Just as the book of genesis opens with “In the beginning,” the founding document of the United States illuminated a new world. The message of equality in the Declaration of Independence delivered a revolutionary charge to humankind. And for the Jewish people, it marked the first time a nation in which we constituted a small minority recognized us as equal citizens from the beginning.

There were other significant moments our founders could have designated as our national birthday, such as the Battles of Lexington and Concord or the British surrender at Yorktown. But the signing of the nation’s founding document on July 4, 1776—250 years ago—was unique, a day linked not to a battle but a vision.

To be clear, the words “all men are created equal” were as aspirational as they were transformative. It would be another 87 years before slavery was abolished, and much longer before the words “and women” came to be included, albeit implicitly, in the declaration’s meaning. The work of guaranteeing equality and justice for all remains incomplete. But none of this negates how pivotal America’s
founding idea was, how it has inspired people and nations around the world and how it should inform the work we do today to fulfill the promise of liberty.

At its birth, America’s Jewish population was fewer than 3,000, but many of the nation’s founders—including George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin and Alexander Hamilton—had Jewish friends and were sensitive to Jewish concerns. In 1790, President Washington shared his vision of equality in his celebrated letter to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, R.I.

“It is no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights,” Washington wrote. “For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens.” 

The following year, that sentiment was ratified as the First Amendment to the Constitution, guaranteeing freedom of religion, speech, the press, assembly and petitioning the government for redress of grievances. These rights form the foundation of American greatness and development. They empowered Americans and served as a magnet for immigrants from around the world who enriched this country in countless ways.

Like any nation, America’s history is also filled with hardship and error. But our founding documents and ideals gave us unprecedented tools to repair our world, to overcome not only physical obstacles but our own worst instincts, too. The Constitution, which begins: “We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union…,” made clear that citizen participation was not only allowed but required.

Hadassah’s primary mission has always been building, healing and educating in Israel, but we have quintessentially American roots and, since our founding, have relied on American women coming together to take action.

Henrietta Szold’s earliest memory was of sitting on her father’s shoulders, watching as Abraham Lincoln’s funeral train passed through Baltimore. In her 20s, as waves of immigrants were arriving on American shores, she became an education pioneer by launching a night school for adult immigrants, teaching English and American civics.

Szold was a trailblazer of women’s leadership in the Zionist movement even before women had the right to vote in America. She planted the seeds for Hadassah’s activism—and Jewish women’s activism—in America’s corridors of power and public squares, where we have advocated not only on behalf of Israel but also for civil rights, voting rights, reproductive freedom, women’s health equity and the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment, among other issues.

As we celebrate the 250th anniversary of America’s birth, we, the women of Hadassah, rededicate ourselves to our nation’s highest values and to “a more perfect union.”