Editorial | This Fourth: Declaring year 250 of independence

History and tradition. July 4 has plenty of both and this year's holiday will reflect these with local parades, barbecues and, unfortunately, illegal fireworks.

This Fourth also marks 250 years since the original colonies declared their independence from a distant king.

The Declaration of Independence stands among the most powerful proclamations in human history. It and the Constitution have inspired democratic movements across the globe and set the standard by which the United States should be judged, even as we fall short of many of the lofty ideals within those documents.

With political polarization the norm and a government that seemingly swings back and forth, many citizens wonder what it means to be an American in the 21st century. The founders created not only the world's most remarkable experiment in limited government, but a durable one. Our nation has had its share of challenges and travails, but two and a half centuries of representative democracy is not easily dismissed.

And we're the most prosperous large nation that the world has ever known. Yet Americans don't seem to be in a celebratory mood. A Reuters/Ipsos poll reveals that 1 in 5 Americans will not mark Independence Day this year and 2 in 5 respondents doubt the nation's ability to endure for another 250 years.

It's optimistic to expect any political system to endure for 250 years, but many Americans - at least if social media debates are an accurate indication - fear that our nation won't survive another 10 or 20 years given the divided nature of our increasingly vicious politics.

President Donald Trump hasn't helped matters. He promised that the July 4 celebration at the White House would be a Trump rally, which is inappropriate given it's about our nation, its people and its founders - not any president.

Under his administration, a nation of immigrants has turned against immigrants. The beacon of democracy disengages from the global community, launches an unnecessary war in Iran and issues expansionist rumblings from the White House. The economy struggles, and too many people cannot afford the basics.

It is not unpatriotic to be both proud and worried. It is unpatriotic, however, to blame others instead of working together for the common good of our neighbors and our nation.

Patriotism requires an honest assessment of how we are fulfilling the ideals articulated by Thomas Jefferson and his compatriots in July 1776. The Founders professed a heady concept: Power to the people! Government derived its powers from the consent of the governed, not from monarchs.

We cannot forget the words in the Declaration that helped start it all: "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 come a long way toward fulfilling the Declaration's truth that all men are created equal, but for too long that did not include enslaved people, Native peoples and women. Today it does, though work remains to create true equality.

Then again, Americans being in a sour mood is hardly historically unique. Go back just 50 years to the last milestone anniversary in 1976. The country was divided and pessimistic then, too, persevering through the Watergate scandal, the end of the Vietnam War and economic malaise, just as it had survived the Civil War, the Great Depression and Jim Crow before. Anniversaries seem more likely to arrive mid-struggle than mid-triumph.

It is the great disappointment of the American experiment, though, that many tensions endure as trust in government, the news media and other institutions has eroded while incidents of political violence are on the rise.

Hope endures, though. The Founders bequeathed not a finished nation but an unfinished argument. It falls to each generation to create a more perfect Union. On this anniversary of the nation's birth, there is room for both celebration and skepticism but not surrender.

Whatever one's political views, this holiday is our latest chance to stand up for the ideals of the founders and that hinges in part on the willingness of Americans from both sides of the political spectrum to view each other as fellow citizens in an amazing political project and, well, chill out a little bit.

Let's put aside our grievances for a day and celebrate.

Portions of the opinions expressed in this Editorial come from other publications in our news group.

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