ClarkCast 015 - Independence Day
July 3, 2006
Transcription by Melange

Good morning and Happy Fourth of July. When I was growing up in Little Rock, this was a day that we eagerly looked forward to. It was a day of fireworks. We scrounged firecrackers and snakes and TNTs and cherry bombs. We ran around the neighborhood blowing coffee cans 15 feet in the air with these things; and generally annoying the adults. It was a day when the sidewalks would be black with the snakes that would be lit and slowly unfurl; and at night of course you'd expect to see the bottle rockets lit off and then maybe you'd see municipal fireworks. It was a day for watermelons and picnics and climbing Pinnacle Mountain. As I got older, I realized that there is a lot more to the Fourth of July than we thought as children here in the south.

Two hundred and thirty years ago, a group of men put their lives on hold - they actually put their lives at risk - to convene a meeting to discuss and debate, and ultimately to resolve to act for the rights of men and women, for their liberty and individual freedom. The result was on that Fourth of July, 1776, the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence - a document whose power sparked a revolution in the 13 colonies and has motivated a revolution that persists around the world today. These words - they're unusual, carefully constructed, debated, thought-through - but still holding, after 230 years an incredible intensity that translates far beyond the English they were written in:

“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.”

The power of these words - they certainly pushed Americans forward at home. They pushed others abroad who came and studied our civilization, who lived here and enjoyed the liberties that we have. They became the foundation for all that we hold dear in America: our democracy, our economy, our civilization, our ideals, the values that protected us and kept us safe during the Cold War.

These words were the beacons of hope for millions of people around the world as they looked at our country and hoped that the example of American civilization could provide the inspiration and the power to free them from tyranny and give them liberty. With the power of these words, though, came responsibility. These words are standards and they're standards that we've held ourselves to for 230 years.

Is it true that all men are created equal? And women? All? Every one of them? With no distinguishable characteristics? Not by the value of the property they own. Not by their racial heritage, their sexual orientation? Nothing. No distinguishing rights? They're all created equal and these rights are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We fought a war - a terrible civil war in America. 600,000 dead resolving this.

We marched and gained direct democracy - direct election of Senators in the early 20th century. And the right of women to vote. We've gotten rid of the poll tax. We're still struggling in America to meet the standards that we professed 230 years ago.

We've done some great things along the way. We've moved across a continent, settled a frontier; mastered the seas, gone to the moon; protected our freedom, defeated fascism. We've had incredible discoveries in science and a lot of work in the humanities. Along the way it's been electric lighting, telephone, lasers, semiconductors, airplanes, the internet, penicillin, polio vaccine, human genome. We've used freedom of the press. We've used our organizing principles. We've created labor unions. We've marched and protested and spoken in an effort to give us these unalienable rights of life, liberty and of pursuit of happiness and the human institutions that are required to protect and advance those rights.

We've got a lot to be proud of as Americans and on this Fourth of July I hope we do that. I think that there's never been an experiment in human living that's come to a happier, let's say, "mid-term" result than what we have in America today. I say "mid-term" because I believe our best days really are in front of us. We have many new frontiers to conquer, frontiers that will transform the way we live and the way we lead our lives.

We've got frontiers of science, in areas like stem cell research, nanotechnology, unlocking the full secrets of the reproductive process - DNA, the human genome and all that can come with it - medicine that can address individually the illnesses that people have, greatly expanded lifetime and more importantly, greatly enhanced health during that lifetime.

We've got unlimited opportunities to develop new and exploit new sources of energy. The energy we have on earth ultimately comes from the sun; we can take it directly from the sun, we don't have to rely on carbon locked up in plants from half a billion years ago. We can find this energy directly if we'll simply put the key to it.

Understanding the human mind, the psychology, the nature of learning; how we can promote better human understanding, faster uptake for scientific knowledge so we have a truly literate population around the world, able to understand the world we live in and therefore better able to make the kinds of direct judgments that democracy requires.

These are great frontiers to work on, to advance across, to conquer in our times. We can do that. We can do it because we're the same Americans whose forefathers signed that Declaration of Independence. We're Americans by heritage, by culture, by will. It was and is our choice to be Americans, to live with that spirit of daring, of risk taking, of commitment, of determination, of courage; which mark the signatures this day 230 years ago in Philadelphia.

We just have to accept who we are and live that heritage. Thank you.