Our view: The Fourth still means something

Another year, another year older. Our country turned 243 yesterday, and it was a day spent celebrating what we like to call the greatest country in the world.

Blessed with rich natural resources, fruitful farmland, mountains and valleys, the United States of America is more than just a land mass.

Our Founding Fathers had the foresight to create a complex yet elegant blend of democracy, accountability, freedoms, and laws that has allowed us to flourish and grow to become the country we are today. They laid the groundwork in The Declaration of Independence.

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.

We have an active form of government, where the disenfranchised and the powerful alike have a voice when it comes to making decisions that affect us all. Anyone can get involved in our elected government, and many have. We applaud them.

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

That structure has allowed us to welcome many cultures, blending the best of what many had to offer, and creating our own brand of nationalism: America.

Not to say we don’t have our issues. We seem to be deeply divided on most political issues, and we still experience the human issues all societies have faced: crime, poverty and disease, among them.

But after a day of patriotic celebration like we experienced yesterday, we’re reminded that we share more in common as Americans than what divides us.

We hope our residents, our citizens, realize how fortunate we are to live here. And that to be a good citizen in a democracy requires engagement — in local government and the issues of the day.

And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

The Declaration of Independence remains a fascinating read. Take time out this long weekend and read it.