by Jacob G. Hornberger

May 8, 2026

In the run-up to the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence this coming Fourth of July, the Washington Post recently published a long article about how Americans celebrated the 100th anniversary of the Declaration in 1876. What was mostly left out of this long article, however, was the fact that Americans in 1876 were celebrating a freedom that was opposite to what Americans today celebrate as freedom.

Let’s consider some examples.

1. There was no income taxation or IRS in 1876. Americans kept 100 percent of their earnings. They didn’t have to keep track of deductions, and they didn’t have to rush down to the Post Office every April 15 to file their tax returns. They had no fear of the IRS because there was no IRS. That’s what freedom meant to Americans back then.

Today, the income tax and the IRS have become part and parcel of the “free” society in which today’s Americans live. The federal government decides how much of their money they will be permitted to keep. The IRS keeps everyone in line. Americans will be celebrating this “freedom”  on the Fourth.

2. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and other welfare-state programs. They didn’t exist in 1876. Americans of that time wanted nothing to do with socialism or socialist programs. They believed that freedom entailed the right to choose for themselves whether — and to what extent — to help parents, the poor, and others. That’s what they were celebrating as freedom in 1876.

Today, mandatory charity through the use of socialist programs is part and parcel of American life. Everyone is required by law to participate. This is the “freedom” that Americans will be celebrating this coming July.

3. There were virtually no immigration controls in 1876. Most everyone who wanted to come to America was free to do so. Only a few were excluded at the federal control station at Castle Garden in New York. (The Ellis Island station wasn’t established until 1892 and, even then, most everyone was admitted into the United States — with the big exception of Chinese citiziens, pursurant to the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882.) No ICE and no Border Patrol. That’s the freedom that Americans were celebrating back then. In fact, Americans most likely remembered that one of the reasons cited in the Declaration of Independence for the Revolution was King George’s imposition of immigration controls on the English colonies.

Today, life is completely different. Americans live under a massive immigration-control system that is enforced by a ruthless and vicious immigration police state, one that is no longer limited to the borderlands but instead is now being expanded nationwide. This is the “freedom” that today’s Americans will be celebrating this July.

4. Americans back then were celebrating the limited-government republic type of governmental structure that the Constitution had called into existence, which had a relatively small, basic military force. That’s what freedom was to them.

Today’s Americans, on the other hand, celebrate the massive national-security state form of governmental structure under which they live — one what wields omnipotent powers of assassination, torture, and indefinite detention for Americans and foreigners alike. This is the “freedom” that Americans will be celebrating in July.

5. Back in 1875, there were no drug laws. People were free to possess, distribute, and consume whatever they wanted. It was none of the government’s business. To Americans back then, that was freedom.

Today, Americans live under a massive drug war, one enforced by a vicious and brutal drug-war police state, one that even wields the omnipotent power to kill people, including Americans, based simply on a suspicion that they are violating the drug laws rather than being convicted in a court of law for having done so. For Americans today, this is “freedom.”

6. America’s foreign policy back in 1875 was one of non-interventionism. The U.S. government did not go abroad “in search of monsters to destroy.” No foreign wars, interventions, coups, invasions, wars of aggression, foreign aid, foreign alliances, and state-sponsored assassinations. For Americans back then, that was freedom.

Today’s Americans live under totally different foreign policy, one based solidly on interventionism, especially invasions, military attacks, sanctions, embargoes, blockades, and undeclared wars of aggression, especially against weak Third World countries.  That’s the “freedom” that today’s Americans will be celebrating on the Fourth.

7. Americans back then lived without public (i.e., government) schooling systems. That’s what freedom meant to them.

Today’s Americans are required by law to subject their children to the state’s educational system. Today’s Americans celebrate compulsory state education as “freedom.”

So, who has it right when it came to celebrating genuine freedom on the Fourth of July — Americans in 1875, who lived without income taxation, Social Security, Medicare, welfare, immigration controls and immigration police state, non-interventionism, a national-security state, drug war, public (i.e., government) schooling, and other statist programs — or Americans today, who live under all these statist systems?