Independence Day this year provides 248 years since the historic and significant signing of the United States Declaration of Independence. At the time, the gathering to declare a colonial development separate from the anchor, the original nation, England, was a new twist, new development. The older European nations offered strength, stability, and competition among the European nations. The upstart colonial states, 13, in all, in the new land away from Europe, with control wrestled from the native inhabitants, were, in a sense a distraction from the competition for European leadership and accumulation of riches away from home. The three leading world nations in the late 18th Century were England, France, and Spain, western European countries.
The significance in the late 18th Century was the strong development of the colonies. It was only natural, given their sense of already being independent from Europe. The 13 states, in a sense of security and unity, worked together, and, with undeveloped land to the West ripe for development with natural resources, it was only inevitable the new states would prosper, form a strong nation, and be open to growth. The 1861-1865 U.S. Civil War, with brutal fighting and 620,000 dead, gave a glimpse into breaking into two nations. President Abraham Lincoln deserves credit for his understanding that the future was best served as one nation and the Civil War was worth fighting, even it meant war, death, and a reformation.
In the late 19th Century with poverty and war wreaking havoc in Europe the U.S. was open to and encouraged immigration for new beginnings.
The gathering in the1770s through the middle 1780s in the colonies was important because those representatives had received good educations, developed leadership capabilities, and knew a sense of financial prosperity. They were ready to form a more perfect union in the abstract and point the way to a bright future. The leaders, we have been taught in classrooms, included George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and several dozen more men. What has changed, is both the continuing immigration to make the United States one of the most populous countries in the world and the inclusion of women in leadership roles. The U.S. has been willing to incorporate new persons as part of the process in the tradition established in the 17th Century.
Although there is an ongoing debate over policies and politics, which is unlikely to cease and desist, and reflection continues of the value and values of the inhabitants of the United States, for both good and bad, as long as the inhabitants believe in ourselves, the nation will prosper and grow.