Despite our dear President’s tanks rolling down Pennsylvania Avenue like a bad action film, the 4th seems to be down several quarts; poignancy commemorating freedom on the lam.

Makes me think of Teddy, our 26th President, when he sent the Great White Fleet around the world during peacetime reminding our neighbors that we were always ready, but was classy about it, walking softly, carrying that big stick.

It wasn’t a tacky, hyped up exhibition at Epcot.

Our Founders who fought so nobly must be frowning from the ether wondering why Liberty lost lots of her luster.

When I grew up, my mother hoisted the American Flag from the upstairs porch that waved alongside sheets and towels billowing on our clothesline.

My Dad’s job was to put up the one in front of the house that I so remember was America the Beautiful at her best.

I was taught to be proud to be an American, and that no matter what happens, we’ll always be the greatest country in the world.

The Land of the Free.

When I see pictures of the Immigration Detention Centers filled with distressed children, my heart strings play Taps. 

I think of Emma Lazarus’s sonnet at the base of the Statue of Liberty she never knew was so immortalized, dying of TB at the age of 38…

“Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to be free…”

and truly want to cry along with our esteemed predecessors I feel worthy to speak for….

The 56 Signers of the Declaration of Independence.

John Adams

Samuel Adams

Josiah Bartlett

Carter Braxton

Charles Carroll

Samuel Chase

Abraham Clark

George Clyme

William Ellery

William Floyd

Benjamin Franklin

Elbridge Gerry

Button Gwinnet

John Hancock

Lyman Hall

Benjamin Harrison

John Hart

Joseph Hewes

Thomas Heyward, Jr

William Hooper

Stephen Hopkins

Francis Hopkinson

Samuel Huntington

Thomas Jefferson

Francis Lightfoot Lee

Richard Henry Lee

Francis Lewis

Philip Livingston

Thomas Lynch, Jr.

Thomas McKean

Arthur Middleton

Lewis Morris

Robert Morris

John Morton

Thomas Nelson, Jr.

William Paca

John Penn

Robert Treat Paine

George Read

Caesar Rodney

George Ross

Benjamin Rush

Edward Rutledge

Roger Sherman

James Smith

Richard Stockton

Thomas Stone George Taylor

Charles Thomson

Matthew Thornton

George Walton

William Whipple

William Williams

James Wilson

John Witherspoon

Oliver Wolcott

George Wythe

Let Freedom Ring…

PLEASE…for them.

A Patriot