I have a friend who can undertake this exercise more knowledgeably and eloquently than I (and while he's not a politician, a lawyer or a historian, he is one of the smartest people I know), but here's my cut.
Let's break down this most fundamental, elemental portion of the Declaration, these 35 impactful words:
"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."
1. These things to follow are accepted as truths. Not opinions. Not beliefs. Truths. Not subject to debate.
2. These truths are held by the authors (representing the People) to be self-evident. They are obvious, they are clear, because of the truths themselves. Self-evident: they are obvious because of themselves, of what they say. Self-evident: because of what they are, what they say, they should be clear to all.
3. Another very important point regarding these first seven words: these truths are not held to be truths by the authors, they are truths, and are held to be self-evident by the authors. This is a vital distinction; the authors could have said, "We hold these to be truths, and to be self-evident." That would mean that their status as truth would be conveyed by the authors. Instead, the authors are saying that they are truths, period, and they hold them to be self-evident. That removes any suggestion that whether they are truths is a matter of opinion.
4. The first self-evident truth is that all men are created equal. Now it's true that the Declaration was written before the suffrage movement or the end of slavery. However, it has become generally accepted that this truth of equality applies to all races and creeds, and to both men and women alike.
Perhaps that perceived gradual broadening of the intent of the Declaration's authors is what has opened the door for so many to re-interpret the words that follow, namely the definition of what is a right as endowed by our Creator. However, we don't know what the authors' original intent was. Maybe it was already sufficiently broad to cover man and woman, slave and free, but they knew that, given the mores of that time, it would take many decades for the full weight of their words to be accepted by all. Or maybe they actually did view women and slaves as less than equal.
No matter. What is clear is that their following words did not leave open for interpretation any broadening of intent, because of the thoughtful and intentional use of what I believe is the most important word in this section of the Declaration. But we'll get to that a little later.
5. The second truth is that all men (people) are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights. Now, whether you're a believer or not, this is very important, for several reasons. First, we are endowed with these rights at birth (some, including me, would argue conception, but that's another argument for another day), by our Creator, meaning that they cannot be taken from us by government fiat. They dwell within us as surely as our breath, our senses and our beating hearts.
Second, they are not granted to us by our government. The implication is that these fundamental rights are above the ability of government to provide, that it is not government's role to be in the business of granting such fundamental rights. The government can ensure the right to free speech, the right to bear arms, and other legal rights. But these rights are so critically important that they transcend government's ability to grant them - and should transcend government's ability to impede them. It's above their pay grade.
And third, these rights are unalienable. Webster's defines this word in simple, but powerful terms:
Impossible to take away or give up.
Thus the authors of the Declaration are stating clearly that these rights come from the One who created us, whomever we may believe that to be; the important point is that they are ours, and no king, no president, no lawmaker can take them from us (at least not without a fight, but we'll get to that later also).
Now, on to the rights themselves, but first, let's consider them in light of two things: first, their unalienability, and second, the context in which the Declaration was written. It was written to declare the independence (hence the name) of a nation of people from the tyranny and oppression of a centralized government that dictated their lives, their freedom, and their ability to achieve whatever happiness they chose in life.
Exactly the kind of powerful centralized government that would try to provide for our every need, by taking from us the means to provide it through our own choices. Food for thought.
6. Life. We have the right to life. It should be impossible to be taken from us. Yet it can be, by criminal act, by accident, by war, by our own actions, and by the government, if a death penalty is imposed. I'm not going to get into that debate here, other than to note that one's own rights end when they infringe upon the rights of another (this is a matter of logic in the academic sense, enforced by law).
What the authors were responding to was the fact that monarchs and other governmental authorities had been determining these rights for centuries, taking the lives or liberties of anyone who threatened or opposed them. We find Biblical examples including Pharaoh and Herod, and more recent examples through the British monarchs our founders were declaring their independence from, right up to North Korea and Iran today.
7. Liberty. We have the right to live as free men and women. (I'll avoid the debate over the fact that a number of the signers of the Declaration owned slaves. That's a separate topic, best taken up by friends I know who are far more knowledgeable - in part because it would be a distraction from this discussion, and, more importantly, this discussion would be a distraction from that important topic. Suffice it to say that I believe chattel slavery was the deepest stain on the fabric of our nation.)
Again in the context of the circumstances, the authors were declaring that no citizen of this fledgling republic would ever again be subject to the whims of a single despotic ruler. In essence, they were raising a collective middle finger in King George's face.
These first two rights are indeed self-evident, and sufficiently clear. We have the right to our own lives, and the right to our own freedom. The next right contains a subtlety that is too often missed, but is critical in understanding the proper role of the government in this republic.
8. The pursuit of happiness. Let's first address happiness itself. The authors don't define it, but leave it to each individual to define - again, a very important and intentional distinction. For some, it may be unimaginable wealth, the ability to buy every thing and every experience one's heart desires. Others may be perfectly happy with little in the way of material things, but want to be free from having to work their tails off, free from having to go to school beyond what's required, free from excessive responsibilities and worry.
For some, it's more about family and relationships. For others, it may be about where they live. It may be about the meaningfulness of the work one does, or one's pursuits and interests, or one's charitable work. For many, it's a combination of at least some of the above.
One important point is that, again, the rights of one individual to pursue what makes him or her happy must not infringe upon the rights of another. So while it might make one person happy to, say, get loaded and go joyriding, doing so puts others' right to life at risk.
However, this cannot be extrapolated to extreme arguments such as this: your right to pursue happiness by becoming wealthy interferes with my right to pursue happiness by having the government give me everything I want, so to pay for that you should be taxed out the wazoo. (More on taxes later.)
9. The most important word among these 35 is: "pursuit."
We do not have a right to happiness, however we define that. Sorry if that bursts your bubble, or seems harsh, but the language is plain - self-evident, in fact. Would being rich make you happy? Fine. You're free to pursue that (not by robbing a bank, by the way). Invent something. Work your tail off. Save your money. Pursue your happiness. Many have done it, from Sam Walton to Chris Gardner.
Would you be happy running a business, being a CEO? Okay. Be prepared to work harder than everyone around you to get there. To work long hours once you're there. To carry the burden of responsibility for everyone who works for you, plus any investors in the company. To handle significant stress. And to sacrifice other things, like time with your family, evenings and weekends off, vacations spent without checking your work email, etc. Those things are part of the pursuit, and in a free, capitalist democratic republic, there's nothing stopping you. (I'm speaking from personal experience here.)
Perhaps happiness to you comes from doing work you find meaningful, like teaching, for example. I can think of few jobs more important. Yet, you're also going to be making sacrifices. A college degree requires sacrifice. Then there's long hours for relatively limited pay, certainly not commensurate with the importance of the work, but in reality commensurate with the laws of supply and demand. On the plus side you have high job satisfaction (again, assuming this is what makes you happy) and summers off. (Lest anyone try to read anything nefarious into these comments, I have nothing but the highest regard for teachers, many of my friends and relatives are teachers, and if I could start my career over, with the benefit of hindsight, I'd rather be a teacher than a CEO.) In any event, there's nothing holding you back from the pursuit of your dream.
Maybe you'd be happiest being able to spend a lot of time enjoying the leisure activities you prefer, in the company of your friends. Maybe you're not interested in material things; all you need is a good pair of shoes and a backpack, and lots of free time. You don't care about the walls that surround you or whether you have to share that space with a roommate or two. You could be happy doing any work that permitted you those things you enjoy most. Have at it - those opportunities abound. (Come to think of it, that scenario sounds pretty appealing too.) Just know that you may have to sacrifice some other things, like wages that would support a family of four with a house in the suburbs and a late-model car.
But no one is endowed by their Creator with the right to be a CEO, a teacher, or a free spirit hiking his or her way through life. You have to pursue it. And nothing is stopping you from that.
What you were endowed by your Creator with is a set of talents, abilities and interests that will allow you to pursue those things, no matter who you are. Yes, there are people who, sadly, cannot pursue their dreams. I'm not talking about the poor; there are far too many examples of enterprising, hard-working people who've overcome poverty to achieve great success in life, in business, in medicine, in academia, and in whatever other pursuits bring them happiness. (Think Chris Gardner again.)
Nor am I talking about people who, sadly, place barriers on their own pursuits in the form of self-imposed limitations. I'm talking about people who unfortunately have some physical or mental limitation that prevents them from the pursuit of their own definition of happiness. And I'm afraid I don't have an easy answer to that particular conundrum.
I do believe that we have an obligation to help others. We can fulfill that obligation voluntarily, assuming we do truly care about others. And I'm also not opposed to limited government-provided basic assistance such as Medicaid, funded by tax dollars. We just have to be careful about how far that goes, or we run the risk of straying from the reason for the very intentional use of the word "pursuit." In other words, we begin to expect that the government will provide for the things that we have the opportunity to earn through that pursuit.
Does the worker at McDonald's have the right to sufficient pay to comfortably support a family of four? Or as much pay as a teacher, or a nurse? The answer lies not in the perceived relative importance of the work, nor does it lie in some sense of fairness, equality or compassion.
The answer once again lies in the immutable laws of supply and demand, and in our unalienable right to the pursuit of happiness. I'm living proof that a guy who worked in a fast food job in college is capable of doing other things that pay more money. And I've encountered numerous young people in fast food drive-throughs that I'd have hired in the brokerage firm I ran for 15 years in a hot minute, because of their great customer service skills. If only they'd had the requisite knowledge to do the job - which they could have pursued (if I can do it, pretty much anybody can) - I'd have done so.
Now, you're perfectly free to spend the rest of your life serving up French fries and McNuggets. Just understand that, again, there will be some necessary sacrifices involved.
The vast majority of us are endowed not only with these rights as set forth above, but with the skills and abilities to pursue our definition of happiness, if we'll only do it. That's one of the wonderful things about the prescient vision that the authors of the Declaration laid out, and that has prevailed for more than 200 years. Quite amazing, really, when you consider how many systems have failed in far less time.
Unfortunately, there is a mindset today that would threaten that vision. One that suggests the government should ensure our happiness, and that others should be forced to pony up to provide that. The definition of that happiness has been broadened to include things like health insurance, equal pay no matter the supply of or demand for the work, and myriad other "rights." (Again, lest my words be twisted, I do believe quite strongly in equal pay for equal work, and I have applied it throughout my career when it was my decision to set pay.)
That broadening of the definition of happiness, of rights, and of the government's role in all of this, is not what the Founders envisioned. Taxes were virtually non-existent in this country at its founding. There was no income tax or estate tax or personal property tax. The first taxes were tariffs on imported goods that were imposed at ports of entry, and an excise tax on whiskey. (The horror!)
Nowhere in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution or the Bill of Rights is there a promise (or even a hint) of the taking of money from one group of people in order to provide for the happiness of another group of people. (In fact, the Revolution that precipitated independence was in part a response to excessive taxation, and to the tyrannical system that employed that practice.)
Granted, the Preamble to the Constitution makes reference to establishing justice, insuring domestic tranquility, providing for the common defense, and promoting the general welfare. This means that:
- We are to be a nation of laws. This is the system that ensures the logical precept that the rights of one do not infringe on the rights of another.
- We should have a means of keeping peace among ourselves and enforcing those laws - police, in other words.
- We should defend America and protect its citizens, thus we should have various entities to provide for our defense - an Army, a Navy, etc.
- We should promote the general welfare. This is not to be misconstrued as creating a welfare state; that was not the framers' intent. No, this speaks to providing the most basic of needs for those who are unable to otherwise meet them. To ensure that we remain free to pursue our own happiness, not to provide that happiness for us. To provide for basic roads and other infrastructure that assist in that pursuit. To clear excessive regulation that would hinder that pursuit. (The topic of the meaning of "promote the general welfare" could be a blog post all its own.)
The Declaration goes on to say that, if a government morphs into something that threatens those unalienable rights, it is not only the right of the people to "throw off that Government," but it is their duty.
There are those who would twist those words and claim that this is exactly what has happened since November 8, 2016. To those people, I encourage a careful reading of the Declaration in its entirety (sober, preferably), including the words that precede this discussion of throwing off such a government:
"Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes ... 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 ..." (italics added).
If the perceived train of abuses and usurpations of our government is long, it has been imposed upon us by both Democrat and Republican, left and right. No one on the left would accept that as truth over the eight years preceding the current administration, nor would anyone on the right have accepted it for the eight years preceding that.
In other words, you can't go around calling for impeachment every time your party's candidate loses a presidential election, especially within the first few months or so, claiming that the new administration is guilty of abuses and usurpations simply because it's in the hands of the opposing party.
Actually, I'd encourage a thorough and careful reading of the entire Declaration to every citizen, without the blinders of bias, but reading for true understanding of what was intended at the birth of our nation.
One final note: there is considerable debate over whether the Constitution should stand as written, or whether it was meant as a living document to be amended as times change. There's a slippery slope between that and becoming a banana republic. For example, a president of a country could seek to amend that country's constitution to eliminate term limits on the presidency, for the sole purpose of retaining power. So the debate over whether our Constitution is a living document will continue.
However, one thing is certain: the Declaration of Independence cannot be viewed as a living document. Otherwise, we might as well all be eating crumpets and drinking Earl Grey, whilst singing "God Save the Queen."
However, one thing is certain: the Declaration of Independence cannot be viewed as a living document. Otherwise, we might as well all be eating crumpets and drinking Earl Grey, whilst singing "God Save the Queen."
