[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Pages 14149-14150]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            INDEPENDENCE DAY

  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, on Friday, July 4, the United States will 
conduct the 232nd celebration of Independence Day. On this day, we 
commemorate the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. 
Flags will fly and rousing music will be heard before the faint whiff 
of gunpowder and thunderous boom of fireworks reminds us of the great 
struggle that took place to set our Nation upon its course through 
history.
  Amid all the parades, fireworks, and backyard barbeques, it is 
worthwhile to consider the document itself. The Declaration of 
Independence is an amazing and powerful manuscript. Phrases in its 
opening paragraphs are familiar to most Americans: ``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.'' That 
line may well be the most recognizable sentence in American political 
history. It is certainly among the top 10.
  As famous as the phrase ``Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of 
Happiness,'' is, however, it is not the first sentence of the 
Declaration. The lead sentence reads: ``When in the Course of human 
events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political 
bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the 
powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws 
of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the 
opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which 
impel them to the separation.'' This sentence sets the stage for the 
body of the Declaration, which lists in some detail the abuses of power 
that drove the Founders to a war of secession.
  Unlike the philosophical goals of life, liberty, and happiness, which 
Americans today readily understand and revere, the complaints listed in 
the Declaration rarely fire the popular imagination. But they should. 
The abuses of the King listed in the Declaration are the very issues 
that the Constitution

[[Page 14150]]

strives to prevent. They are the issues that the Bill of Rights 
specifically protects us against. They are issues, and battles, still 
being fought today, as the recent debates and court actions over the 
rights of detainees and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or 
FISA, demonstrate.
  Reading the list of the colonists' grievances paints a vivid picture 
of life in those times. One can readily imagine the frustrations of a 
people trying to build a working society, ruled by laws, that welcomes 
new settlers and that promotes trade and commerce but is continually 
set back by contempt and indifference. The colonies' governments are 
dissolved or are forced to meet in out-of-the-way, uncomfortable places 
or at times that discourage part-time legislators from attending. Laws 
are arbitrarily suspended until the King, can rule on them, but he 
never does provide a ruling. New courts cannot be established unless 
the King, thousands of miles and months of travel away, will agree to 
them. Judges depend on the King's favor for their jobs and their 
salaries, so they rarely rule against him, anyway. New taxes and new 
rules from Britain are continually imposed upon the colonists, from 
stamp taxes to tea taxes, and their complaints about them are met with 
silence or violence. Large armies are camped among the colonies and 
take what they demand from the colonists, but they are immune from 
prosecution for any wrongs they commit. Mercenaries are brought in, and 
colonists are seized and forced into military service on behalf of the 
King.
  The colonists complain, but the King does not care. The Declaration 
concludes, therefore, ``A Prince, whose character is thus marked by 
every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free 
people.'' In the Constitution to come, the Founding Fathers will design 
a government that limits the power of the executive in order to prevent 
tyranny by one man, and will protect the rights of the individual 
against the state. Courts will be independent, and taxes must be levied 
only by the representatives of the people.
  Our Government was expressly designed to prevent anyone from having 
to live under the same conditions suffered by the colonists. As Thomas 
Jefferson wrote, ``In questions of power then, let no more be heard of 
confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the 
Constitution.''
  Ultimately, the colonists declared in their Declaration of 
Independence that `` . . . these united Colonies are, and of Right 
ought to be Free and Independent States . . . Absolved from all 
Allegiance to the British Crown . . . '' and held Britain, `` . . . as 
we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.''
  On this Independence Day, the current generation can look back upon 
those strong, resolute words with pride and gratitude. We would do well 
to remember the abuses that finally compelled our Founding Fathers to 
declare war, so that we never let the freedoms that were won for us to 
be lost. Remember the words of John Adams, who warned that ``The jaws 
of power are always open to devour, and her arm is always stretched 
out, if possible, to destroy freedom of thinking, speaking, and 
writing.'' He further wrote, ``Be not intimidated . . . nor suffer 
yourselves to be wheedled out of your liberties by any pretense of 
politeness, delicacy, or decency. These, as they are often used, are 
but three different names for hypocrisy, chicanery and cowardice.'' 
Those are the words of experience, speaking across the ages. This 
Independence Day, we best honor our legacy by caring for it with the 
same passion and vigilance that John Adams did.
  Mr. President, I wish you, and everyone listening, a happy 
Independence Day.

                          ____________________