While controversy abides to the present day as to whether the primary author of those ennobling words intended for them to include all human beings (or just privileged white aristocrats), no one can question their eloquence nor their inspirational quality. Despite the 18th century realities of slavery and the lack of women's suffrage in most states, the words of our Declaration of Independence have done more to define us as a people than any other such expression.
With just a few revisions to the opening lines of the Declaration of Independence, the delegates to the Second Continental Congress affirmed that which would be the basis for our very existence as a nation:
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 to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.
Those individuals that have most emerged in our nation's short history as heroes are those who have most advanced those sacred principles, as enshrined in our national heritage.
These principles include a commitment to human equality, recognition of basic and fundamental human rights endowed in every human being, and faith in a Higher Power (not human government or society) as the ultimate source of those "unalienable" rights.
Just what are those "unalienable rights"? According to the Second Continental Congress, Thomas Jefferson, and the men who inspired Jefferson (including Virginia's George Mason), they included a right to live, a right to live free of government control, and a right to "pursue happiness." The basis of that last right was property ownership and the freedom to determine one's own occupation and future. It is the promise of what we know as "the American Dream."
Some of these ideas, perhaps especially the one concerning faith in a Divine Power, have been controversial in recent years. Yet this does not change the fact that these ideas are the basis of the United States of America.
Only those individuals who embraced virtually all - if not all - of these ideals qualify for mention in this list. And only those individuals who truly committed themselves to advancing these ideals are included.
 |
 |
 |
