The 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence invites reflection on America’s “experiment in republican government and ordered liberty.” Although some today question whether that experiment has failed, figures such as Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King Jr. understood the Declaration as a “promissory note”—a statement of principles the nation must strive to fulfill. America’s failures have stemmed not from excessive devotion to these ideals but from departing from them. Renewing the Declaration’s promise requires recognizing that natural rights and republican institutions aim at substantive justice and the common good, and that their survival depends on civic virtue and civic friendship among citizens.
