In 1777, John Adams wrote to his wife the following lamentation on the current status of the fight for our freedom: "You will never know, how much it cost the present Generation, to preserve your Freedom!" He wrote this because a mere proclamation of Independence from Great Britain, was not the same as actual independence from Great Britain because to accomplish this massive mission, required stealth, courage, bravery, dedication, outside aid, persistence, and God's grace.
The Founding Fathers along with fellow colonists of this nation, made true their vow and commitment to fight for our freedom, and literally did pledge their lives, their honor, and their fortunes on behalf of this fight for our freedom and consequently for a government that would derive its just powers from the consent of the governed, as opposed to the tyranny and oppression of the British crown.
The war between the colonists and the British Empire cost the lives and fortunes of many brave men and women, to which, some of those that lost their lives and their fortunes were signatories of our Declaration of Independence. Some of these signatories lost all of their private fortunes through the confiscation and destruction of their private property by the British, while others suffered imprisonment by the British, yet none of the fifty-six signatories to the Declaration ever brought dishonor to their sacred cause of freedom.
America's Declaration of Independence while signed in 1776, did not mean that all of a sudden the colonists were free, but instead meant that the colonists were willing to fight for that freedom, and this freedom meant the sacrifice of time, money, material, and blood, of which, some paid for the pursuit of that freedom by giving their lives for that cause and by their devotion to that cause.
Once engaged, the battles between the colonists and the British, raged up and down our States, to which, the British had no intention of not bring the States to heel, and the States would not disengage from their fight against the British, despite privations, despite their repeated injuries, despite their repeated injustices, yet continually sacrificed, because they believed wholeheartedly in their cause, which was that each man was born with unalienable rights, and that thereby no legitimate government had the right to counteract or to take these rights from any man.
The freedom that the colonists desired was the freedom of self-determination, and the colonists did not see the validity of paying tribute to those despotic interests that laid across the great Atlantic ocean, no matter for whatever reasons, valid or not. The colonists had become united in their cause, united in their common defense, united in the belief that they had the right to steer and to guide their own ship, and to thereby make their own place in this world.
These brave colonists took on the greatest naval power of that age, and with pluck, tenacity, outside assistance, some good fortune, and courage were able to break free from the bonds of Great Britain, and thereby establish a republic and a Constitution that we live under until this very day. The costs that these valiant men and women made on behalf of the United States of America were enormous, and we owe them our eternal tribute, properly paid by living by the true principles of America: of which that we are all created equal, that we are all are entitled to equal justice, that our government is one of checks and balances, and that this government is and shall ever be a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, to which when such a government becomes destructive of those things it is the right of the people to abolish or to alter it.