QUARANTINE BLOG # 461

July 4, 2021

The Meaning of the Declaration of Independence

The year was 1997, and one of the greatest orators and spiritual leaders of our day shared very special words about July 4, and the real reason we celebrate Independence Day. His words have stood the test of time, across spiritual and ethnic backgrounds, and touched the hearts of all. Here are his words, showing that America is truly the home of the free because of the brave:

“Americans, on this eve of the Fourth of July, if I, Paul Harvey, could bequeath unto you one message, this would be that message:

“You may not be able to quote one line from our Declaration of Independence at this moment. But, henceforth, you will always be able to quote at least one line! It’s in the last paragraph, where you will recall when I remind you, where it says: ‘We mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.’

“Now, you recognize those impressive words, but you don’t understand them, quite yet.

“In the Pennsylvania State House, now called Independence Hall in Philadelphia, the best men from each of the colonies, sat down together. It was a very fortunate hour in our nation’s history, one of those rare occasions in the lives of men when we had greatness to spare.

“These were men of means. Well educated, remember this! Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists; nine were farmers and owners of large plantations. On June 11, a committee sat down to draw up a declaration of independence. We were going to tell our British fatherland “no more rule by red coats.” Below the dam of ruthless, foreign rule, the stream of freedom was running shallow and muddy and we were lighting the fuse to dynamite that dam. This pact, as Burke later put it, was a partnership between the living and the dead and the yet unborn.

“There was no bigotry, no demagoguery in this group. All had shared hardships.

“Jefferson finished a draft of the document in 17 days. Congress adopted it in July, so much is familiar history. But now….

“King George III has denounced all rebels in America as traitors. Punishment for treason was hanging! Hanging! The names now so familiar to you from the several signatures on that declaration of independence, the names were kept secret for six months because each knew the full meaning of that magnificent last paragraph in which his signature pledged his life, his fortune and his sacred honor.

“Fifty-six men placed their names on our nation’s Declaration of Independence. Fifty-six men knew when they signed that they were risking everything! Everything! They knew if they won this fight, the best that they could expect would be years of hardship in a struggling nation. If they lost, they would face a hangman’s rope. But they signed the pledge. And they did, indeed, pay the price, for here…is the documented fate of that gallant 56.

“Carter Braxton of Virginia, a wealthy planter and trader, saw his ships swept from the seas. To pay his debts, he lost his home and all of his properties and died in rags.

“Thomas Lynch, Junior, who signed the pledge, was a third generation rice grower, aristocrat and large plantation owner. After he signed, his health failed. With his wife, he set out for France to regain his failing health but their ship never got to France and was never heard from again.

“Thomas McKeen of Delaware was so harassed by the enemy, that he was forced to move his family five times in five months. He served in Congress without pay, his family in poverty and in hiding.

“Vandals looted the property of Ellery, and Klimer, of Hall, and Gwinnette, and Walton, and Hayward and Rutledge and Middleton.

“Sir Thomas Nelson Jr. of Virginia raised $2 million on his own signature to provision our allies, the French fleet. And after the war, he personally paid back the loans and wiped out his entire estate. And he was never reimbursed by his government. In the final battle for Yorktown, Nelson urged General Washington to fire on his [Nelson’s] own home which was occupied by Cornwallis. He died bankrupt. Thomas Nelson Jr. had pledged his life, his fortune, and his sacred honor.

“The Hessians seized the home of Francis Hopkinson of New Jersey.

“Francis Lewis had his home and everything destroyed. His wife imprisoned, he died within a few months.

“Richard Stockton, who signed that declaration was captured, mistreated and his health broken to the extent that he died at 51. And his estate was pillaged.

“Thomas Hayward Jr. was captured when Charleston fell.

“John Hart was driven from his wife’s bedside while she was dying. And their 13 children fled in all directions for their lives. And his fields and his gristmill were laid waste. For more than a year, he lived in forests and caves and returned home after the war to find his wife dead and his children gone. And his properties gone. He died a few weeks later of exhaustion and a broken heart.

“Lewis Morris saw his land destroyed and his family scattered.

“Phillip Livingstone died within a few months from the hardships of the war.

“John Hancock history remembers best due to a quirk of fate rather than anything he stood for. That great sweeping signature attesting to his vanity, towers over all of the others, John Hancock, one of the wealthiest men in New England and yet, he stood outside Boston, one terrible night of the war, and he said, “Burn Boston though it makes John Hancock a beggar, if the public good requires it!” He, too, lived up to the pledge.

“Of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence, few were long to survive. Five were captured by the British and tortured before they died. Twelve had their homes from Rhode Island to Charleston sacked and looted, occupied by the enemy or burned. Two lost their sons in the army. One had two sons captured. Nine of the 56 died in the war from its hardships or from its more merciful bullets.

“Americans, I don’t know what impression you’ve had until now of the men who met that hot summer in Philadelphia, but I thought it important we remember this about the signers of the Declaration of Independence, that they were not poor men. They were not wild-eyed pirates. These were men of means. These were rich men, most of them who enjoyed much ease and luxury in their personal living. They were not hungry men. They were prosperous men. They were wealthy, landowners, substantially secure in their prosperity. But they considered liberty and this is as much as I shall say of it – they had learned that liberty is so much more important than security. That they pledged their lives and their fortunes and their sacred honor. And they fulfilled their pledge. They paid the price. And freedom was born!

“Oh, say does that star spangled banner yet wave? Yes, it does! It does!

“Paul Harvey…Good day!”

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