A Fredericksburg Address for America’s 250th Year

'Four score and many years ago, at Gettysburg and across a nation at war with itself...'

By Phil Huber, ADVANCE COLUMNIST

Fredericksburg National Cemetery with Luminaria Candles/Buddy Secor/Ninja Pix/National Park Service

Four score and many years ago, at Gettysburg and across a nation at war with itself, Americans were asked whether a people “conceived in liberty” could remain united and true to the promise of equality. On those July days in 1863, the answer was paid for in blood and decided in battle, and Lincoln later gave it words that still echo in our ears.

Now, as our country marks the 250th anniversary of its independence, here in Fredericksburg—where the Rappahannock cuts through a landscape shaped by revolution, civil war, and the daily work of governance—we face a different kind of test. No armies clash on these streets, but our union is strained by election denial, by assaults on voting rights, and by foreign wars that tempt us to forget the values we claim to defend.

We do not gather on a battlefield, yet we stand in the long shadow of July 1863 and July 1776. The question is not whether cannon fire will tear the republic apart, but whether lies about our elections, indifference to whose vote counts, and a willingness to wage war abroad while neglecting democracy at home will do what violence could not.

We cannot consecrate our democracy with words alone; it has already been hallowed at places like Fredericksburg and Gettysburg, by those who fought for union and by those who later fought for civil rights and equal justice under law. But we can decide whether their work ends with us or continues through us.

Let us, in this 250th year of American independence, be dedicated to that unfinished work: defending the right to vote, rejecting efforts to overturn lawful elections, insisting that our foreign policy reflect our democratic ideals, and welcoming every neighbor into equal citizenship. And let us prove our patriotism not only in words and celebrations, but by registering, voting, and volunteering—so that government of the people, by the people, and for the people will endure in Washington, in Fredericksburg, across Virginia, and throughout this land.

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Phil Huber is a retired Army Reserve colonel, a federal civil servant, and a retired consultant who writes on civic education. He lives in Fredericksburg.