Recovering independence in an age of dependency
Thomas Jefferson’s genius as a writer lay not only in his command of language but in his ability to gather ideas. In our modern discussion, we often hear many traits that we aren’t supposed to like about Jefferson, but he’s a beautiful writer. He sought, as he put it, “to place before mankind the common sense of the subject in terms so plain and firm as to command their assent,” and the Declaration remains the clearest “expression of the American mind” ever written.
Nearly 250 years later, Jefferson’s account of rights still presses on our conscience, not as a mere artifact, but as a test of whether we still have the capacity to govern ourselves.
In this issue, devoted to that document, U.S. Rep. Tom Barrett reflects on how those principles shape federalism, citizenship, and the work of a free society.
In our conversation with North Carolina Rep. Mike Schietzelt, he reminds us that rights remain inseparable from responsibility, and that the work of self-government belongs first to citizens themselves.
Because Jefferson’s pen did not emerge from a vacuum, Peter Reichard contributes a historical essay retelling the events of 1776. From Tom Paine’s Common Sense to Richard Henry Lee’s resolution to the edits of Jefferson’s draft, his contribution reveals how the Declaration came to be.
One of this issue’s central arguments, that the Declaration must be read within its historical and moral limits, comes from historian Timothy Minella. As new or trendy rights multiply, Rev. Ben Johnson argues, self-government weakens, shifting authority from citizens to courts, bureaucracies, and international institutions.
The words assert, plainly and without apology, that tyranny is never to be accepted by a free people.
We also turn to Steven Skultety of the Declaration of Independence Center at Ole Miss, who offers us a vision of the Declaration as a model of reasoned persuasion. At a time when many campuses mistake protests for real dialogue, he argues for a richer commitment to civil debate and discussion.
The Declaration emerged from messy coalitions and was defended by ordinary people determined to preserve their right to govern themselves. That same demanding work of coalition-building, Kerri Toloczko reminds us, is still essential today.
James Dickson suggests that while the Founders risked everything to escape distant rule, today’s states have instead issued a declaration of dependence, bound not by force but by federal money.
Neal McCluskey challenges the assumption that self-government depends on centralized schooling, showing instead how a culture of reading, debate, and civic engagement prepared ordinary Americans to better receive the claims in the document.
Addressing a generation tempted toward dependence and disillusionment, Drew DiMeglio reminds young Americans that the Revolution was a fight to preserve self-government and that understanding this cause is the first step toward renewing it.
Looking to the forgotten wisdom of Presidents Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover, John Hendrickson argues that the Declaration’s first principles remain final and timeless truths as Coolidge so eloquently put it in his 150th anniversary address.
Finally, Jefferson’s rhythmic, rat-tat cadence gives the Declaration its sense of urgency. The grievances against the Crown were not abstract complaints but a plain statement of what free people must never tolerate: arbitrary power, distant rule, and the steady erosion of self-government. The words assert, plainly and without apology, that tyranny is never to be accepted by a free people.
As Matt Beienburg of the Goldwater Institute observed in an interview, America now stands at an inflection point. The enduring question Jefferson leaves us is the same one before us today: are we prepared for a renewed birth of freedom, or will we quietly accept decline?
