We wish you a joy-filled 4th of July as we honor that day in the summer of 1776 when the remarkable and also deeply flawed Declaration of Independence was approved by Congress.
All men were not, of course, created equal under this document. Certainly non-white men were not. Indigenous people were quickly dismissed and slandered by the declaration. And women were not considered at all.
But it was a beginning.
So, to celebrate this day, here’s the glorious version of America the Beautiful by the great Odetta Holmes, known to most simply as Odetta.