All men are born equal free#

Native peoples could be, but only if they agreed to assimilate with white people. Neither the enslaved nor women were part of it.

God did not create man to be a slave nor did he endow him with intelligence to have. A majority of Americans now favor gay marriage and support will continue to grow. Jefferson’s vision of equality was not all-inclusive. 'All men are born equal, naked, without bonds. However the Supreme Court rules, gays, like blacks and women, will eventually bask in the sunlight of equality. If the Court does rule that the California law is a violation of the equal protection clause as a lower federal court already has, thousands of gay couples in the Golden State will join the ranks of same sex couples who now can legally marry in New York, Iowa, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, Maine, and New Hampshire. Equal protection should equal marriage equality. In the near future, the Supreme Court will rule on the constitutionally of the California prohibition against marriage equality. States can’t favor men over women, whites over blacks, or heterosexuals over gays. The equal protection clause in the 14th Amendment means that states must treat all their citizens equally. The next wave of freedom will extend the American Dream to gay and lesbian Americans. The wave of freedom started with blacks in 1868 then moved on to women through the 19th Amendment ratified in 1920. The 14th Amendment says, 'Nor shall any state … deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.' Jefferson’s ideals and Lincoln’s hopes were embodied in the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which became effective in 1868. In the Gettysburg Address, Abraham Lincoln echoed Jefferson’s words when he said 'Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.' The agony of the Civil War advanced the cause of political equality.

All men are born equal free#

'We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal.' Those words did not free the slaves, but they started a movement toward equal rights for all Americans. The Fourth celebrates the ratification of the Declaration of Independence, which contains these words. ” With this new comprehension, there are questions remaining about whether we are still following the universal standard of equality.When you celebrated the Fourth of July yesterday, you recognized the right of gays and lesbians to get married like any other American. The Massachusetts Constitution, chiefly authored by John Adams in 1780, contains in its Declaration of Rights the wording: 'All men are born free and equal, and have certain natural, essential, and unalienable rights among which may be reckoned the right of enjoying and defending their lives and liberties that of acquiring, possessing, and. Lastly, while the phrase “all men are created equal” was considered to apply only to white men who owned property at the time the Declaration of Independence was written, it is now understood that all human beings are included in “all men. We must share our knowledge, skills, and experiences with members of our communities and learn lessons from people who have faced similar difficulties so that we can achieve success together. We are unique in many ways, we choose our own destinies, and we have our own unique paths to success, but this does not mean that we have to go through life’s challenges alone. Additionally, we all face different trials or challenges which we must conquer that could certainly lead us to success in life. Every one of us is unique, and we all have different sets of knowledge and skills that we use as our tools to achieve our own goals.

We are entitled to decide what goals to achieve, what beliefs to follow, which political leaders to vote for, where to live, and whom to marry, but not all of us have access to free choice in these matters, and this makes us unequal. On the other hand, I believe that we are not born equal but we are born to have equal rights, to have the right to own the results of our hard work and to make decisions about our own fate.