Tag: Declaration of Independence

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An All-American Mind: Author and Professor Matthew Spalding

Matthew Spalding, professor and dean at Hillsdale College, is the author of "The Making of the American Mind: The Story of Our Declaration of Independence," among other books. (Courtesy of Hillsdale College)

Certain childhood events leave a lasting impact on our lives, with memories that stay with us. For Matthew Spalding, it was a birthday celebration. Not his own, but America’s.

On July 4, 1976, the United States celebrated its bicentennial, and Spalding, who was then a middle school student in California, felt swept away by the festivities. The tall ships, the parades, the Freedom Train rolling through his valley, all of it made a powerful impression on him. His mother even took him to the bank to get a special two-dollar bill, issued as a commemorative, which she later had stamped at the post office with that memorable date.

“I kind of liked history,” he recalled, “but that really got me interested in American history.”

The Path to Academia

His budding interest flourished a decade later during another historical milestone, the Constitution’s bicentennial, when he was in college. These formative experiences paved the way for his journey into studying the nation’s foundational ideas.

Today, Spalding serves as the Kirby Professor in constitutional government and the dean of the Van Andel Graduate School of Government at Hillsdale College. He also serves as senior academic adviser for America250 projects and has authored several works on the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, including his latest book, “The Making of the American Mind: The Story of Our Declaration of Independence.”

However, Spalding’s path to academia was not straightforward. Although he earned a doctorate in politics, he initially had no plans to pursue a teaching career. Rather, his goal was to “teach in the public square as a writer and speaker.” He took a job with the Heritage Foundation, where he led education initiatives focused on American history and constitutional thought. His first books recommended that the ideas of the Declaration and Constitution form the basis of contemporary political thought.

Teaching came to him later. Through his friendship with the president of Hillsdale College, he was recruited to help establish the college’s Washington campus. Spalding says the opportunity to teach and write was a perfect fit for his talents; the classroom became a fertile ground for his ideas to thrive.

The Ideas Behind the Founding

In “The Making of the American Mind,” Spalding takes readers through the Declaration of Independence, examining the political, legal, and philosophical ideas behind its most significant passages.

“I am not sure exactly when it was that I fell in love with my country,” he begins. “We each have our own story. I invite you to join me in falling in love with America again, or perhaps for the first time.”

The book explores the origins of the Founders’ ideas, tracing them back to the long history of British constitutional law, from the 1215 signing of the Magna Carta to the Glorious Revolution, as well as the impact of thinkers like John Locke, Edward Coke, and William Blackstone. These influences led the Founders to conclude that, by imposing taxes and laws without the Colonists’ consent or representation, Parliament had exceeded its powers. “The Americans concluded that Parliament had become the very font of the arbitrary powers England had rejected in 1688,” which permanently transformed the country from an absolute to a constitutional monarchy.

However, Spalding highlights that the Declaration surpasses mere British precedent. Its assertion that all men are created equal and endowed with unalienable rights is rooted in the “Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God.” The Founders, he argues, drew not only on legal traditions but also on the classical ideas of Plato, Aristotle, and Cicero, as well as on biblical teachings. They understood liberty as inherent to human nature.

“Scene at the Signing of the Constitution of the United States” by Howard Chandler Christy, 1940.

This grounding, according to him, sets the American Revolution apart from others. Instead of trying to dismantle society, as the French revolutionaries attempted, the Founders opposed what they perceived as genuine abuses of power, creating a system grounded in principles that have withstood the test of time.

Spalding also acknowledges the importance of religion in the founding process: “It is unfathomable that a Congress that publicly prayed together and worshipped together and issued proclamations calling for days of prayer and fasting would approve an anti-religious or even a purely secularized Declaration.” The belief in divinely granted rights reflects a worldview that is central to the Declaration itself.

For Spalding, these ideas are not just relics of the past. They remain crucial for understanding contemporary America. While today’s political discourse often emphasizes the immediate, he argues that both the Declaration and Constitution provide a profound framework that defines America as a self-governing republic based on universal principles of equality and liberty.

He sees the upcoming 250th anniversary of the nation as an opportunity to revisit these principles. “This is not just a one-off moment. We have the attention of a lot of Americans who might not necessarily be already engaged in these questions. … We might have the opportunity to try to teach them something.” That renewed focus, says Spalding, might spark a broader conversation about the country’s core values and their enduring relevance.

In this way, the book serves as both a historical exploration and an invitation to reconnect readers with the foundational ideas that shaped the nation, perhaps through a fresh lens.

Spalding still has that two-dollar bill, which features Thomas Jefferson on the front and the signing of the Declaration of Independence on the back. In retrospect, it’s a fitting keepsake for a scholar who has spent his career studying the ideas behind both.

From July Issue, Volume VI

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Founding Fathers History

Founding Father George Clymer: A Founder Twice Over

American politician George Clymer (1739-1813), circa 1780. Signed Declaration of Independence in 1776, Constitutional Convention member in 1787. Engraved by J.B. Longacre from a miniature by Trott. (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

By the time George Clymer was 1 year old, both his mother and his father were dead. Orphaned, George was placed in the care of his Philadelphia uncle, William Coleman. Coleman was an extraordinary man—a lawyer and merchant of Quaker stock, a friend of Benjamin Franklin (and member of the latter’s Junto), a founder with Franklin of the American Philosophical Society and the University of Pennsylvania, and a leading philanthropist. In his “Autobiography,” Franklin described Coleman as possessed of the “coolest, clearest head, the best heart, and the exactest morals of almost any man I ever met.” And fortunately for young Clymer, uncle William loved him like a son.

Clymer was educated primarily in the extensive personal library of his new benefactor, where Coleman often found the lad poring over some tome or another. Clymer’s favorite author was Jonathan Swift. He thus developed a predilection for learning at a young age, and before long, he had adopted “republicanism” as a political philosophy. He thus cherished liberty as defined by Thomas Gordon and John Trenchard who, writing anonymously as “Cato” in the 1720s, characterized it as:

“The power which every man has over his own actions, and his right to enjoy the fruit of his labour, art, industry, as far as by it he hurts not the society, or any members of it, by taking from any member, or by hindering him from enjoying what he himself enjoys.”

George’s education continued in his uncle’s counting-house, where he was trained in numbers—and the ins and outs of running a mercantile enterprise.

An Influential Merchant in Tempestuous Times

Clymer inherited some wealth from his grandfather in 175o. Then, with the death of William Coleman in 1769, he inherited the lion’s share of his uncle’s sizable estate as well. This was a great material blessing, of course, but these were tempestuous times. The French and Indian War had effectively removed the French from North America—but British authorities decided to leave ten thousand troops on the continent. To raise revenue in support of these troops, the various Navigation Acts—heretofore somewhat ignored—would finally be enforced, including a new set of regulations: the Sugar Act (1764). Colonists from Massachusetts to Pennsylvania had protested loudly at this, questioning Parliament’s very right to levy such a tax in the first place. Many colonials boycotted British goods.

The real uproar, however, came with Parliament’s passage of the Stamp Act (1765), which applied an internal tax on the colonies for the first time. In response, the Sons of Liberty rioted in the streets, colonial legislatures passed anti-Stamp Act resolutions, and an inter-colonial Stamp Act Congress issued a joint protest to Parliament and to the king. Clymer, now 26 years old and recently married, was among the protesting colonials. Indeed, among the Philadelphia elite, he was one of the most militant advocates of resistance to Britain.

Even though the Stamp Act was eventually repealed, Parliament immediately passed the Declaratory Act, reminding the colonists that Parliament hadn’t given up the principle that it could legislate for the colonies “in all cases whatsoever.” The subsequent Townshend Acts demonstrated this, and once again the non-importation movement roared to life, crippling British exports. Clymer himself led boycott efforts in Philadelphia, at the same time authoring political pamphlets and broadsides in support of separation from Britain—a very radical view at the time. Despite the barrage of colonial opposition, Charles Townshend, the British politician who proposed the Townshend Acts, stringently enforced the acts. When the Massachusetts assembly issued an anti-Townshend circular letter, the governor dissolved the assembly, sparking mob violence, in turn precipitating the arrival of four regiments of British troops to Boston.

It was in this atmosphere that Clymer inherited his uncle’s significant mercantile business. He now had much more to lose, even as the military occupation up north produced ever-worsening relations between British authorities and the people of Massachusetts—and, by extension, those of other colonies as well. The killing of a twelve-year-old named Christopher Snider by a customs informer in Boston was the last straw, leading within a couple of weeks to the “Boston Massacre.” Troops were subsequently pulled out of Boston proper.

The Tea Act and Tea Parties

Though things seemed to quiet down after 1770, the Gaspee Affair of 1772—when a British customs schooner was attacked off the coast of Rhode Island—sparked both British and colonial outrage once more. The next year, the Tea Act was passed, favoring the British East India Company at the expense of countless American smugglers.

At 34 years of age, Clymer took charge of local resistance to the Tea Act. When the Boston rebels established a committee of correspondence with fellow rebels in Philadelphia, they particularly sought out Clymer. Clymer also played a leading role in Philadelphia’s Oct. 16, 1773 “tea meeting,” when, according to an early biographer, citizens of the city were impressed by Clymer’s “reasoning, sincerity, zeal, and enthusiastic patriotism.” The gathering produced a series of resolutions, one of which declared that:

“The resolution lately entered into by the East India Company, to send out their tea to America subject to the payment of duties on its being landed here, is an open attempt to enforce the ministerial plan, and a violent attack upon the liberties of America.”

The resolutions of the Philadelphia “tea meeting” inspired Bostonians to similar resolves. Indeed, Massachusetts man John Adams would later write that:

“The flame kindled on that day [Oct. 16, 1773] soon extended to Boston and gradually spread throughout the whole continent. It was the first throe of that convulsion which delivered Great Britain of the United States.”

That December, just days after Boston’s more famous “Tea Party,” Philadelphia held one of her own, intercepting a British tea ship. Clymer himself convinced the captain to turn around and return to Britain.

George Clymer thus helped set in motion the chain of events that would ultimately explode into armed revolution.

Signing the Founding Documents

After the “shot heard round the world” was fired at Lexington, initiating the American Revolutionary War, Clymer answered the call for “Patriot” volunteers, engaging the British in company with other Pennsylvanians in support of George Washington and the Continental Army. He also established a militia and helped fortify Philadelphia. Around the same time, and in a show of support for “the cause,” he poured much of his gold and silver into the Congress’s paper money, or “continentals,” eventually losing a fortune when the “continentals” were inflated into worthlessness. But when part of the Pennsylvania delegation to the Second Continental Congress rejected the proposed joint Declaration of Independence and abandoned that body, Clymer was elected to help fill their vacant positions.

This he did—and as such, he was present to inscribe his signature onto the new confederation’s founding document, along with 55 other men. “For the support of this Declaration,” Clymer and his fellows thereby announced, “with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.”

Clymer went on to act as a liaison between George Washington and the Continental Congress, a risky business, since it often involved covert travel across enemy territory to the front; served in the Congress for most of the war years; helped formulate Pennsylvania’s constitution; secured an alliance with the Shawnee and the Delaware; and raised vital funds for the Continental Army. After the war, he continued to work as a merchant while serving in the Pennsylvania legislature, then represented that state in the Philadelphia Convention of 1787. It was there that the Constitution was written. Clymer was a signatory.

Thus it was that Clymer became one of only half a dozen men to have signed both the Declaration of Independence and, 11 years later, the federal Constitution. In his honor, a borough and a township in Pennsylvania and a town in New York are all named after him.

Dr. W. Kesler Jackson is a university professor of history. Known on YouTube as “The Nomadic Professor,” he offers online history courses featuring his signature on-location videos, filmed the world over, at NomadicProfessor.com

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Believing in America

(L to R) Marcelo Bavaro, Sara Fattori, and Paul Fattori at Bavaro's frame-making workshop in Brooklyn, on June 10, 2021. (Lux Aeterna Photography)

The stars aligned for a group of artists and artisans to pay proper homage to the Declaration of Independence

Back in 1992, artist José-María Cundín, originally from the Basque Country, Spain, released a hand-engraved facsimile of the United States Declaration of Independence, after three years of hard work and collaboration with craftsmen from his homeland—a papermaker and a renowned metal engraver. But the project didn’t draw broader interest from the American public.

Sara Fattori, who owned a fine art gallery in Palm Beach, Florida, before starting her interior design business, knew of Cundín’s work, but it wasn’t until her father’s passing, around 2007, that she pondered more deeply the meaning of the country’s founding document and the possibility of promoting Cundín’s hand-engraved version. Her father had fought in World War II and was part of an aviation force in the Normandy invasion. “The reality of war,” she said, and the sacrifices made by previous generations to preserve freedom, moved her.

The Perfect Frame

Around 2014, when an opportunity arose to donate a Cundín engraving for an auction event benefiting the Carson Scholars Fund’s initiative to promote literacy in low-income neighborhoods, Fattori began searching for a frame worthy of encasing the document. While researching online, she discovered Marcelo Bavaro, a fourth-generation historical frame maker based in New York, whose Italian family inherited a century of craftsmanship in carpentry and gilding. Fattori instinctively knew he was the right fit.

Paul and Sara Fattori at the 2015 auction event, pictured here with Dr. Ben Carson (leftmost). (Courtesy of Fattori Fine Frames)

When they met, Bavaro said the Declaration should be encased in a Federal-style frame befitting the time period when the original document was drafted—the newly formed country wanted to distinguish itself from its former ruler, so a style emphasizing simple, clean lines was popularized, contrasting sharply with ornate British detailing. “I knew I was with the right person when Marcelo said, ‘Oh, it should be in a Federal-style frame,’” Fattori said during a recent interview at Bavaro’s Brooklyn firm Quebracho Inc., which restores and makes frames for top museums, art galleries, and auction houses.

Bavaro was intrigued by the project: “I always wondered how this country was guided by this piece of paper for centuries. And everybody respects it. I come from a country where nobody respects anything.” He was referring to Argentina—his family emigrated there in the early 20th century. In the early 1980s, when Argentina was under military rule, Bavaro himself was caught in the political turmoil and jailed for writing articles that criticized the government. Due to his family’s influence, he managed to escape and was on the run for five days before crossing the Brazilian border and taking a plane to the United States, where he met up with his father, the first of his family to settle here.

Federal-style frames require incredible carpentry skills; an artisan must shape the wood into a narrow concave shape. There are few workshops left in the world that are still engaged in this artwork. “Craftsmanship is something that is dying out,” Bavaro said. “It’s so simple to make money sitting in front of a computer; why are you going to break your hands doing what we do?”

A craftsperson working on gilding a frame, at the Quebracho studio in Brooklyn, New York City. (Lux Aeterna Photography)
A craftsperson works on etching a pattern on a frame. (Lux Aeterna Photography)

While working on the Declaration project in 2014, Bavaro, together with Fattori and her husband, Paul, joined forces to launch a new company, Fattori Fine Frames, that would provide custom-made, handcrafted frames for people looking to frame artwork and mirrors in their homes.

The auction event that took place the following year was a success, with a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution buying the framed document.

A selection of frames made by the Quebracho workshop in Brooklyn. (Lux Aeterna Photography)

History

Cundín’s facsimile is a copy of William J. Stone’s engraving—the latter was commissioned by then-Secretary of State John Quincy Adams during the 1820s as an official government copy, because Adams had grown concerned over the fragile condition of the original Declaration. In Stone’s tradition, Cundín set out to make a hand-engraved brass plate—it would be the first such engraving since Stone’s time.

Cundín always had a personal connection to America, even before becoming a citizen in 1971. His father was born on July 4 and frequently joked about how his birthday coincided with that of America’s. Cundín was moved by the content of the Declaration upon reading it in its entirety. “The demand for freedom—that is the connection that I found most touching in my heart,” he said in a recent phone interview.

The brass plate etched with the Declaration of Independence. (Courtesy of José-María Cundín)

When he began the engraving project in 1989, out of curiosity he started researching the founding fathers who signed the document. Cundín found out that John Adams had visited the Basque Country in 1780, and had been so inspired by the local governance system that he kept it in mind while drafting the United States Constitution years later. Adams also wrote about the “Biscay” government in his treatise, “A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America,” stating, “While their neighbors have long since resigned all their pretensions into the hands of kings and priests, this extraordinary people have preserved their ancient language, genius, laws, government, and manners … their love of liberty, and unconquerable aversion to a foreign servitude.”

Engraver Pedro Aspiazu (L) and artist José-María Cundín studying a proof of the printed Declaration. (Courtesy of José-María Cundín)

The connection with Cundín’s homeland convinced him to look for artisans there for the engraving project. Pedro Aspiazu, who was born into a multi-generational family of engravers, hand-chiseled the plate, while a Basque company handmade the paper from pure cotton, and a Madrid company did the printing.

Cundín retained the same paper size as the original, but reduced the text size so there would be empty space—“a visual environment, to make it … a document that everybody could receive in the mail, but in a magnificent size,” he said. The framed engraving resembles a painting, yet is humble in its quiet dignity. Cundín’s team made 1,200 copies—the first few were gifted to George H.W. Bush during his presidency, the king of Spain, and the United States Congress. Today, there are about 1,000 copies still available for purchase.

Independence Day

Paul Fattori hopes that younger generations can truly appreciate what this document means and the extent to which the signees risked their lives to publicly protest the British monarchy. “It symbolizes all that freedom, that liberty—and it’s about the people, … consent of the people,” he said.

Sara Fattori hopes Americans neither take their freedoms for granted nor forget about the balance of powers in government. “I’m looking at a country like a family unit; like, if someone is too powerful and controlling, then the other people are not going to thrive … and be able to flourish as a human being,” she said.