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Proclamation 4411

Preparing for the Semiquincentennial.

Next week marks the 249th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and will inaugurate the one-year countdown to America’s 250th birthday. The 2026 Semiquincentennial — an occasion that should enthrall all true American hearts — warrants more than just a slapdash celebration; therefore, we must begin planning now.

In the book of Joshua, the Lord commands the children of Israel to build a monument of stones to help them remember their past. “That this may be a sign among you, that when your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean ye by these stones? Then ye shall answer them, That the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord; when it passed over Jordan, the waters of Jordan were cut off: and these stones shall be for a memorial unto the children of Israel for ever” (Joshua 4:6-7).

Similarly, God instituted the Passover to memorialize the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt. “And it shall come to pass, when your children shall say unto you, What mean ye by this service? That ye shall say, It is the sacrifice of the Lord's passover, who passed over the houses of the children of Israel in Egypt, when he smote the Egyptians, and delivered our houses. And the people bowed the head and worshipped” (Exodus 12:26-27).

To this day, the fifth step in the Passover seder, Maggid (literally “narrate”), involves a narration of the Jews’ liberation from bondage.

Notably, Jehovah established these memory-enhancing rituals for the Jewish nation. Might not America be well served by similar practices?

The Holy One of Israel knew the limitations of the human mind and mankind’s proclivity for forgetfulness. By instructing his people to remember their past, God introduced them — and us — to the antidote to the nation-killing sins of pride, ingratitude, and cultural decay.

Pride (not national pride) is begotten when we begin to adopt an heir of superiority over our ancestors, scoffing at their outdated views compared to our supposed “progress.” This is a deadly (and ludicrous) conceit; one needs only to examine the surpassing excellence of past architecture, art, literature, and rhetoric to debunk it. Nevertheless, once it takes root in a nation, it quickly gives birth to ingratitude.

June 14, 2025, marked the 250th birthday of the U.S. Army; that means that for two and a half centuries, American soldiers have risked their lives to keep you safe. Does that not stir gratitude within you? It won’t if you look down on them.

“It’s very easy to stand on the mountaintop as an historian or biographer and find fault with people for why they did this or didn’t do that, because we’re not involved in it, we’re not inside it, we’re not confronting what we don’t know—as everyone who preceded us always was,” noted historian David McCullough at a 2005 lecture for Hillsdale College.

“We think this is our way of speaking,” he continued. “It isn’t our way of speaking—it’s what we have been given. The laws we live by, the freedoms we enjoy, the institutions that we take for granted—as we should never take for granted—are all the work of other people who went before us. And to be indifferent to that isn’t just to be ignorant, it’s to be rude. And ingratitude is a shabby failing. How can we not want to know about the people who have made it possible for us to live as we live, to have the freedoms we have, to be citizens of this greatest of countries in all time?”

Pride, therefore, leads to ingratitude, and ingratitude precipitates cultural decline.

If we truly valued our national heritage, grateful to the men who, often through great personal sacrifice, created and sustained it, we would seek to maintain it. If, however, we feel complacent or perhaps even contemptuous, we will simply shrug as it falls into disrepair. That’s why an indifferent nation can never be a great one.

Concerning the spread of these three terrible plagues, to quote from Lincoln, “Our progress in degeneracy appears … to be pretty rapid.” Fortunately, a year-long emphasis on the Semiquincentennial, if done correctly, may be exactly what we need to reignite a fresh zeal about American history, restore national gratitude, and inspire the nation’s youth to participate with renewed fervor in the Great American Experiment.

President Gerald R. Ford exemplified how remembering the past should be central to Independence Day when he issued Proclamation 4411 in 1975 to prepare for America’s Bicentennial in 1976, urging the nation “to reflect … on the historic events of our past, on the heroic deeds of those whose legacy we now enjoy, and on the compelling visions of those who helped shape our constitutional government.”

“I call upon educators, clergy and labor, business and community leaders, as well as those in the communications media, to review our history, and publicize the shaping events, people, and ideas of our historic beginnings,” he added.

Imagine if everyone from influencers to news reporters started talking about the Mayflower Compact (which turns 405 this November!), the Declaration of Independence, the United States Constitution, and the Bill of Rights instead of the latest TikTok trends or whatever soulless, mind-numbing trash TV people talk about these days. Imagine if real-life American heroes, including Daniel Boone, David Crockett, Theodore Roosevelt, Neil Armstrong, and the firefighters who risked their lives on 9/11, replaced comic book heroes as our kids’ favorite role models.

That’s the kind of celebration America deserves, and it’s the kind of celebration with the potential to elevate our politics and culture.

Next week, we will highlight several specific and creative ways in which we can memorialize and teach our families about 250 years of American independence. But, in the meantime, let’s turn up the hype: God has uniquely blessed this nation for nearly two and half centuries, and that calls for a gratitude-infused fête!

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Created:	2025-06-25 19:01 GMT
Updated:	2025-07-02 07:00 GMT
Published:	2025-06-25 19:00 GMT
Converted:	2025-11-11 12:06 GMT
Change Author:	Jakob Fay
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