US Independence Day (July 4) 2025: Were the founding fathers really heroes?

Time of India

6 hours ago

Source: Getty Images
It is July 4, Americans across the country are filled with a sense of pride and a loud reverence for the country they call home. Fireworks light up the skies, parades roll through main streets, and patriotic songs echo in every corner.
The day marks a turning point in world history — when thirteen colonies broke free from the British Empire and forged a new republic based on liberty and self-rule.
At the heart of this revolutionary story are the Founding Fathers — men like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, Benjamin Franklin, and John Adams. Their vision, intellect, and leadership helped give birth to what would eventually become one of the most powerful nations in the world.
Their contributions laid the foundation for a democratic experiment that has inspired movements for freedom across the globe.
And yet, for all their brilliance and bravery, the Founding Fathers were far from flawless.
If we take a closer look at the lives they lived and the laws they helped create, we begin to see a darker side — one that complicates the patriotic glow of Independence Day. These were men of their time, yes — but even in their time, many of their choices were deeply harmful.
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They built a nation on revolutionary ideals, while denying those ideals to entire populations.
So, while we can respect the legacy of America's founders, it's time we stop idolizing them. Because, Lord, they have sinned.
Slave ownership and exploitation
Many of the most celebrated Founding Fathers were slave owners. George Washington enslaved more than 300 people by the time of his death. Thomas Jefferson, who penned the words 'all men are created equal,' enslaved over 600 people in his lifetime.
Even Benjamin Franklin — often portrayed as a progressive thinker — owned slaves early in life, though he later turned against slavery.
What's more disturbing is that some of these men fathered children with enslaved women. Jefferson is widely believed to have had several children with Sally Hemings, a woman he legally owned. This wasn't romantic. It was a power dynamic rooted in coercion and violence — and it's a truth that too often gets swept under the rug.
The Constitution's compromise on slavery
In creating the U.S. Constitution, the Founding Fathers had a chance to end slavery — but instead, they chose political convenience. The Three-Fifths Compromise is perhaps the most glaring example. It counted enslaved people as 'three-fifths' of a person for the purpose of political representation, without granting them any rights or freedom. This wasn't just a footnote — it gave disproportionate power to slaveholding states and extended the life of slavery in America.
By choosing compromise over justice, the Founders enshrined racial inequality into the very fabric of the republic.
The Alien and Sedition Acts
Freedom of speech and press are cornerstones of American democracy, but in 1798, President John Adams signed the Alien and Sedition Acts into law. These acts made it a crime to criticize the federal government and allowed the deportation of immigrants deemed 'dangerous.'
At a time when the U.S. was still shaping its identity, the federal government cracked down on political dissent and targeted immigrants.
That doesn't align with the idea of a free republic — it aligns more with authoritarian control.
Dehumanization and displacement of Native Americans
Though the Indian Removal Act is most often linked with President Andrew Jackson in the 1830s, the groundwork for Native displacement was laid much earlier, by the Founding Fathers themselves.
Even the Declaration of Independence, a document hailed around the world for its ideals of liberty and equality, contains language that reveals deep-rooted racism and dehumanization.
Just after declaring that 'all men are created equal,' the document refers to Native Americans as: 'merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.'
This wasn't just rhetoric. George Washington authorized military campaigns to forcibly remove Native communities and clear their lands for white settlers. Thomas Jefferson championed westward expansion, writing of the 'extermination' of tribes who resisted.
These weren't policies of peaceful coexistence — they were deliberate strategies to displace, erase, and dominate Indigenous nations.
Exclusion of women and hypocrisy of "No Taxation Without Representation"
In 1776, the rallying cry of the American Revolution was 'no taxation without representation' — the idea that it was unjust for people to be taxed by a government in which they had no voice. Yet that very principle was not extended to half the population.
Women in colonial America did not vote, did not hold office, and had no legal political voice — but they were still taxed.
After independence, nothing changed. All-male legislatures continued to impose taxes on women, denying them the same representation they had just fought a war over.
So how did the new republic reconcile this contradiction? It didn't. The Declaration of Independence declared that 'all men are created equal,' and the word 'men' was interpreted quite literally. The founding framework excluded women from the political process entirely — no vote, no voice, and no true citizenship in the way men enjoyed it.
The limits of their vision — then and now
Some argue that we shouldn't judge historical figures by today's standards. That's partly fair — but only partly. There were abolitionists, feminists, and Native advocates even in the 18th century. There were people — Black, white, male, female — who could see what was wrong and spoke up. The Founders chose not to listen to them.
And even by the standards of their time, many of their decisions were morally questionable.
Acknowledging this isn't about tearing down history — it's about seeing it clearly. We don't have to cancel the Founding Fathers, but we do have to understand that their legacy is a mixture of greatness and grave injustice.