America at 250: The promise of equality is still worth defending

America's 250th anniversary arrives with the nation deeply divided over its history, identity, and future. The enduring legacy of the Declaration of Independence, with its bold claim that "all men are created equal," has served as a powerful standard for judging the country, even as the reality at its founding fell far short. This promise, larger than the founders themselves, has fueled generations of reformers.

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We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.

Figures like Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King Jr. invoked the Declaration's language to challenge slavery and demand civil rights, not by rejecting American ideals but by insisting the nation live up to them. This distinction is crucial today, as some view patriotism as uncritical defense and others see the nation primarily as a catalog of injustices. Both approaches miss the essential point: a country can be loved enough to be judged.

Israelis, the editorial argues, should understand this dynamic well. Their own Declaration of Independence made promises of equality and freedom that also outstripped the nation's reality at its founding. Israel, like America, has spent its history grappling with what those words require, a debate that has become dangerously difficult. The editorial cautions against framing disagreements as tests of loyalty, where criticism is seen as hostility and defense as blindness.

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America’s most important reformers did not reject the American promise. They demanded that America keep it.

The article concludes that national self-criticism need not be an act of disloyalty. America's 250-year journey offers a lesson: engaging with a nation's imperfections, while holding onto its founding promises, is essential for progress. This ongoing argument, though fraught, is what keeps the national project alive.

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National self-criticism need not be an act of disloyalty.