On July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress appointed a committee to design a Great Seal for the new nation whose independence they had just declared. The 56 men who signed their name to the Declaration of Independence had just committed the most audacious act of treason one could possibly imagine.
They were lawyers and merchants and plantation owners, physicians, farmers, scientists, printers. Francis Hopkinson was a musician and John Witherspoon a minister. Some were wealthy, others like Samuel Adams were so poor they could barely afford a suit to wear to the Continental Congress. Some enjoyed university educations – others had no formal education at all.
They adopted for themselves a motto – E Pluribus Unum – “Out of the many, we are One.”
For them, this was an extraordinary aspiration. There was so much that divided the people who shared those thirteen colonies: questions of loyalty to crown, slavery and the rights of indigenous peoples, questions of economic opportunity and responsibility. Those in the south saw things differently than those in the north. Those with means saw things differently than those without.
America has always suffered from division and polarization. Our divisions led even to a Civil War in which nearly 750,000 people lost their lives. Abraham Lincoln was right when he prophesied in 1858, “a house divided against itself cannot stand.”
But for 250 years, America has been held together by those who devoted their lives – their acumen, their energy and in so many cases, “the last full measure of devotion” – to the complimentary ideals of freedom and mutuality – and the mission to improve the quality of our collective lives.
The story of America includes the legacies of Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglas, W.E.B. Dubois and Martin Luther King – and countless others who gave their lives in service to “a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.’”
The story of America includes the legacies of Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucy Stone, and Sojourner Truth – and countless others who fought the repressions of sexism, and who insisted that “we cannot accept any code or creed that uniformly defrauds woman of all her natural rights.”
The story of America includes the legacies of Harvey Milk, Barbara Gittings, Audre Lord, and Larry Kramer – and countless others who fought to ensure that people would be free to love whomever their hearts called them to love, and who taught that “the more people open their hearts to us, the less we will have to fight for our rights.”
The story of America includes the legacies of Uriah Phillips Levy, Louis Brandeis, Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, and Deborah Lipstadt – and countless others who strove to eradicate the virus of antisemitism from our country, and who fought for a world where “The Jew in the kippah, the Muslim woman in the hijab, the African American student walking across campus, the Latino kids gathered celebrating, or just enjoying themselves in a park, must feel as safe as anyone else.”
The story of America includes thousands of scientists who devoted their lives to discovering medicines that would restore us to health, technologies that would transform how we travel, communicate, learn, and connect, who enriched our lives with new ideas, literature, music, and art that touched our souls and changed our minds.
Their legacy exemplifies the holy virtue of our original motto. And we best honor this milestone in American history by renewing our commitment to it.
Let’s use our freedom of speech to listen with curiosity and appreciation to those whose ideas and opinions differ from our own.
Let’s use our freedom of the press to expose the truth, to offer a perspective, to learn from each other, and hold the powerful to account.
Let’s use our freedom of religious expression to sanctify the gift of life and love, and to anchor our souls in sacred principles that lift up the holy quality of life.
Let’s use our freedom to assemble, not to intimidate, demean, or dehumanize, but to welcome and celebrate and lift each other up with respect and dignity.
This nation was founded 250 years ago by an audacious act of collective sacrifice to the ideals of freedom and human equality. We grew to become a nation that welcomed people from across the globe seeking freedom from persecution and economic opportunity. We thrived when we offered our people the freedom to unleash their ingenuity and imagination, and to endeavor to build and create whatever their dreams and hard work could accomplish.
The promise and potential of America is still untold. But we will only realize that potential when we understand our shared fate and destiny, when we celebrate not simply our independence but our interdependence, and by seeking much more deliberately to grow to be one with each other. The quality of our future depends on our willingness to renew our pledge of allegiance to this extraordinary republic, “one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Dan Levin
Temple Beth El of Boca Raton
