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This morning, National Public Radio’s Morning Edition continued its 2+ decade tradition of reading the US Declaration of Independence on the air – the complete text. It’s a stirring document, meant to be read aloud. It was written in a time when rhetorical skills were used to communicate passion and vision, not just PR. It uses clear and bold terms like “tyranny” and “happiness.” It’s well worth a complete listen.

And in 2004, to me, it’s starting to sound bitterly ironic.

In case you haven’t read it lately, there’s a lot more to the Declaration of Independence than a statement of unalienable rights. The “meat” of this document is a litany of specific complaints by the former British colonies against the King of Great Britain, to justify their formal break from the British empire. For example…

• “He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.”

• “He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures. He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.”

• “For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us: For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States.”

• “For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world: For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent: For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury.”

These complaints and many others represent the fundamental friction of an empire. Empires have not proven to be sustainable systems. They tend to have a lot of endemic problems, especially militarism, tyranny, and a climate of ongoing conflict and fear. In short, empires can be a powerful form of terrorism, in the sense that they subjugate people at least partly through fear and the threat of violence.

Despite the powerful rhetoric of the Declaration, the global plague of empire didn’t end in 1776 – just ask anyone in Africa, Asia, the Pacific islands, South America, or the Middle East. Just ask the Native American peoples. Still, since its initial reading that singular document has served as a model and inspiration for many formally and informally colonized peoples around the world.

A good bit of writing is a powerful thing.

To put this in current context, I just finished reading The Sorrows of Empire, by Chalmers Johnson – president of the Japan Policy Research Institute and a noted historian. Wow. This sobering book contends that the US, over the last century but especially since 2001, has shifted from a functional republic to a de facto empire. He gives a lot of detailed support for this. Some of what he lists sounds awfully familiar – in a recent sense.

I can’t help remembering the famous line from the Pogo cartoon: “I have met the enemy and he is us.” Humor can be powerful rhetoric, too.

No, I’m not going into a heavy rant about current events and politics. All I’m suggesting is that perhaps one fitting way to celebrate this holiday weekend would be to read the Declaration of Independence aloud to a group of people. Or listen to it being read. (The NPR recording is online.) Allow yourself to be moved by its rhetoric. Discuss what this document means to you personally, and to the US as a nation today. It will mean very different things to different people, to be sure. Still, maybe it’s better to think consciously about those personal meanings, and discuss them, at least once in awhile. They’re pretty important.