What the United States’ 250th birthday showed the world

Michael Green

The author is the CEO of the U.S. Studies Centre at the University of Sydney and the Henry A. Kissinger Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. 

The celebration of the United States’ Declaration of Independence on July 4 reflected the diversity, complexity and contested nature of U.S. history itself. Korean readers would recognize this, since interpretations of Korea’s own modern history remain deeply divided between progressives and conservatives.

The 250th anniversary of U.S. independence also spotlighted political polarization. On one side was the bipartisan “America 250” celebration authorized by the U.S. Congress. On the other side was the Donald Trump administration’s “Freedom 250” celebration, characterized by a cult-of-personality treatment of U.S. President Donald Trump, whose speeches in Washington and at Mount Rushmore veered into partisan attacks on Democrats.

Polarized debate over U.S. history is hardly new. In 2017, The New York Times’ “The 1619 Project” argued that the United States’ true founding began not in 1776 but in 1619, when the first enslaved Africans arrived, prompting the first Trump administration to respond with the equally ideological 1776 Project, which appeared to whitewash slavery from the United States’ founding story.

The Declaration of Independence itself was full of contradictions. On one hand, it embraced the Enlightenment ideal that “all men are created equal,” a revolutionary proposition that transformed ideas of political legitimacy around the world. Yet it also contained disturbing contradictions, including language implying a defense of slavery in its complaint that British King George III had encouraged “servile insurrection.”

Even so, anyone who looked closely at last weekend’s celebrations could see the Declaration’s enduring power. Although the country’s founders did not imagine women or people of color participating as full citizens when they wrote that all men are created equal 250 years ago, they nevertheless planted a seed that would grow to overcome injustice over time.

The founders also designed a nation in which no single national narrative imposed from above could remain unchallenged. Instead, competing interpretations would be continually tested through the executive, legislative and judicial branches, state and local governments, civil society and the media.

What the French political philosopher Alexis de Tocqueville discovered during his study of U.S. democracy in the 1830s remains true today. Before visiting the United States, he feared that government by the people would eventually descend into the kind of tyranny that had destroyed liberty in ancient Athens and Rome. After observing the country firsthand, however, he concluded that churches, local government, the media and countless civic organizations would serve as a safeguard against the popular tyranny that had undone ancient democracy. Although this aspect of the  United States rarely attracts the same attention as partisan politics, the nationwide 250th anniversary celebrations demonstrated the enduring strength of that grassroots civic tradition.

Today, most Americans who study the American Revolution turn to mainstream history rather than the competing extremes of “The 1619 Project” or the 1776 Project. Legendary documentary filmmaker Ken Burns captured that middle ground in his latest series, “The American Revolution” (2025), presenting both the idealism, sacrifice and global significance of U.S. independence and the hypocrisy of slaveholders writing that “all men are created equal.” Patriotism means confronting the past honestly, accepting human frailty and national shortcomings, and honoring those whose sacrifices planted the seeds of justice enjoyed today.

I now live in Australia. Koreans, Australians and U.S. allies around the world look to U.S. democracy both as an inspiration and as a measure of the country’s reliability. There are understandable reasons for anxiety among U.S. allies today. Trust in the United States has fallen to record lows in Japan, Australia and much of Europe. Yet support for an alliance with the United States remains at record highs in Japan and Korea and remains strong in Australia. Despite the discordant notes in U.S. politics, there remains an underlying confidence that the resilience of U.S. democracy and its economy will ultimately prevail. I found evidence of that resilience in the Independence Day celebrations held across the United States on July 4.