Independence & InclusionA Reflection on the Fourth of July

“The only freedom which deserves the name, is that of pursuing our own good in our own way, so long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs, or impede their efforts to obtain it.” John Stuart Mills

As we venture into a holiday weekend celebrating America’s independence as a nation, we may celebrate with family and friends or use the time to catch up on some much-needed rest. Whatever we have going on over the next few days, those of us in the United States will be surrounded by messages of celebrating independence, celebrating the inalienable rights that this nation’s independence grants each of us. We are a nation that likes to talk about our inalienable rights, but that is only half of the social contract that binds us together as a people. The other half of this social contract — the critical piece necessary for the sustainability of our inalienable rights — is our responsibility to each other and our nation.

Inalienable means that our rights cannot be taken away, but inalienable does not mean and has never meant absolute. For example, we have an inalienable right to freedom of speech, but we do not have an absolute right to freedom of speech. Our freedom of speech is constrained by our responsibility to not use our speech to harm other people or violate their rights. Your freedom to say whatever you want is constrained by facts, context, and the potential impact of your words. Your freedom of speech cannot be taken away from you, but it needs to be limited because we rely on each other’s words for cues as to how to live together as a society.

Independence focuses on our rights; inclusion focuses on our responsibilities. We have the right to believe, say, act, and live as we wish, but we also have a responsibility to make our social spaces safe for others to do the same. As John Stuart Mills philosophized in “On Liberty,” “The only freedom which deserves the name, is that of pursuing our own good in our own way, so long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs, or impede their efforts to obtain it.” This principle of harm asks us to reach beyond the question of “what are my rights” to also ask “where do my rights end and my responsibilities to not harm others begin.” I do understand that the history of this nation is inextricably imbued with this tension between independence and inclusion, but the sustainability of this nation has also depended on us not shying away from doggedly confronting this tension. We are a nation that adamantly excluded many peoples from their inalienable rights at our founding, and we fought our way into amending our early versions of independence to include inclusion.

So here we are, celebrating 248 years of independence and once again dividedly engaged in figuring out what’s next for us in this fight to integrate independence and inclusion. Our conversations about our rights are arrogantly animated, but our conversations about our responsibilities are far more muted. We have even allowed our conversations on inclusion to be twisted into farcical terms such as political correctness and wokeness instead of pushing back against the notion that respect is political correctness or that making space for stories other than the ones you understand is wokeness.

Yes, it would be easier to celebrate the summer Independence Day weekend with parades, fireworks, and barbeques without thinking about this tension between independence and inclusion. Each of us has the inalienable right to do so. But do we also have a responsibility to engage in the tough conversations that have enabled our nation to get to 248? Doesn’t celebrating our independence come with the responsibility to contribute to its sustainability through inclusion?

Here is to all of the above…celebration of independence and the challenge of sustaining that independence with inclusion.