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

Happy fourth of July everyone.

The Declaration of Independence (first two paragraphs only)

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

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. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

xoxo
Abielle