The Fate of the 56 Signers of the Declaration of Independence

July 4, 2007 by Michelle

A friend of mine sends me this e-mail every Fourth of July.  It’s worth remembering.  This is the kind of leadership and citizenship we need if our nation is to survive:

Have you ever wondered what happened to the 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence?

Five signers were captured by the British as
traitors, and tortured before they died.

Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned.

Two lost their sons serving in the Revolutionary
Army; another had two sons captured.

Nine of the 56 fought and died from wounds or
hardships of the Revolutionary War.

They signed and they pledged their lives, their
fortunes, and their sacred honor.

What kind of men were they?

Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists.

Eleven were merchants, nine were farmers and large plantation owners; men of means, well educated.

But they signed the Declaration of Independence knowing full well that the penalty would be death if they were captured.

Carter Braxton of Virginia, a wealthy planter and
trader, saw his ships swept from the seas by the
British Navy. He sold his home and properties to pay his debts, and died in rags.

Thomas McKeam was so hounded by the British that he was forced to move his family almost constantly. He served in the Congress without pay, and his family was kept in hiding. His possessions were taken from him, and poverty was his reward.

Vandals or soldiers looted the properties of
Dillery, Hall, Clymer, Walton, Gwinnett, Heyward,
Ruttledge, and Middleton.

At the battle of Yorktown, Thomas Nelson JR, noted that the British General Cornwallis had taken over the Nelson home for his headquarters. He quietly urged General George Washington to open fire. The home was destroyed, and Nelson died bankrupt.  Francis Lewis had his home and properties destroyed.  The enemy jailed his wife, and she died within a few months.

John Hart was driven from his wife’s bedside as she was dying. Their 13 children fled for their lives.  His fields and his gristmill were laid to waste. For more than a year he lived in forests and caves, returning home to find his wife dead and his children vanished. A few weeks later he died from exhaustion and a broken heart.

Norris and Livingston suffered similar fates.

Such were the stories and sacrifices of the American Revolution.

These were not wild-eyed, rabble-rousing
ruffians.

They were soft-spoken men of means and
education. They had security, but they valued
liberty more. Standing tall, straight, and
unwavering, they pledged: “For the support of this declaration, with firm reliance on the protection of the divine providence, we mutually pledge to each other, our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.” They gave you and me a free and independent America.

The history books never told you a lot about what
happened in the Revolutionary War.

We didn’t fight just the British.

We were British subjects at that time and we fought our own government!

Some of us take these liberties so much for granted, but we shouldn’t. So, take a few minutes while enjoying your 4th of July holiday and silently thank these patriots. It’s not much to ask for the price they paid.

Remember: freedom is never free!

H/T to Michelle St. Pierre and The Reagan Wing

~LTG

You can read a fuller and very moving account of what happened to the 56 signers and their families, here.

~Eowyn

We Need a Businessman in the White House

Too Many Career Politicians and Not Enough Businessmen In Washington.

After seeing the disastrous fiasco that has taken place over the last two and a half years and over the course of other administrations, I’ve become a firm believer that career or professional politicians are absolutely ruining this country. After watching Herman Cain mop the floor with the other GOP candidates at the first Republican debate, I say a successful businessman is the way to go.

Herman Cain has proven, at least to me that he has what it takes and it make no difference to me that he has not held public office before, in fact that is one of his endearing factors. He is someone who brings a fresh perspective to the mix. He is a decision maker, he has been an executive and he has been successful. He has managed people and turned a failing business around, he is in my opinion the best choice for chief executive.

Let’s face it, the founding father’s were all businessmen of one type or another and they penned the Declaration of Independence and Constitution. They took an idea, a dream and turned it into an independent nation, the most powerful nation on earth.

Herman Cain is a relative unknown now but in the months to follow I hope his name will be on everybody’s lips, we need a man like him to turn things around and with the exit of Trump and Huckabee and with Gingrich, Romney and Paul imploding things are looking better for this true Conservative.

~Tom in NC

Obama Forgot The Creator, Again

He just can’t help it.

Try as he might, Obama just can’t help forgetting and leaving out our Almighty God.

Back in 2009 and again in 2010, Obama left out the phrase “endowed by their Creator” from the Declaration of Independence. After much negative publicity in the blogosphere, Obama made an effort to get it right during the last couple of months in 2010.

Alas, the recovery was brief. The other night, April 21, 2011, he did it again while speaking at a mega fundraiser to supporters in San Francisco:

“The America we know is great not because of our skyscrapers or the size of our GDP. It’s because we’ve been able to keep two ideas together at the same time. The first idea is that we are all individuals endowed with certain inalienable rights and liberties; that we are self-reliant; we are entrepreneurs. We don’t expect others to do for us what we can do for ourselves, and we don’t really like people telling us what to do.” (Laughter.)

Blogger Consigliere5 found another example of Obama’s Omission this month on the White House website. Obama was speaking at yet another fundraiser in Navy Pier, Chicago, on April 14, 2011: .

“It’s not the size of our skyscrapers. It’s not the size of our GDP. It’s the fact that we’re able to keep two ideas together at the same time: One, that we’re all individuals with — endowed with certain inalienable rights and liberties….”

Umm, Obama, endowed by whom? I sure hope you’re not so grandiose you think it’s you?

H/t new fellow Consigliere 

~Eowyn

Obama Left Out Creator, Again

The first time, it’s an accident. The second time, it’s intentional.

~Eowyn

Obama Again Omits ‘Creator’ When Speaking of ‘Inalienable Rights’ Cited in Declaration of Independence

By Terence P. Jeffrey – CNSNews – Sept 27, 2010

Just seven days after he sparked controversy by omitting the word “Creator” when he closely paraphrased the passage from the Declaration of Independence that says all men “are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights,” President Barack Obama again omitted the Creator when speaking about the “inalienable rights” that “everybody is endowed with.”

This time the president was speaking at a Sept. 22 fundraiser for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York City, and his reference to “inalienable rights” was not as close a paraphrasing of the Declaration as it had been the week before.

“And what was sustaining us was that sense that, that North Star, that sense that, you know what, if we stay true to our values, if we believe that all people are created equal and everybody is endowed with certain inalienable rights and we’re going to make those words live, and we’re going to give everybody opportunity, everybody a ladder into the middle class, every child able to go as far as their dreams will take them–if we stay true to that, then we’re going to be able to maintain the energy and the focus, the fight, the gumption to get stuff done,” Obama said at the DCCC/DSCC event, according to the transcript posted by the White House.

Speaking at the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute’s Annual Awards Gala on Sept. 15, Obama had left out the word “Creator” when otherwise virtually quoting from the Declaration of Independence. “We hold these truths to be self-evident,” Obama said at that event, “that all men are created equal, endowed with certain inalienable rights: life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That’s what makes us unique.”

[...] On Fox News on Sept. 20, Bret Baier reported that the White House said the president had made a mistake when he omitted the Creator from his citation of the Declaration of Independence at the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute dinner. The “White House,” Baier reported, “said that President Obama went off script and adlibbed when he made that mistake.”

The Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute dinner, however, was not the first time President Obama has omitted mention of the Creator when speaking of the “inalienable rights” cited in the Declaration of Independence. He has also published official presidential proclamations that take this approach.

On Sept. 17, 2009, for example, Obama issued a “Constitution Day and Citizenship Day” proclamation that mentioned man’s “certain unalienable rights” but not the Creator who endows man with them. This proclamation was issued in both Spanish and English—with neither versions mentioning the Creator.

[...] On Feb. 2, 2009, Obama issued a presidential proclamation for “National African American History Month” that mentioned “certain unalienable rights” Obama said “we all are endowed with” but did not mention the Creator, who, according to the Declaration of Independence, is the grantor of those rights. “The ideals of the Founders became more real and more true for every citizen as African Americans pressed us to realize our full potential as a Nation and to uphold those ideals for all who enter into our borders and embrace the notion that we are all endowed with certain unalienable rights,” Obama proclaimed.