The Michael Berry Show.

I'll see you show talking about the signers of the Declaration of Independence.

Tuesday is July 4th and by the way on Monday I will be guest hosting for Clay and Buck on their show from 11 to 2 Central.

Obviously noon to 3 Eastern and 9 to noon Pacific and I would encourage you or welcome you to listen in to our guest hosting of that.

We're talking about on Tuesday July 4th which is so much more than just barbecue and family.

So founding this country and the men and the wives who supported them and the families who supported them who made such a commitment to the founding of this nation and our independence.

See we'd still have rivers and mountains and grass and trees but we wouldn't be free in the sense that we came to be and that would have meant that the world wouldn't have been free in the sense that we offered that up.

I want to read to you the clothes and then I got a Paul Harvey bet I want you to hear.

I want to read to you the clothes of the Declaration of Independence and I want you to realize this this wasn't overly dramatic what they said came to be as you will learn.

We therefore the representatives of the United States of America and General Congress assembled appealing to the supreme judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions.

They're not appealing to their fellow man. They are appealing they are appealing to God.

God grant us that what we believe is the right course. You will affirm.

That tells you a lot. We're talking about natural rights here. We're talking about something more than mankind and human courts.

It's pretty deep but they conclude by this we do and for the support of this declaration with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence.

We mutually pledge to each other our lives our fortunes and our sacred honor.

As you will hear from Paul Harvey in one of my favorites of his they would in fact sacrifice their honor. Well no they're not their honor.

They would in fact sacrifice their fortunes and many would sacrifice their lives.

Americans the how and the why of our beloved republic are so much better known and understood than the who.

The United States of America was born in 1776 but it was conceived 169 years before that. The earliest settlers had watered the new world with much sweat.

They had built substantial holdings for themselves for their families and when the time came to separate themselves from a tyranny and ocean away at best it meant starting all over again after the ravages of war.

Researching what you're about to hear gave a whole new dimension to my reverence for our nation's first citizens all others of the world's revolutions before and since were initiated by men who had nothing to lose nothing to lose.

Our founders had everything to lose and nothing to gain except one thing.

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