This Fourth of July marks the 248th anniversary of the day America’s Declaration of Independence was adopted by the Second Continental Congress.
At the time, Great Britain’s King George III ruled an empire on which “the sun never sets.” Its vast wealth was strengthened by trade and protected by a powerful navy and a professional army, making it a global power of the first order. By contrast, the colonists’ army had little equipment or formal training.
- In 1776, our infant nation was composed of thirteen colonies with about 2.5 million people. Today, we are fifty states and fourteen territories with a population of more than 330 million.
- Our economy has grown to over $27 trillion.
- Our child mortality rate has fallen from over 45 percent to under 1 percent.
- Our citizens live over thirty-five years longer on average.
- Our scientific achievements have delivered the light bulb, modern flight, the internet, air conditioning, movies, the polio vaccine, and the list goes on.
- More than 2.7 million miles of power lines electrify the country.
- We have paved more than four million miles of roads.
- We have been responsible for more than eight hundred human visits to space—the most of any country.
