Remarks for the 250th Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence
State of New Hampshire Independence Day Celebration
July 4, 2026
By JerriAnne Boggis
Good morning. Governor, distinguished guests, and fellow Granite Staters.
It is a tremendous honor to join you today as we commemorate the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
250 years ago, 56 men signed a document that would change the course of history. More than a declaration of separation from Great Britain, it was a declaration of ideals—an extraordinary statement affirming that all people possess inherent rights that no government should take away.
In just over thirteen hundred words, it proclaimed a revolutionary idea that liberty is not granted by kings or governments, for it belongs to every human being by virtue of their humanity.
"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."
And yet, even as those words were being written, they were not being fully lived.
Enslaved Africans were denied liberty. Indigenous peoples were being displaced from their homelands. Women were excluded from political life.
Yet this document has endured because it gave voice to ideals that are larger than any one nation.
It proclaimed that every person possesses inherent rights simply because they are human. That governments exist to protect those rights, not to bestow them. That political power belongs to the people through their consent. And that when governments fail to protect liberty and justice, the people have both the right and the responsibility to demand something better.
The Declaration did not simply describe a new nation. It challenged every generation of Americans to build one worthy of its ideals.
Generation after generation, people have returned to the Declaration's promises and asked our nation to become what it claimed to be.
In 1776, the Declaration proclaimed ideals that would echo far beyond the thirteen colonies.
In 1779, just three years later, twenty-two enslaved men stood together here in New Hampshire and petitioned the legislature for their freedom, praying that "the name of slave may not be heard in a land gloriously contending for the sweets of freedom." They were not asking America to invent new principles; they were asking America to honor the ones it had already declared.
In 1852, Frederick Douglass stood before the nation and, in his famous speech What to the Slave Is Your Fourth of July?, challenged America to live up to its own creed—that all are created equal and endowed with the unalienable rights of life and liberty.
Then, in 1963, standing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. reminded America that the Declaration and the Constitution together were a "promissory note"—a promise that had yet to be fully redeemed for all of its citizens.
The story of the Declaration, then, is not confined to 1776.
It is the story of every generation that has claimed its ideals, expanded its promise, and moved our nation closer to becoming what it declared itself to be.
That is the story we inherit today.
The greatness of the Declaration lies not in claiming perfection, but in offering an ideal powerful enough to call every generation to greater justice.
Our responsibility, 250 years later, is the same as theirs.
To preserve the freedoms we enjoy.
To tell the full history of those who made them possible.
To recognize that patriotism is not diminished by truth...it is strengthened by it.
When we understand our complete history, we better understand each other.
And when we understand each other, we move closer to the vision first imagined 250 years ago.
Today, as we celebrate this anniversary, let us remember that history is not asking us merely to celebrate the past.
It is asking us to shape the future.
In the words of Dr. King, "Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy."
May we have the courage to do just that. Thank you.