Two Hundred and Fifty Years of Freedom
Signs and billboards are going up in cities and towns across America that proclaim this is the year that marks “250 years of freedom.” But it is an ironic fact of history that we are farther from freedom now than we were fifty years ago. The United States is in retrograde motion. We are rapidly moving backwards when it comes to civil rights, human rights, economic prosperity, and constitutional stability.
Freedom did not come for enslaved people until the 13th Amendment to the Constitution (1865), the 14th Amendment (1868) and the 15th Amendment (1870), all passed in the wake of an incredibly bloody civil war that killed upwards of 700,000 Americans, and left the southern states in ruins for generations.
To say slaves were freed did not mean that freedom followed. A concerted effort of terror and intimidation kept freedmen and women from full citizenship. As soon as federal troops no longer occupied the South, black Americans found themselves subjected to “black codes” which all but returned them to the status of slaves. African Americans experienced “second-class” status and racial segregation called “Jim Crow” until the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Women were not fully free citizens until the passage of the 19th Amendment in 1920, which means they have had 106 years of Freedom, not 250. But even this major step forward, after a long struggle, did not mean women were free of social and political strictures, and limitations in the workplace, except in times of war, when they performed so-called “men’s” jobs with great skill.
Native American Indians, whose ancestors were on the North American continent for thousands of years before Europeans arrived, suffered centuries of genocidal wars and constant pressure from generations of a variety of Americans who wanted their land. It was not until 1924 that the United States granted citizenship to all Native Americans, but then many states denied them the right to vote and found other ways to keep them in a second-class status.
For Americans who identify as part of the LGBTQ community, freedom has come very slowly and fitfully. It was not until 1973 that the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from a list of mental disorders. And it was just 23 years ago that the Supreme Court struck down laws criminalizing same-sex relationships nationwide. And it was only 11 years ago that the Supreme Court recognized same-sex marriages as a constitutional right.
Immigrants to America, those who passed Ellis Island and saw the Statue of Liberty and learned its message, found the struggle for acceptance did not come easy. The United States has, at times, welcomed immigrants. The nation’s booming industries actually recruited them to come to America. At other times we have excluded them, or seriously limited their numbers. And we have applied immigration laws unevenly depending on where the immigrants originated.
This year, as we celebrate the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, we have an unprecedented army of ICE agents rounding up immigrants, especially those from Latin American nations. These immigrants are jailed and deported, often dividing families, without due process of law. Plans are underway in several states to build giant “detention” centers that are little more than prisons or concentration camps.
Various religions and religious groups have struggled to find freedom and acceptance in America. It did not come to all in 1776, and it does not fully exist in 2026. We have wavered between religious liberty and toleration and persecution of religious sects and denominations. Likewise, atheists and agnostics have been ostracized and discriminated against and books on these subjects have been banned by various school boards. Freedom of thought does not come easy in America.
So how can we proclaim throughout the land that we have had 250 years of freedom? We owe it to all who have struggled for their freedom over generations to tell our national story truthfully. We owe it to all those who gave their lives and limbs in wars to keep us from the grips of fascism and imperialism. We cannot simply proclaim that freedom exists and say it has existed for 250 years when it has not.
Unfortunately, in this 250th year of the Declaration of Independence, which declared that “all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights and among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” we find our Supreme Court gutting civil rights and voting rights, declaring the president is above the law, and taking us in a backward direction to Jim Crow America.
And, unfortunately, in this 250th year of the Declaration, we have a president who is an undemocratic authoritarian, who has ordered his agency heads to get rid of troubling aspects of American history in our museums and national parks, so we can all be happy and celebrate this year.
Our Fourth of July celebrations have gone on since 1776. They are real and worth celebrating. The ideas of the Declaration of Independence were, and still are, powerful and world changing. John Adams said in 1776 that Americans should always celebrate the Declaration with fireworks, parades, and displays of history and patriotism. We were not perfect in 1776, we are not perfect now. But we must keep the promise, and we should never give up on the meaning of the Fourth of July.
The Preamble to the U.S. Constitution begins with the idea that the purpose of government is to “form a more perfect union.” We should keep this in mind as we watch parades in communities across the nation, as we watch fireworks, as families gather in backyards and parks for picnics. We can only build a more perfect union for all of us, when we recognize the limits of our freedom and find ways to expand it—for all the people, all the time.
There is one essential truth in all of this. As long as some of us are unfree, none of us are truly free. Lincoln knew that slavery degraded not just the enslaved, but those who were the enslavers. What he called for was a “new birth of freedom.” That is still our goal.
