Obama Knocks Founders Before America’s 250th

Former President Barack Obama said Thursday that America’s Founding Fathers “fell terribly short” when they adopted the Declaration of Independence in 1776 because they did not immediately abolish slavery. 

Obama made the remarks ahead of the official opening of his sprawling presidential library in Chicago, flanked by other former presidents, including Bill Clinton, George Bush, and Joe Biden. The library, which kicked off its opening day with a land acknowledgment, cost $850 million to construct and opened 3,437 days after Obama left office. 

“In forming our union, the founders fell terribly short of the Declaration’s promise, leaving slavery intact, allowing states to restrict the franchise to white men who owned property,” Obama said of the document’s proclamation that “all men are created equal” and are “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights.”

“But in drafting a Constitution and a Bill of rights, they did have the foresight, the genius, to provide us with a framework that allows each generation to make our union more perfect,” Obama added. 

“Over more than two centuries, through petitions and protests, marches and strikes, moral appeals from the pulpit and conversations at the family dinner table, men and women from all walks of life, of every color, every faith, every region took up the cause of democracy and made it their own. Until we the People came to include not just some of us, but all of us,” Obama added later.

The Obama family has been infamously critical of America’s past, with former first lady Michelle Obama once claiming that the first time she was ever proud of the United States as an adult was during her husband’s first presidential campaign. 

“For the first time in my adult life I am proud of my country because it feels like hope is finally making a comeback,” she said on the campaign trail in 2008. 

Obama’s comments come as the nation prepares to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration.

In recognition of that milestone, President Donald Trump has promised to have the “largest fireworks show in history” to celebrate Independence Day. 

Trump said that the festivities will kick off on June 24 with music performed by the Army and Marine Corps military bands and Lee Greenwood. He said that Air Force fighter jets and stealth bombers would fly over for the ceremony taking place on the National Mall.