The United States of America counts July 4, 1776, as the day of its founding. Other nations count a pivotal battle, the signing of a treaty, or the coronation of a king. But we count neither April 19, 1775 (the battle of Lexington and Concord), nor September 3, 1783 (the Treaty of Paris), nor September 17, 1787 (Constitution Day).
America marks her 250th anniversary by celebrating the Declaration of Independence. The revolutionary war had already been in progress since the “shot heard ‘round the world” at Lexington. So, the Declaration was not an act of war.
It was a principled statement of the reasons why war was necessary. It was not addressed to King George III. It was addressed to the world.
That is remarkable.
Our founding fathers believed that they had a duty to the world. They believed that not only individual people, but every people-group—nation, state, or colony—has a duty to the world to do what is right.
That is America’s foundation.
The Declaration of Independence begins: “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.”
A “decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires” the Declaration.
These words do not only theorize the existence of natural law. The authors actually subject themselves to that law. They recognized an obligation to explain themselves and to be subject to the judgment of all mankind. And this obligation was personal.
Every man who signed the Declaration could never again hide in the crowd. Each personally and individually offered his neck to the king’s noose. And he did so because he was obligated to explain his actions to the world. While the “course of human events” could have continued anonymously, these men risked everything to make themselves accountable.
But who wrote this law that compelled them to publish their names at such great risk? Was there some global legislation that they were following? Was it the decree of some planetary potentate, or the opinion of some world supreme court? Nope, nope, and nope.
The law was written into nature. It was authored by “Nature’s God.” And “the rectitude of [their] intentions” was adjudicated by “the Supreme Judge of the world.”
Moreover, this “Law of Nature” was not a secret, known only to an anointed few. It was written for every eye to see and for every mind to understand. The entire population of the world has access to this “Law of Nature,” so that nobody should be surprised when “the Supreme Judge of the world” hands down His verdict.
Populism, rightly understood, is not a substitution of the voice of the people for the voice of God (vox populi, vox Dei). The Founders’ Populism was an unwavering belief that God’s “invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse” (Romans 1:20).
Every single delegate to the Continental Congress understood that personal responsibility. So, they did not issue the Declaration as a work of a committee, or of the congress as a whole. They insisted on unanimity. And each was personally accountable.
That is the foundation of America. Government actions can never be outsourced to anonymous state actors. The machinations of the mob can never be an excuse for immorality—whether that mob occupies main street or the halls of power. Rather, moral and upright individuals are chosen who will make every government decision and take every government action as one who will personally answer for that act.
Eleven years later, the people of the United States crafted the United States Constitution to make this founding principle a reality. They did not write it to put process in the place of personal responsibility.
No system, no process, no protocol can ever replace the individual who stands before the God of Creation and who asks the whole world to judge his or her actions in the light of commonly accessible truth.
July 4, 2026, marks a quarter of a millennium since 56 men mutually pledged to each other their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor. To honor that founding rightly, we too should recognize our obligation to each other to stand for the Truth as given by God and commonly accessible to all mankind.
Jonathan Lange is a Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod pastor in Evanston and Kemmerer and serves the Wyoming Pastors Network. Follow his blog at https://jonathanlange.substack.com/. Email: JLange64@protonmail.com
