So, does anyone remember why the United States is an independent country of fifty united states and not a colony (or colonies) of the British Empire?

On July 4, 1776, a group of freedom-seeking and freedom-loving men put in writing a list of grievances against a tyrannical king. They stated the reasons that they, representing the thirteen individual colonies or states, had come to this momentous decision. The document was called the Declaration of Independence. They concluded it by pledging to each other in support of this declaration "our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor." Many of them paid dearly for this commitment.

For a moment, let's review some of these grievances and consider whether much has changed. For the purposes of this review, let references to the "King" be replaced by any or all of the following:

• The Office of the President of the United States, his administrations and any agencies or departments created by and/or under his control (examples: Department of Justice, Environmental Protection Agency, Internal Revenue Service)
• The Congress of the United States
• The Supreme Court of the United States and federal courts at all levels

From the Declaration of Independence, here are a few selected grievances given as reasons for declaring independence from Great Britain, in each case followed by current comparison and analysis.

Grievance #1:

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

In recent years, various entities of our federal government have ignored, circumvented, and slow-walked federal laws and overturned state laws. A very few of the many examples include:

•  Overturning Arizona's attempt to enforce existing federal immigration law
•  Overturning the vote of the people of California on Proposition 8 concerning same-sex marriage
•  Opening our southern border to illegal immigration and ordering Border Patrol and ICE to ignore the law
•  IRS refusal to process tax-exemption applications for conservative groups in a timely fashion
•  Failure of the State Department to follow security procedures and refusal to comply with investigations of these failures
•  Presidential decrees concerning bathroom facilities

While the court cases have gone through the established processes, it can be argued that the decisions often come down to the political leanings of appointed federal judges. For the other examples, the only way to describe much of what has been occurring is unadulterated lawlessness. And for the last eight years, there has been virtually no accountability, only hearings, cover-ups, dissimulation, deceit, and everyone walks away scot-free to continue doing the same things.

Grievance #7:

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

We now have the opposite problem. The president, for a variety of reasons, many unstated but implicit in his actions, has opened our country to illegal immigration. “Illegal” because his plans are not in compliance with immigration laws. He has ordered immigration enforcement agencies to ignore their duties. We also know that federal jobs were posted for workers to handle unaccompanied minors coming from Latin American countries in January 2014, so some of this was apparently planned beforehand. Given Mexico's very strict immigration policy, how are all these illegals traversing Mexico to our border?

This policy has produced numerous detrimental effects on states and communities receiving these illegal immigrants:

• Lack of assimilation (which is a planned outcome)
• Language requirements in schools, businesses and government agencies for non-assimilated peoples
• Lack of adequate funding to handle the influx
• Impact on existing housing, education, medical, law-enforcement and other infrastructure
• Impact to communities from inadequate screening of illegal aliens (disease, gangs, terrorism ties, political dissension and lack of allegiance to the U.S.)
• Apparent arbitrary relocation of aliens to communities across the country
• No review of immigrants ability to contribute and be productive citizens; so far, the majority are observed to be gaining immediate access to government programs

A Democratic president, if elected in November, plans to turbocharge this policy.

Grievance #10:

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.

There is no better way to describe the current acutely ponderous bureaucratic mess which is our federal government. A recent candidate for president proposed doing away with the IRS, four cabinet departments, and 25 agencies, bureaus, commissions, and programs. This would be a good beginning. The taxpayer money consumed by our federal government to little effect is staggering. And the debt continues to grow with no end to spending in sight. Would you intentionally leave your children and grandchildren with an enormous debt that they will never be able to pay? That's what your government is doing.

Grievance #16:

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

While the president is certainly not bringing large armies of foreign mercenaries into the country, the decision to practically open our southern border has the potential to create the same effect. FBI documents which were not publicly released but leaked and then published by Breitbart reveal that from July 2015 to July 2016 there were 7712 "known or suspected terrorist encounters" in the U.S., the majority in Texas, Arizona, and California. This is only the number that were encountered. There is no way to know how many others got through undetected in recent years and are living among us. Why does the government believe this information is not important enough reveal to the public?

Grievance #18:

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

While they cannot be classified as "insurrections", protests, riots, assaults, burning and destruction of property have become the norm in the last eight years. This response can be attributed to how the president and his law-enforcement administration and the news media have spun every incident of a black person being killed by police as unjustified. The rush to judgement in each case and refusal to wait for facts has served to drive a wedge of scorn, fear, and resentment between black citizens and the police. This deceitful, insidious portrayal by our leaders has had the effect of depicting these incidents as the modern equivalent of lynching. Race relations have suffered tremendously. The progress gained over the last few decades seems to have been lost and, most unfortunately, deliberately so.

In conclusion, there were other grievances which could have been selected as well. The Founders determined that these reasons were entirely sufficient for the thirteen united states to take the step of separation from Great Britain and rebellion against the King. As stated in the final paragraph of that founding document, we see that the independent states were united in purpose and hoping to accomplish something truly great for their citizens in this newly declared independence:

"We... do... solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do."

The purpose of this analysis is not to propose that it is time for rebellion. But are the fifty states actually independent states as originally noted in the Declaration?  After watching all that has been going on to the harm of our states and our union as a result of the policies of, decisions by, actions and lack of action on the part of our federal government, perhaps it is time for free and independent states to take a larger hand in the destiny of this land that we love.