To the Editor:
Did our ancestors get it wrong? 

This past week the vice president of the United States provided what appeared to be a quote from the Declaration of Independence.

A transcript of her speech in Tallahassee, Florida on Jan. 22, 2023, reads, “So we are here together because we collectively believe and know America is a promise. America is a promise. It is a promise of freedom and liberty — not for some, but for all. A promise we made in the Declaration of Independence that we are each endowed with the right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Be clear. These rights were not bestowed upon us. They belong to us as Americans.”

There are so many subtle and overt efforts to distort the original text of the document which established and shaped our nation it is difficult to fathom. This speech was abhorrent and a complete misinterpretation of what many understand our founding fathers’ text to represent. This speech sounded more like an attempt to rewrite Thomas Jefferson’s famed opening statement, which introduced the United States to the world. 

Reading into this misquote, one must ask, did “by their Creator” and “Inalienable rights, among these are Life” not belong in their places within the Declaration? Did Mr. Jefferson and others, after painstaking debate and resolve, include words that ought to be omitted in its reading today? Judging by the way our nation, and the validity of this document, has held up against continuous onslaught and scrutiny since its inception I doubt that is the case.

First, the Declaration’s listing of the inalienable rights was not a promise, it was merely a statement. “These truths are self-evident,” enumerated as “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness” are rights worth upholding and fighting for. Never was this statement of fact a promise of those rights remaining in perpetuity if we do not work to preserve them.

Second, these rights were in fact bestowed upon us, exactly as Mr. Jefferson explains. We are “Endowed by our Creator,” meaning the only reason we even have these rights is because our Creator first gave them to us. These rights do not originate from us, and that endowment can be taken away at any moment through the judgment of our Creator.

Third, the right of “Life” is the sole reason our nation is still in existence almost 250 years later. If we scrub this from our identity were are left with only the opposite, death and decay. Life is why we keep turning over new generations, keep growing into something new, keep forging ahead into different frontiers. Life should be embraced and cherished by all, not snuffed out under the guise of liberty to live for yourself.  

I doubt that if the text read as the vice president stated, our nation would have survived for now almost 250 years. I also doubt that, if we embrace the ideal that we are owed liberty and happiness without personal responsibility, we will survive but another 10. 

Christopher Longo

Guilderland

Editor’s note: The Declaration of Independence actually says, “We hold these truths to be self-evident ….” meaning: We, the men who signed this document, believe or assert the equality of all men, and their unalienable rights are clear. The signers also held that governments derive their just power from the governed and that, when government becomes destructive, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it “to effect their Safety and Happiness.”