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Published on: July 3rd, 2020

15 Great Speeches to Remind America what Independence Day is About

best conclusion for independence day speech

This year we will celebrate the 244 th anniversary of American independence. This day does not only represent the creation of a new nation, but the creation of a new civilization, one founded on the principles of freedom, self-government, and equality. Here are 15 speeches to inspire new vigor for our founding principles. Looking at who and what we were will help us remember who and what we ought to be.

1. Patrick Henry, “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” 1775

Patrick Henry gave this speech in 1775 at the Virginia Convention. It took place only a few months after the assembly of the first Continental Congress had sent King George III a petition for the redress of grievances. Boston Harbor was also blockaded by the British in retaliation for the Boston Tea Party. Tensions were high, revolution seemed inevitable, but still many political leaders in Virginia held out hope that the relationship with Great Britain could be restored. Patrick Henry sought to dispel them of that notion.

Patrick Henry was a lawyer and had a reputation as one of the greatest opponents of British taxation. In this speech he argues passionately for independence. He made his case clear in the opening of his speech stating, “For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery…” He chides the assembly for indulging in “illusions of hope” for passively waiting “to be betrayed with a kiss” and for falling prey to the siren songs of the British.

He reminds the assembly of the lengths the colonists have gone to in order to plead their case to the British, “We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and Parliament.” He then states how the British have received such outreach, “Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne.”

Next is Henry’s powerful call to action, a call that would galvanize the colonies into declaring independence from Great Britain:

In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained, we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to the God of Hosts is all that is left us! … Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations; and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave… There is no retreat but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable and let it come! I repeat it, sir, let it come. It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!

Read Patrick’s entire speech . Watch Patrick’s speech on YouTube .

2. Samuel Adams, “On American Independence” 1776

Samuel Adams was a delegate to the First Continental Congress in 1774, was a Signer of the Declaration of Independence, helped get the Constitution ratified in the Massachusetts Convention, and became Governor of Massachusetts in 1794.

In this speech Adams recognizes that this was not simply a battle that would determine the fate of two nations, but the fate of the world at large. He declared, “Courage, then, my countrymen; our contest is not only whether we ourselves shall be free, but whether there shall be left to mankind an asylum on earth for civil and religious liberty.”

Adams notes the ability of men to “deliberately and voluntarily” form for themselves a political society. He cites John Hampden, John Locke, and Algernon Sidney whose ideas and actions paved the way for such a feat. Of this new founding he states:

Other nations have received their laws from conquerors; some are indebted for a constitution to the suffering of their ancestors through revolving centuries. The people of this country, alone, have formally and deliberately chosen a government for themselves, and with open and uninfluenced consent bound themselves into a social compact. Here no man proclaims his birth or wealth as a title to honorable distinction, or to sanctify ignorance and vice with the name of hereditary authority. He who has most zeal and ability to promote public felicity, let him be the servant of the public. This is the only line of distinction drawn by nature. Leave the bird of night to the obscurity for which nature intended him, and expect only from the eagle to brush the clouds with his wings and look boldly in the face of the sun.

He like Patrick Henry then gives a call to action:

We have no other alternative than independence, or the most ignominious and galling servitude. The legions of our enemies thicken on our plains; desolation and death mark their bloody career, while the mangled corpses of our countrymen seem to cry out to us as a voice from heaven.

Lastly, Adams ends his address declaring the people of America the guardians of their own liberty. Then with an ode to the ancient Roman republic he ends stating, “Nothing that we propose can pass into a law without your consent. Be yourselves, O Americans, the authors of those laws on which your happiness depends.”

You can read Samuel Adams' full speech .

3. John Quincy Adams, “An Address Celebrating the Declaration of Independence” 1821

Painting of John Quincy Adams.

Adams begins the speech recounting the first settlers of the Plymouth colony and how they entered into a written covenant with one another on the eve of their landing. Of this event he states,

Thus was a social compact formed upon the elementary principles of civil society, in which conquest and servitude had no part. The slough of brutal force was entirely cast off; all was voluntary; all was unbiased consent; all was the agreement of soul with soul.

Adams continues to trace America’s historical and political development throughout the speech. He recalls how the British mistreated the colonists from the beginning, citing how Britain went against its own ideas and principles in denying the colonists representation and consent. He states, “For the independence of North America, there were ample and sufficient causes in the laws of moral and physical nature.”

Adams’ ode to the Declaration of Independence is most worth reading:

It was the first solemn declaration by a nation of the only legitimate foundation of civil government. It was the corner stone of a new fabric, destined to cover the surface of the globe. It demolished at a stroke the lawfulness of all governments founded upon conquest. It swept away all the rubbish of accumulated centuries of servitude. It announced in practical form to the world the transcendent truth of the unalienable sovereignty of the people. It proved that the social compact was no figment of the imagination; but a real, solid, and sacred bond of the social union. From the day of this declaration, the people of North America were no longer the fragment of a distant empire, imploring justice and mercy from an inexorable master in another hemisphere. They were no longer children appealing in vain to the sympathies of a heartless mother; no longer subjects leaning upon the shattered columns of royal promises, and invoking the faith of parchment to secure their rights. They were a nation, asserting as of right, and maintaining by war, its own existence. A nation was born in a day. […] [T]hat a new civilization had come, a new spirit had arisen on this side of the Atlantic more advanced and more developed in its regard for the rights of the individual than that which characterized the Old World. Life in a new and open country had aspirations which could not be realized in any subordinate position. A separate establishment was ultimately inevitable. It had been decreed by the very laws of human nature. Man everywhere has an unconquerable desire to be the master of his own destiny.

Adams goes on to pronounce that the Declaration was more than the “mere secession of territory” and the “establishment of a nation.” No, these things have occurred before, but the Declaration of Independence not only liberated America but ennobled all of humanity, he stated. 

You can read John Quincy Adams' entire speech here .

  4. Daniel Webster “Speech at the laying of the cornerstone of the capitol,” July 4, 1851.

Daniel Webster was one of the most prominent lawyers in the 19 th century, arguing over 200 cases before the Supreme Court. He also represented New Hampshire and Massachusetts in Congress and was Secretary of State under three presidents. Webster is also known for his speech in Congress, called the Second Reply to Hayne, which derided the theory of nullification espoused by John C. Calhoun.

Webster’s speech on the occasion of laying the Capital building’s cornerstone had a patriotic tone, He begins with the celebratory declaration, “This is America! This is Washington! And this the Capitol of the United States!”

Of the Founding generation Webster stated,

The Muse inspiring our Fathers was the Genius of Liberty, all on fire with a sense of oppression, and a resolution to throw it off; the whole world was the stage and higher characters than princes trod it… how well the characters were cast, and how well each acted his part…

He went on to speak about the tremendous sacrifice the men who signed the Declaration paid. “It was sealed in blood,” he stated. Of the liberty that the Founding generation bestowed upon successive generations Webster said,

Every man’s heart swells within him; every man’s port and bearing becomes somewhat more proud and lofty, as he remembers that seventy-five years have rolled away, and that the great inheritance of liberty is still his; his undiminished and unimpaired; his in all its original glory’ his to enjoy’ his to protect; and his to transmit to future generations.

Finally, Webster made clear that American liberty is unique among nations,

I have said, gentlemen, that our inheritance is an inheritance of American liberty. That liberty is characteristic, peculiar, and altogether our own. Nothing like it existed in former times, nor was known in the most enlightened States of antiquity; while with us its principles have become interwoven into the minds of individual men… […] And, finally another most important part of the great fabric of American liberty is, that there shall be written constitutions, founded on the immediate authority of the people themselves, and regulating and restraining all the powers conferred upon Government, whether legislative, executive, or judicial.

You can read Daniel Webster's entire speech here .

5. Frederick Douglass, “What to the slave is the 4 th of July?”  July 5, 1852

Statue of Frederick Douglass.

He spoke about the Founding Fathers as men of courage who “preferred revolution to peaceful submission to bondage.” Of the “fathers of this republic” he said, “They were statesmen, patriots and heroes, and for the good they did, and the principles they contended for, I will unite with you to honor their memory.”

Drawing a contrast between the Founders and the men of his generation advocating the positive good of slavery Douglass stated,

They believed in order; but not in the order of tyranny. With them, nothing was “settled” that was not right. With them, justice, liberty and humanity were “final;” not slavery and oppression. You may well cherish the memory of such men. They were great in their day and generation. Their solid manhood stands out the more as we contrast it with these degenerate times.

Douglass encouraged Americans to celebrate the Declaration as the ring-bolt to the chains of the United Sates’ destiny. “The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, and at whatever cost,” he stated.

Douglass then rightly points out that America was not living up to its own ideals as laid out in the Declaration when it came to the millions of black men and women still enslaved. He stated,

Fellow-citizens, pardon me, allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here to-day? What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? and am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar, and to confess the benefits and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us?

Of Slavery’s effects on the American union he declared, “It fetters your progress; it is the enemy of improvement, the deadly foe of education; it fosters pride; it breeds insolence; it promotes vice; it shelters crime; it is a curse to the earth that supports it…”

He goes on to explain that this anniversary does not yet include black men and women. He stated, “The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me.” Yet Douglass was optimistic that this would soon change. He called the Constitution a “GLORIOUS LIBERTY DOCUMENT.” He exhorted the assembly to consider the Constitution’s preamble and ask themselves if slavery was listed as one of its purposes.

He finished his momentous speech by saying, 

Allow me to say, in conclusion, notwithstanding the dark picture I have this day presented of the state of the nation, I do not despair of this country. There are forces in operation, which must inevitably work the downfall of slavery. “The arm of the Lord is not shortened,” and the doom of slavery is certain. I, therefore, leave off where I began, with hope. While drawing encouragement from the Declaration of Independence, the great principles it contains, and the genius of American Institutions, my spirit is also cheered by the obvious tendencies of the age.

You can read Frederick Douglass' entire speech here .

6. Abraham Lincoln, Electric Cord Speech, 1858

In this speech often titled, “Speech at Chicago, Illinois” Abraham Lincoln replies to Senator Stephen Douglas’ conception of popular sovereignty. This was a theory that argued that each new territory should be able to decide whether or not to have slavery within their borders instead of allowing the federal government to decide. Lincoln saw this as a repeal of the Missouri Compromise which kept slavery relegated to the South.

To make his case against popular sovereignty and the expansion of slavery Lincoln argues that the adopters of the Constitution decreed that slavery should not go into the new territory and that the slave trade should be cut off within twenty years by an act of Congress. “What were [these provisions] but a clear indication that the framers of the Constitution intended and expected the ultimate extinction of that institution,” Lincoln asked the crowd.

After expounding upon the evils of slavery and recent actions to preserve the institution Lincoln turns to the Declaration of Independence for support. He stated,

We hold this annual celebration to remind ourselves of all the good done in this process of time of how it was done and who did it, and how we are historically connected with it; and we go from these meetings in better humor with ourselves—we feel more attached the one to the other and more firmly bound to the country we inhabit. In every way we are better men in the age, and race, and country in which we live for these celebrations. But after we have done all this we have not yet reached the whole. There is something else connected with it. We have besides these men—descended by blood from our ancestors—among us perhaps half our people who are not descendants at all of these men, they are men who have come from Europe—German, Irish, French and Scandinavian—men that have come from Europe themselves, or whose ancestors have come hither and settled here, finding themselves our equals in all things. If they look back through this history to trace their connection with those days by blood, they find they have none, they cannot carry themselves back into that glorious epoch and make themselves feel that they are part of us, but when they look through that old Declaration of Independence they find that those old men say that “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,” and then they feel that that moral sentiment taught in that day evidences their relation to those men, that it is the father of all moral principle in them, and that they have a right to claim it as though they were blood of the blood, and flesh of the flesh of the men who wrote that Declaration, (loud and long continued applause) and so they are. That is the electric cord in that Declaration that links the hearts of patriotic and liberty-loving men together, that will link those patriotic hearts as long as the love of freedom exists in the minds of men throughout the world.

You can read the entire Electric Cord speech here .

7. Abraham Lincoln, Address in Independence Hall, February 22, 1861

On Abraham Lincoln's inaugural journey to Washington as president-elect, he stopped in Philadelphia at the site where the Declaration of Independence had been signed. There he said,

I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence. I have often pondered over the dangers which were incurred by the men who assembled here, and framed and adopted that Declaration of Independence. I have pondered over the toils that were endured by the officers and soldiers of the army who achieved that Independence. I have often inquired of myself, what great principle or idea it was that kept this Confederacy so long together. It was not the mere matter of the separation of the Colonies from the motherland; but that sentiment in the Declaration of Independence which gave liberty, not alone to the people of this country, but, I hope, to the world, for all future time. It was that which gave promise that in due time the weight would be lifted from the shoulders of all men. This is a sentiment embodied in the Declaration of Independence.

You can read the entire address in Independence Hall here .

8. Abraham Lincoln, Fragments on the Constitution and Union, January 1, 1861

This short selection is not part of Lincoln’s tome of public speeches. One theory is that Lincoln wrote it while composing his first inaugural address. It is noteworthy because of Lincoln’s argument that what is most important about America are the principles and ideals it was founded upon. That principle, he states, is “Liberty to all.”

The  expression  of that principle, in our Declaration of Independence, was most happy, and fortunate.  Without  this, as well as  with  it, we could have declared our independence of Great Britain; but  without  it, we could not, I think, have secured our free government, and consequent prosperity. No oppressed, people will  fight,  and  endure,  as our fathers did, without the promise of something better, than a mere change of masters. The assertion of that principle, at that time, was the word, “fitly spoken” which has proved an “apple of gold” to us. The Union, and the Constitution, are the picture of silver, subsequently framed around it. The picture was made, not to conceal, or destroy the apple; but to adorn, and preserve it. The picture was made for the apple–not the apple for the picture.

Read the entire Fragments on the Constitution and Union selection here .

9. Abraham Lincoln, The Gettysburg Address, November 19, 1863

Aside from our original founding documents the Gettysburg address is perhaps the most important American creed ever written. It signifies America’s second founding or the moment our first founding more fully aligned with its own ideals. Since its decree America has begun to live in what Lincoln called “a new birth of freedom.” Here are selections from the address:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. […] It is rather for us, the living, we here be dedicated to the great task remaining before us that, from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here, gave the last full measure of devotion that we here highly resolve these dead shall not have died in vain; that the nation, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

You can read the full Gettysburg Address here .

10. Winston Churchill, “The Third Great Title-Deed of Anglo-American Liberties” July 4, 1918

Statue of Winston Churchill.

A great harmony exists between the spirit and language of the Declaration of Independence and all we are fighting for now. A similar harmony exists between the principles of that Declaration and all that the British people have wished to stand for, and have in fact achieved at last both here at home and in the self-governing Dominions of the Crown. The Declaration of Independence is not only an American document. It follows on Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights as the third great title-deed on which the liberties of the English-speaking people are founded.

Read Churchill's entire speech here .

11. Calvin Coolidge, “Speech on the 150 th Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, July 5 1926

 Calvin Coolidge, the 30 th president of the United States, was sworn in after President Harding’s unexpected death. Harding’s administration was steeped in scandal. Coolidge is known for restoring integrity to the executive branch by rooting out corruption and being a model of integrity.

Coolidge gave his Fourth of July Speech in Philadelphia, the birthplace of our nation. There he pointed to the Liberty Bell as a great American symbol,

It is little wonder that people at home and abroad consider Independence Hall as hallowed ground and revere the Liberty Bell as a sacred relic. That pile of bricks and mortar, that mass of metal, might appear to the uninstructed as only the outgrown meeting place and the shattered bell of a former time, useless now because of more modern conveniences, but to those who know they have become consecrated by the use which men have made of them. They have long been identified with a great cause. They are the framework of a spiritual event.

Of the Declaration Coolidge stated,

It was not because it was proposed to establish a new nation, but because it was proposed to establish a nation on new principles, that July 4, 1776, has come to be regarded as one of the greatest days in history. Great ideas do not burst upon the world unannounced. They are reached by a gradual development over a length of time usually proportionate to their importance. This is especially true of the principles laid down in the Declaration of Independence. Three very definite propositions were set out in its preamble regarding the nature of mankind and therefore of government. These were the doctrine that all men are created equal, that they are endowed with certain inalienable rights, and that therefore the source of the just powers of government must be derived from the consent of the governed.

Of his trust in our Founding documents he said,

It is not so much, then, for the purpose of undertaking to proclaim new theories and principles that this annual celebration is maintained, but rather to reaffirm and reestablish those old theories and principles which time and the unerring logic of events have demonstrated to be sound. Amid all the clash of conflicting interests, amid all the welter of partisan politics, every American can turn for solace and consolation to the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States with the assurance and confidence that those two great charters of freedom and justice remain firm and unshaken. Whatever perils appear, whatever dangers threaten, the Nation remains secure in the knowledge that the ultimate application of the law of the land will provide an adequate defense and protection.

Read Coolidge's full speech here .

12. John F. Kennedy, “Some Elements of the American Character” July 4, 1946

John F. Kennedy gave this speech as a candidate for Congress. In it he offers a robust defense of America’s founding. He lauds America’s religious character and derides the theory that America’s founders were concerned purely with economic interests. He explicitly states,

In recent years, the existence of this element in the American character has been challenged by those who seek to give an economic interpretation to American history. They seek to destroy our faith in our past so that they may guide our future. These cynics are wrong…

 Kennedy instead argues,

In Revolutionary times, the cry "No taxation without representation" was not an economic complaint. Rather, it was directly traceable to the eminently fair and just principle that no sovereign power has the right to govern without the consent of the governed. Anything short of that was tyranny. It was against this tyranny that the colonists "fired the shot heard 'round the world."

Kennedy then espouses a political theory of the American founding that relies on natural rights, 

The American Constitution has set down for all men to see the essentially Christian and American principle that there are certain rights held by every man which no government and no majority, however powerful, can deny. Conceived in Grecian thought, strengthened by Christian morality, and stamped indelibly into American political philosophy, the right of the individual against the State is the keystone of our Constitution. Each man is free.

You can read John F. Kennedy's full speech here .

13. Martin Luther King Jr., “I Have a Dream” 1963

Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream Speech” is another great cry from another great man declaring that America was not living up to its founding principles.

King begins his speech by harkening back to Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. He states, “This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice.” Yet, he argues, 100 years later black men and women are still not free. To right this wrong, he points to the Declaration,

In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the "unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds."

King refused to believe that there was no hope. He said,

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we've come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.

King’s dream inspired a nation to live up to its ideals. His beautiful words have become iconic,

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."

 You can read and listen to "I Have a Dream" in full here .

14. Martin Luther King Jr. “The American Dream” Sermon Delivered at Ebenezar Baptist Church” July 4, 1965

In this sermon delivered on July 4, 1965, Martin Luther King Jr. locates the substance of the American dream within the Declaration of Independence. About the statement, “All men are created equal,” King states, “The first saying we notice in this dream is an amazing universalism. It doesn’t say “some men,” it says “all men.”

King goes on to explain to the congregation what separates the United States from other nations around the world.

 Then that dream goes on to say another thing that ultimately distinguishes our nation and our form of government from any totalitarian system in the world. It says that each of us has certain basic rights that are neither derived from or conferred by the state.

As the source of these inalienable rights King points to the fact that they are God-given. “Never before in the history of the world has a sociopolitical document expressed in such profound, eloquent, and unequivocal language the dignity and the worth of human personality,” he said.

King goes on to point out that America has not lived up to this dream. He describes America as being “divided against herself.” He argues that America cannot afford an “anemic democracy.”

He however professed hope that this dream will challenge America to remember her “noble capacity for justice and love and brotherhood.” He further challenged America to respect the “dignity and worth of all human personality” and to live up to the ideal that “all men are created equal.”

King clarifies that equality does not mean that every musician is a Mozart or every philosopher an Aristotle, but that all men are “equal in intrinsic worth.” He points to the Biblical concept of imago dei . He states, “[T]are no gradations in the image of God. Every man from a treble white to a bass black is significant on God’s keyboard, precisely because every man is made in the image of God. He ends his sermon with these powerful words,

We have a dream. It started way back in 1776, and God grant that America will be true to her dream. I still have a dream this morning that truth will reign supreme and all of God’s children will respect the dignity and worth of human personality. And when this day comes the morning stars will sing together and the sons of God will shout for joy.

Read Martin Luther King Jr.'s full sermon here .

15. Ronald Reagan, “Address to the Nation on Independence Day” July 4, 1986

Statue of Ronald Reagan.

In this speech Reagan recalls the moment of the signing of the Declaration,

Fifty-six men came forward to sign the parchment. It was noted at the time that they pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honors. And that was more than rhetoric; each of those men knew the penalty for high treason to the Crown. ``We must all hang together,'' Benjamin Franklin said, ``or, assuredly, we will all hang separately.'' And John Hancock, it is said, wrote his signature in large script so King George could see it without his spectacles. They were brave. They stayed brave through all the bloodshed of the coming years. Their courage created a nation built on a universal claim to human dignity, on the proposition that every man, woman, and child had a right to a future of freedom.

Reagan also talked about the beautiful friendship between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. He noted how they died on the same day, July 4 th , exactly 50 years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. It was their first gift to us, Reagan said.

My fellow Americans, it falls to us to keep faith with them and all the great Americans of our past. Believe me, if there's one impression I carry with me after the privilege of holding for 5 ½ years the office held by Adams and Jefferson and Lincoln, it is this: that the things that unite us -- America's past of which we're so proud, our hopes and aspirations for the future of the world and this much-loved country -- these things far outweigh what little divides us. And so tonight we reaffirm that Jew and gentile, we are one nation under God; that black and white, we are one nation indivisible; that Republican and Democrat, we are all Americans. Tonight, with heart and hand, through whatever trial and travail, we pledge ourselves to each other and to the cause of human freedom, the cause that has given light to this land and hope to the world.

You can watch Ronald Reagan's speech here or read Reagan's speech here .

About Hillsdale in D.C.

Hillsdale in D.C. is an extension of the teaching mission of Hillsdale College to Washington, D.C. Its purpose is to teach the Constitution and the principles that give it meaning. Through the study of original source documents from American history—and of older books that formed the education of America’s founders—it seeks to inspire students, teachers, citizens, and policymakers to return the America’s principles to their central place in the political life of the nation.

About Hillsdale College

Hillsdale College is an independent liberal arts college located in southern Michigan. Founded in 1844, the College has built a national reputation through its classical liberal arts core curriculum and its principled refusal to accept federal or state taxpayer subsidies, even indirectly in the form of student grants or loans. It also conducts an outreach effort promoting civil and religious liberty, including a free monthly speech digest, Imprimis , with a circulation of more than 5.7 million. For more information, visit hillsdale.edu .

The July 4 speeches that helped define what America is — or what it should be

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Generations ago, America’s leading political figures delivered many of their most eloquent orations not in the chambers of the Capitol but from local gazebos and bandstands on Independence Day. Before large crowds on town greens or in front of fire halls, they would harken back to the lessons of the nation’s Founders, often holding their audiences spellbound for an hour, perhaps even more.

American presidents still deliver pro-forma July Fourth messages; last year President Trump, in a remarkable personal version of history and the capabilities of George Washington’s Revolutionary War forces, said that “our Army manned the air, it rammed the ramparts, it took over the airports. ”

But the grand tradition of the Independence Day oration has largely disappeared. Today’s audiences are unaccustomed to the patriotic rhetoric that once commanded attention. Indeed, the standard themes of July Fourths past — paeans to the wisdom of Washington, suggestions that his Revolutionary comrades were soldiers in God’s own cause — now possess an antiquarian, almost alien air.

“A politician’s Fourth of July speech may seem anodyne and clichéd,” said Rutgers historian David Greenberg. “But it also contributes in some way to understanding and perhaps subtly redefining, in that moment and from that political perspective, what Americanism is or should be.”

And there are lessons in these orations of a long-ago age. They are period pieces, and yet they underline in the 21st century how the 18th century Enlightenment values embedded in the Declaration of Independence have not been redeemed or realized.

“If democracy is America’s civic religion, then its sacred text is the Declaration of Independence ,” said Martin Kaplan, a USC expert on media and society. “What better occasion for a secular sermon about our founding values than the anniversary of our birth certificate? The first time many Americans heard their unalienable rights proclaimed was with their own ears, listening to its text. In a way, every Fourth of July speech since then has been a reenactment of that first declaration, renewed and recommitted in the terms of its changing times.”

So as the 244th celebration of American Independence draws near, let us pause and draw inspiration, and perhaps wisdom, from this holiday sampler of Fourth of July addresses of the past:

Daniel Webster, July 4, 1800

“It becomes us, on whom the defence of our country will ere long devolve, this day, most seriously to reflect on the duties incumbent upon us. Our ancestors bravely snatched expiring liberty from the grasp of Britain, whose touch is poison... Shall we, their descendants, now basely disgrace our lineage, and pusillanimously disclaim the legacy bequeathed to us? Shall we pronounce the sad valediction to freedom, and immolate liberty on the altars our fathers have raised to her?”

Of all the remarkable elements of Webster’s life, what might be most remarkable was that the citizens of Hanover, N.H., invited him as a Dartmouth junior to deliver a speech at the tiny college town’s Independence Day commemoration. At age 18, Webster consciously looked to the past (by invoking the greatness of Washington, who had died earlier that year) and eerily foreshadowed the future (by providing a direct antecedent to the message John F. Kennedy would offer when he bid Americans to “ask what you can do for your country”).

These words also remind us that these moral principles are at the heart of the American creed, a theme that John Quincy Adams would return to on July 4, 1821, when he spoke of how the American Revolution “swept away all the rubbish of accumulated centuries of servitude” and “proved that the social compact was no figment of the imagination, but a real, solid, and sacred bond of the social union.”

Charles Sumner, July 4, 1845

“Nothing resembles God more than that man among us who has arrived at the highest degree of justice. The true greatness of nations is in those qualities which constitute the greatness of the individual. It is not to be found in extent of territory, nor in vastness of population, nor in wealth; not in fortifications, or armies, or navies; not in the phosphorescent glare of fields of battle; not in Golgothas, though covered by monuments that kiss the clouds; for all these are the creatures and representatives of those qualities of our nature, which are unlike any thing in God’s nature.”

These remarks by Sumner, who would become known as one of the Senate’s most ardent opponents of slavery, are part of a larger speech delivered six months before Texas joined the Union. In summoning an image of Golgotha, the Jerusalem hillside where Christ was crucified, and in decrying the prospect of war with Mexico, Sumner offered a vivid celebration of the concept of justice. This is a meditation on eternal truths that we might embrace in our own time, when the killings of men in Minneapolis and Atlanta remind us that we have not yet arrived at “the highest degree of justice.”

Frederick Douglass, July 5, 1852

“The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice, are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought light and healing to you, has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn...”

Speaking in Rochester, N.Y ., the Black abolitionist and statesman opened by asserting that he was “not wanting in respect for the fathers of this republic.” Douglass, perhaps the greatest orator in our history, escaped slavery and in in his freedom spoke across the country, assuring that Americans could not escape the moral questions inherent in human bondage nor the hypocrisy of Americans’ rhetoric about human freedom.

In this speech he went on to ask the preeminent question of the age, and of ours: “Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us?”

Douglass’ speech came on July 5, not the Fourth, because he refused to celebrate American independence on the usual day until the enslaved were free. July 5 was not without meaning; on that date in 1827 , 4,000 Blacks people had marched through New York to mark the end of slavery in that state.

Edward Everett, July 4, 1861

“We contend for the great inheritance of constitutional freedom transmitted from our revolutionary fathers. We engage in the struggle forced upon us, with sorrow, as by our misguided brethren, but with high heart and faith….”

Few Americans ever assembled a resume quite like that of Everett, who served as governor of Massachusetts, member of both the U.S. House and Senate, secretary of State — and president of Harvard University. But he is remembered most for a speech he delivered whose content, ironically, is not remembered at all — a two-hour stemwinder with allusions to classical antiquity, references to the War of the Roses and quotes from the philosopher David Hume that turned out to be merely the warm-up act to the two minutes of what is now known as Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.

Everett possessed a voice that was, in the words of his protege, Ralph Waldo Emerson, “most mellow and beautiful, and correct of all the instruments of the time.” In the speech excerpted above, delivered in the early months of the Civil War, he spoke of the primacy of freedom in the Constitution and, by employing the powerful verb “contend,” he underlined the enduring struggle that has animated all of our history — and our own time: the debate over the nature, and the extent, of freedom in the nation.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, July 4, 1863

“It is easy to understand the bitterness which is often shown toward reformers. They are never general favorites. They are apt to interfere with vested rights and time honored interests. They often wear an unlovely, and forbidding, aspect.”

Oliver Wendell Holmes, pictured in 1870, was a physician and poet.

Physician and poet, Holmes was both one of the leading literary figures of a period with a surfeit of cultural giants and the father of the famous Supreme Court justice (1902-1932) who bore his name.

These remarks came as Union troops were surging to victory at Gettysburg in Pennsylvania and Vicksburg in Mississippi, and they anticipated a period when the country, rent by the Civil War, would need to be reconstituted on a new, reformed basis — in essence the “new birth of freedom” that Lincoln spoke of in his Gettysburg Address and that we seek in this hard year of contention and conflict.

Susan B. Anthony, July 4, 1876

“Our faith is firm and unwavering in the broad principles of human rights proclaimed in 1776, not only as abstract truths, but as the corner stones of a republic. Yet we cannot forget, even in this glad hour, that while all men of every race, and clime, and condition, have been invested with the full rights of citizenship under our hospitable flag, all women still suffer the degradation of disfranchisement.”

The official celebration of the centenary of the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia included no remarks by women. But a group of determined feminists distributed a Declaration of Rights for Women to the crowd assembled outside Independence Hall and then, at a stand erected for a group of musicians, Anthony read that document aloud.

“It is with sorrow we strike the one discordant note’’ at the anniversary commemoration, she said, but went on to assert, “The history of our country the past hundred years has been a series of assumptions and usurpations of power of woman, in direct opposition to the principles of just government...’’

With Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Anthony founded the National American Woman Suffrage Assn. It took 44 more years for the passage of the 19th Amendment, guaranteeing all women the right to vote — a measure known as the “Susan B. Anthony Amendment” — and a century and a half later there remains a pay gap between men and women in the workplace and a representation gap in Congress. Anthony, an important ally of Douglass in the abolitionist movement, became the first woman portrayed on an American coin.

Charles Francis Adams, July 4, 1876

“Let us labor continually to keep the advance in civilization as it becomes us to do after the struggles of the past, so that the rights to life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness, which we have honorably secured, may be firmly entailed upon the ever enlarging generations of mankind.”

The son and grandson of presidents, Adams was a state senator, a congressman, twice an unsuccessful vice presidential candidate, and the American ambassador to London. In this excerpt, delivered pointedly on the 100th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, he speaks of the fragility of liberty and the threat that it might not be extended to all in the future. This sentence is a vow that any contemporary American political figure could, and perhaps should, quote in a speech this Independence Day.

John F. Kennedy, July 4, 1946

“Our idealism, [a fundamental] element of the American character, is being severely tested. Now, only time will tell whether this element of the American character will be true to its historic tradition.”

John F. Kennedy examined several elements of the American creed in a 1946 speech.

In an evocative setting where Daniel Webster thundered about the Union and Frederick Douglass lectured about the evils of slavery, a first-time congressional candidate delivered a thoughtful analysis of what it means to be an American. In Boston’s Faneuil Hall, the meeting place for colonial rebels built by a slave trader and slave owner, Kennedy examined several elements of the American creed.

“JFK’s speech couldn’t be more timely,” said Robert Dallek, a prominent historian and Kennedy biographer. “With a current president, whose character defects cast a shadow across the presidency and the nation’s reputation for human decency, Kennedy’s speech reminds us that the country is better than what Donald Trump represents.”

Yet the Kennedy speech is more than an answer to the Trump presidency. As president he would weaponize the rhetoric of idealism, but as a recent war veteran and fledgling politician he set forth the ultimate American challenge, as fresh on the Fourth of July in 1946 as it would be three-quarters of a century later: for the United States to be true to its historic traditions.

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Independence Day Bill Pullman Speech Transcript: Great Movie Transcripts

Independence Day Movie Speech Transcript

Today at Rev on the 4th of July we’d like to honor one of the greatest fake presidents of all time, who gave one of the greatest fake presidential speeches of all time, on the greatest fake Independence Day of all time. Happy 4th of July Bill Pullman, aka President Thomas J. Whitmore!

President Whitmore: ( 00:00 ) Good morning. Good morning. In less than an hour aircrafts from here will join others from around the world and you will be launching the largest aerial battle in the history of mankind.

President Whitmore: ( 00:22 ) Mankind, that word should have new meaning for all of us today. We can’t be consumed by our petty differences anymore. We will be united in our common interests. Perhaps it’s fate that today is the 4th of July and you will once again be fighting for our freedom not from tyranny, oppression, or persecution but from annihilation.

President Whitmore: ( 00:56 ) We’re fighting for our right to live, to exist, and should we win today the 4th of July will no longer be known as an American holiday but as the day when the world declared in one voice,

President Whitmore: ( 01:14 ) “We will not go quietly into the night. We will not vanish without a fight. We’re going to live on. We’re going to survive. Today we celebrate our Independence Day!”

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best conclusion for independence day speech

‘What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?’: The History of Frederick Douglass’ Searing Independence Day Oration

Frederick Douglass

A merica has been working to fully live up to the ideals laid out in the Declaration of Independence ever since the document was printed on July 4, 1776. So while the U.S. tends to go all out celebrating freedom on the Fourth of July, alternate independence commemorations held a day later often draw attention to a different side of that story, with readings of the Frederick Douglass speech best known today as “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?”

The speech was originally delivered at a moment when the country was fiercely locked in debate over the question of slavery, but there’s a reason why it has remained famous more than 150 years after emancipation, says David Blight, author of the 2019 Pulitzer Prize winning biography Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom.

To some, celebrations of American independence on July 4 are a reminder of the country’s hypocrisy on the matter of freedom, as slavery played a key role in the nation’s history; even today, America’s history of racism is still being written , while other forms of modern-day slavery persist in the U.S. and around the world . For those who feel that way, July 5 may be an easier day to celebrate: on that day in 1827, 4,000 African Americans paraded down Broadway in New York City to celebrate the end of slavery in their state.

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One person who felt that way was Douglass, the famous abolitionist, who was himself born into slavery. When the Ladies Anti-Slavery Society of Rochester, N.Y., invited Douglass to give a July 4 speech in 1852, Douglass opted to speak on July 5 instead.

Addressing an audience of about 600 at the newly constructed Corinthian Hall, he started out by acknowledging that the signers of the Declaration of Independence were “brave” and “great” men, and that the way they wanted the Republic to look was in the right spirit. But, he said, speaking more than a decade before slavery was ended nationally, a lot of work still needed to be done so that all citizens can enjoy “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Above “your national, tumultuous joy” — the July 4th celebrations of white Americans — were the “mournful wails of millions” whose heavy chains “are, today, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee shouts that reach them.”

In the oration’s most famous passages, Douglass discussed what it felt like to see such festivities and to know independence was not a given for people like him:

What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? and am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar, and to confess the benefits and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us?… I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us. I am not included within the pale of glorious anniversary! Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice, are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought light and healing to you, has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn… What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer; a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are, to Him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States, at this very hour.

Douglass’ speech also foreshadowed the bloody reckoning to come: Civil War. “For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder,” he said. “We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake.”

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At the time Douglass spoke, Blight says, the opportunity was ripe for a lecture on the moral crisis.

“ Uncle Tom’s Cabin had just been published that spring and was taking the country by storm. The country was in the midst of crises over fugitive slave rescues in the wake of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. The political party system was beginning to tear itself asunder over the expansion of slavery,” he says. “It’s also an election year; the 1852 presidential election was heating up that summer. The Nativist party is rising. It’s an extraordinary political moment.”

It was a turbulent time for Douglass personally, too. In the late 1840s and into the 1850s, his finances were tight, and he was struggling to sustain the newspaper he founded, The North Star . He’d had a breakdown in the early 1850s, and was having trouble supporting his family. His friend Julia Griffith, the treasurer of the Rochester group that invited him to give the 1852 speech, was one of the people helping him fund-raise to keep the paper alive.

The message wasn’t new — Douglass promoted those ideas year-round — but Blight says he knew the Fourth of July was a good hook, and expected the speech to be a hit. He had it printed immediately after delivering it and then went out on the road and sold it for 50 cents a copy or $6 for a hundred. “He does some of his greatest writing in early 1850s during this terrible personal crisis,” Blight says, “and right there in the middle of it comes the greatest speech he’s ever delivered, of the hundreds of speeches he delivered in his life.”

“It’s the birth of American Independence, the birth of a nation, and what the speech is saying is you must destroy first what you created and remake it, or it will be destroyed — and you with it,” says Blight.

Douglass continued to add to the speech in the years that followed. On July 4, 1862 — with the war underway — he addressed an audience of about 2,000 in Himrods Corner, N.Y.; Blight argues that his shift then from addressing simply “you” to discussing the Revolution as something undertaken by “your fathers, and my fathers” indicates he believed emancipation will happen more than he did a decade earlier.

President Lincoln did issue the Emancipation Proclamation six months later — but even after the war’s end, Douglass continued to use the Fifth of July to draw attention to the nation’s track record on the idea celebrated on the Fourth. On July 5, 1875, as Reconstruction brought its own fears, like violence from the Ku Klux Klan, Douglass shifted his speech for the day, asking, “If war among the whites brought peace and liberty to the blacks, what will peace among the whites bring?” But the 1852 “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” speech remains the best known of his addresses on the occasion, especially as it became even more widely read in the late-20th century, with events like the public readings sponsored by the Vermont Humanities Council and a powerful reading by James Earl Jones in 2004.

Douglass’ message — about America struggling to live up to the lofty goals it set for itself at the founding — continues to be relevant, says Blight.

“He would use the Fourth of July for its irony over and over and over, just like the Declaration of Independence is used to remind the country of its potential and promise, and to him, race was always the measure of that,” he says. “America, by its nature, is never quite fulfilling all of those promises.”

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The Oral History of the President’s Speech in ‘Independence Day’

As ‘Independence Day Resurgence’ continues filming in the desert, re-live the most patriotic and motivational speech in cinematic history.

Image via 20th Century Fox

Independence Day President's Speech Oral History

The Fourth of July is a simple holiday with a few beloved traditions. From coast to coast, the day calls for enjoying some beer, eating a few hot dogs, and trying not to lose a hand while blowing up miniature bombs. However, for 220 years we Americans celebrated the creation of our independent political state without even realizing that things could get even better. Then, in 1996, Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin put out a film that would redefine summer blockbusters, launch the career of Will Smith , and give America even more to cheer for on the Fourth.

Independence Day  had it all. The explosions, aliens, and global destruction set a new standard (in a pre-9/11 world when you could blow up fake world monuments with little hesitation), earning the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. The world fell in love with Will Smith, who, combined with his role in  Bad Boys , became the leading action star of the decade. The film made over $800 million and became synonymous with the holiday that anchored its theme and story, joining the ranks of Halloween , Groundhog Day , and the marathon of Christmas movies that flood secondary cable channels every year.

Amongst all that, there is one scene in the epic that has persevered through two decades, and has stood above the CGI orgy that thrashes box offices each summer. To kick off the third act, President Thomas J. Whitmore, played by Bill Pullman, only has a few minutes before joining a ragtag team of volunteers who are about to launch a last-ditch effort against an all-powerful alien force. The military hero never got used to the neckties and bureaucratic compromise of politics, but in a short monologue, Whitmore delivers a rousing speech that immediately unites the surviving dregs of the desert who have gathered at Area-51 in the common desire to once again win back mankind's independence. 

Yes, an element of camp and nostalgia have increased the enduring love of this speech among the patriotic hordes that recite it every Fourth of July, but the truth behind this timeless scene only adds further to the greatest cinematic moment in the summer of '96. Not every 90-second sermon remains more engrained in the collective conscious than footage of the White House exploding, so we spoke to the people who made the scene happen (and also Bill Clinton's former speechwriter) to find out why. As Independence Day: Resurgence continues filming in the New Mexico desert and motors to a summer 2016 release, here is the full story on how one of the greatest speeches in cinematic history came to be, and how it very well may have influenced a future, real life president.

best conclusion for independence day speech

Dean Devlin : Not to get spiritual, but it felt like the whole experience in making this movie was somehow channeled. Roland and I wrote the original draft in about three weeks, and we didn’t do a whole lot of rewriting after that. I mean things like that just never happen. The day we filmed the speech was especially magical.

Michael Waldman : The ‘90s were this golden period between the end of the Cold War and the beginning of the War on Terrorism where, at the time, Americans often wondered if we were going soft. Having a fighter pilot president killing aliens was a good escapist alternative history. Also, the White House got blown up over and over again every time I saw the preview; it was very exciting for those of us who worked there.

Roland Emmerich : We made the movie under quite a lot of time pressure because we wanted to beat the Warner movie [ Mars Attacks ] from Tim Burton that we knew about. We wrote the script really fast, optioned it, and then shot the movie in record time.

Devlin : The real trick to these movies and making the big action sequences work—and I’ve forgotten this sometimes and screwed it up—the characters really have to be humanized. Because you can have the greatest special effects in the world, but if you don’t care about the people in those effects, there’s no impact. So Roland and I took a lot of care in this third act to really give each character a big moment before we went into nonstop action so that you were really invested in them.

Vivica A. Fox : The significance of that scene was just generating huge momentum for the big attack, and the speech had to pull together in unity all the survivors. I loved how in that scene, you saw people from all different walks of life standing together and deciding we would not be defeated; that we would stand up and we would declare our Independence Day and fight back.

Devlin : I said to Roland, “It would be great if we could do a kind of a St. Crispin’s Day speech.” You know, where the king basically rallies the troops.

{ "id": 133151630 } “I went into the other room and literally in five minutes I whipped the speech out, put it into the script—we didn’t even read it. It was just a placeholder.” —Dean Devlin

Waldman : The speech is obviously very derivative of Shakespeare’s  Henry V  and his St. Crispin’s Day speech before the Battle of Agincourt, where King Henry leads his outnumbered men into battle. In the  Independence Day  speech the president says, “July Fourth will no longer be known as an American holiday…” Henry the Fifth says, “This day is called the Feast of St. Crispian, he that outlives this day and comes safe home will stand a-tip-toe when this day is named.” Basically, they took that and rewrote it. Shakespeare wasn’t gonna sue.

Devlin : Roland turned to me and said, “Oh great. We only have to write a speech as great as the St. Crispin’s Day speech. How are we going to do that?”

Waldman : The vast majority of presidential speeches are not to rally the troops before attacking aliens, but some statement about policy, about education grants or something like that. The key thing in writing a presidential speech is understanding the policies, the president’s policy approach, and their agenda. Usually we would talk with President Clinton about a week before a speech on what his policy and strategic goals were. Very frequently there was close work with the policy advisors, and then typically it would go to the president. Right before he would give it, there would be a meeting in the Oval Office or wherever where he would go over and grill everybody about what this word means and why this, why that, and in his case, he would add quite a bit.

Devlin : I said, “Let me kind of just vomit out something really fast now and then we’ll spend a lot of time on it later and really rewrite it and make it perfect.” So I went into the other room and literally in five minutes I whipped the speech out, put it into the script—we didn’t even read it. It was just a placeholder.

Emmerich : Dean said, “We can always change it.”

best conclusion for independence day speech

Image via Fox

Waldman : Hollywood over the decades has had this very interesting relationship with presidents, and Hollywood’s often portrayed the presidents it wish it had.

Emmerich : Bill is such a moderate man, and he totally knew in a weird way what he had to play. When we talked at the very beginning of the film, he said, “I am gonna play this a little bit like a John Wayne figure. Maybe a little bit unsure of himself, but at the end he’s very sure of what he has to do.”

Devlin : Earlier in the film, the president’s people are talking about the criticism in the press about how he always has to compromise and everything is kind of a half measure. So for him, this is a chance to go all the way. And not have to play politics.

Waldman : Liberal Hollywood, which liked Bill Clinton and liked his policies, usually felt uncomfortable in some way with him personally. A lot of liberals in Hollywood thought Bill Clinton was a compromiser, and so Bill Pullman got up there and told it like it is and said what he really thought, which everyone dreamed the real president would do.

{ "id": 133151631 } “there’s not a lot of phony baloney or posturing in those circumstances. That comes from some place deep down inside that is looking to calm that collective heart racing.” —bill pullman

Devlin : We always want our leaders to be great leaders. And just this idea that this guy wasn’t just a politician—he went in there. He saw the kids being nervous and he thought, “I’ve gotta rally them.” And really, all that was in my head as we started to work on that scene was, “How can he motivate them? How can he get them on their feet and get ready to fly?”

Bill Pullman : When I first read this scene, I remember thinking that I’d need to think about speeches, and about motivation. I started doing research and had a collection of great speeches from the 20th century. One of them was an amazing speech that Robert Kennedy gave about two minutes after he had been informed that Martin Luther King had been shot.

The recording of the speech just captured the incredible energy in the place. He says, “I regret to inform you that Martin Luther King has been shot.” You hear this horrific gasp from the people in the crowd. And you get the sense that everyone’s collective heart is just beating like a rabbit’s. Then, his ability to frame his thoughts and cite references to Greeks, and of course get over the connection to the fact that he knows something about this—he can speak to the pain because his own brother had been shot.

That was one of those things that always reminded me that there’s not a lot of phony baloney or posturing in those circumstances. That comes from some place deep down inside that is looking to calm that collective heart racing.

best conclusion for independence day speech

Devlin : I remember on the day that we went to shoot it, I had a panic attack. I was like “Oh my god. We never got to rewrite the speech.”

Pullman : Dean reminded me of that just yesterday, and I had forgotten about that part. I don’t think he ever mentioned to me that he planned on editing it. I knew it was really important to him.

Devlin : I came running on the set in a panic thinking, “We had screwed up.” This is a scene we were supposed to spend weeks on and we just never got around to it. And when I got there they were already rehearsing the speech. I was so nervous about it, but when he got to the end of the speech—all of the extras went crazy, applauding and screaming. I looked at Roland and he looked at me and we’re like, “I guess this speech is pretty darn good.”

Pullman : I don’t think we were given a lot of direction. We were shooting nights, and so everyone’s a little bit woozy, but somehow everyone involved in that scene was on the money.

Emmerich : That wasn’t the only thing we shot that day. We shot from the evening until the morning, because we were under so much pressure. I always call it the tragic hour, because there’s a lot of yelling, screaming, and crying because we have such a short amount of time.

Pullman : You’re just trying to do your work, and focus on what you’re concentrating on. There wasn’t a lot of discussion about “Give me more,” or “Do it less.” Really, kind of at the core of Roland, I think at a certain point, he believes that you’re gonna work at it and keep the lines fresh all the way through. Roland was focused on the close-ups and the lighting and the sound. I don’t think anyone was really paying attention to, you know, “Is this great?”

Devlin : Bill Pullman just knocked this one out of the park. None of us were prepared for it until his first rehearsal and then we were just staring in awe and wonder and going, “Man he just owned this thing.”

{ "id": 133151636 } “They just let it stay. Sometimes that’s how moments happen. If Bill Pullman delivers, why take that moment away from him and from the film?” —Vivica A. Fox

Emmerich : We had a good feeling when we shot it. It felt like Bill hit a home run with it, but when we saw it in a cut with the music and everything, we all said, “Oh my God.”

Pullman : The next night, it practically seemed like Dean came into my trailer, we were shooting nights, and we were still on the White House set, and he brought in this VHS and said, “Take a look at this.” It was a quick edit of the speech, and it didn’t change much from that first edit.

Emmerich : It was actually never really re-cut. The only thing which was later added was that one shot I did of Randy Quaid and his kids.

Fox : They just let it stay. Sometimes that’s how moments happen; they can just be so organic in the film. If Bill Pullman delivers, why take that moment away from him and from the film?

Pullman : When I saw it for the first time, I remember feeling like the real genius of it is the cutaways to the people in the crowd, the pilots, the soldiers. It had a Capraesque quality, a Capra kind of engagement with humanity. They were all really honest faces that weren’t straining for anything, but were incredibly present. That’s what was going to make the whole speech work.

Fox : I got chills when he delivered it. And then watching it with an audience; I’ll never forget being at the premiere of what, 20 years ago in Westwood Village, and just when that scene, when he did it it was like you could hear a pin drop; everybody was hanging on every single word that he said, and was proud; when he finished it, it was like “Yes! Let’s go kick some alien butt!”

Waldman : I would say that a lot of times when presidents are given words to speak on the screen, both then and now I would wince, because they are always so off. This was not off; this was pretty good.

best conclusion for independence day speech

Devlin : Have you ever gone on YouTube and searched the speech? People do it at weddings. They break into it at bars. It’s hilarious.

Pullman : We didn’t ever imagine that the speech was gonna explode into something that would be a little set piece within the whole story.

Waldman : I wrote a book that was a collection of great presidential speeches , and if in fact the world had been invaded by aliens, this speech would have made the collection, so that’s high praise, I guess.

Devlin : The only thing we changed was we added at the last minute the line, “Today we celebrate our Independence Day.” And the main reason we did that is ‘cause the studio at the time was threatening to change the title to “Doomsday.” So we thought, let’s get it into the speech.

Pullman : I remember that there suddenly came some interest in pushing up the date in the schedule on when we would shoot the speech, because Fox was considering pushing the title “Doomsday.” That would’ve been a horrible title, and I’ve gone through a couple movies that got stuck with bad titles. So it was urgent to get it in and to have the words, “Today we celebrate our Independence Day” to prove why that had to be the title. I felt the urgency to get it right.

{ "id": 133151635 } “Fox was considering pushing the title ‘Doomsday.’ That would’ve been a horrible title.” —bill pullman

Devlin : There was a concern because we wanted to make sure that this was the moment where it wasn’t about America saving the world. It was about mankind around the world coming together for a common good. And it’s interesting because when the film came out, there was a lot of confusion about that when Roland and I toured the world promoting the movie. People kept thinking, “Well isn’t this just saying that America has to be the world’s policeman?” We would always point back to that speech and say, “No. The whole purpose of that speech is to say, ‘Today we speak with one voice.’”

Waldman : Looking at the scene again, what comes to mind a little bit is George W. Bush’s most memorable moments from his presidency. The staging and iconography of his “Mission Accomplished” moment looks like they borrowed a lot from that movie. I mean, Bush wearing his fake fighter pilot outfit on the deck of the Abraham Lincoln [aircraft carrier] looks so much like this scene. And one of the high points of his presidency was when he jumped up on the fire truck at Ground Zero and spoke into a megaphone to the firefighters and the first responders and said, “I can hear you. The rest of the world hears you.” It is so similar to this scene.

Emmerich : After the speech, when Rob Loggia said to him, “What are you doing?” And he says, “I’m getting in the air. That’s where I belong.” And actually, I always think that George W. Bush stole that, when he was on his aircraft carrier. When I saw that during the Iraq War, I laughed really hard.

best conclusion for independence day speech

Emmerich : This speech was very different from what you’d normally hear from a president.

Waldman : Actually, there was one point that summer when scientists believed they had found some evidence of bacterial life on a meteorite that had come from Mars. It was pretty tenuous, if I recall, but anyway that’s what they thought, and so we wrote a speech for President Clinton and he went out and announced contact with life on Mars. It kind of was quickly forgotten, which is probably a good thing.

Fox : They did a screening at the White House for Bill Clinton, and he loved it. He loved it.  I was working and I couldn’t make it and I was bummed about that, but then later at an event in Washington D.C. I got to introduce myself to Bill Clinton and he was like “I loved you in Independence Day , Vivica!”

Emmerich : When we screened Independence Day in the White House for President Clinton and Hillary Clinton, afterwards Hillary said, “Well, it looks like Bill has to get his pilot license!”

Pullman : There’s a lot that goes into making a speech, and some of it is just the right character at the right time, and you know, I’m fortunate to have been in that position in a movie that has become such a classic.

Devlin : The popularity of this speech blows my mind. It absolutely blows my mind. It’s the thing that I look back in my career and have the most pride about. AFI did a thing recently of the top 10 speeches of all time in movies. And they listed ours at number two behind Patton’s speech.

{ "id": 133151642 } “I finally realized how big this speech was during the making of Independence Day Resurgence. Everyone’s asking, ‘Is there a speech?’” —Roland Emmerich

Pullman : I don’t know it by heart. I think of it as a circumstantial thing, you know, being there at that time, and having the words pour through you. That’s just so much more interesting.

Emmerich : I finally realized how big this speech was during the making of  Independence Day Resurgence . Everyone’s asking, “Is there a speech?”

Pullman : It’d be boring in a sequel to have a big speech to the troops or something again. That was never an option, really. You wouldn’t want to set yourself up for that kind of failure.

Emmerich : These things happen once in a lifetime. You can’t repeat stuff like that. There’s a lot of great emotional moments in  IDR , but there’s no place where a speech like this could fit, so we’re staying away from it. There are some speech-like moments, but I think having a president’s speech would just be like playing with fire.

Devlin : I like to make popcorn movies. It’s my passion. I love the genre. And traditionally, these kinds of movies aren’t celebrated as anything other than movies that make money and are populist. And to have this speech recognized almost separately from the film, it’s a very humbling thing.

Emmerich : Independence Day was so successful and is maybe holding up so well because it has all these very simple human stories. Dean and I met with Steven Spielberg after the film, because he wanted to be involved with the ride, which never happened, but he said to us, “You guys changed something, there’s something different now. Everybody has to see a summer movie differently.” And I knew exactly what he meant, which was combining very big images with very humanized stories. And he meant it; at that time he was shooting Lost World , and he said, “We’re changing the script now.”

Devlin : Spielberg said to Roland and I not long after the movie came out—it was the first time that different genres were combined to try and create a new genre. And that started to become the fashion: taking genres and gene-splicing them together.

Emmerich : In a way we unknowingly invented a new thing, with no plan. I see the influence of Independence Day everywhere: in all the Marvel movies, and all the superheroes of the DC Universe, there’s always an alien invasion, there’s always like a disaster element, but they always try to humanize the characters.

Devlin : The experience of making this movie was unlike anything that ever happened to me before or since. And it was just this odd thing where everything just kept going right every single day. We had no egos from any of the actors. They were all on board and all terrific. There are so many things that go wrong when you make a movie and so many problems and fights with the studio. It’s like every day we kept looking at each other going, “When’s the other shoe gonna drop? When is something gonna go wrong?” And it was kind of just this blessed process of making this film. It was unlike anything I’ve ever seen or experienced.

Emmerich : It’s amazing how this speech took off. But hey, it’s out of your control, and I’m very proud that we did it, and we had no idea what impact this would have. We didn’t have any idea how successful the movie would be. Nobody was expecting this.

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Teaching American History

Speech on the 150th Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence

  • Political Culture
  • Religion in America
  • Rights and Liberties
  • July 5, 1926

No study questions

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

We meet to celebrate the birthday of America. The coming of a new life always excites our interest. Although we know in the case of the individual that it has been an infinite repetition reaching back beyond our vision, that only makes it the more wonderful. But how our interest and wonder increase when we behold the miracle of the birth of a new nation. It is to pay our tribute of reverence and respect to those who participated in such a mighty event that we annually observe the fourth day of July. Whatever may have been the impression created by the news which went out from this city on that summer day in 1776, there can be no doubt as to the estimate which is now placed upon it. At the end of 150 years the four corners of the earth unite in coming to Philadelphia as to a holy shrine in grateful acknowledgement of a service so great, which a few inspired men here rendered to humanity, that it is still the preeminent support of free government throughout the world.

Although a century and a half measured in comparison with the length of human experience is but a short time, yet measured in the life of governments and nations it ranks as a very respectable period. Certainly enough time has elapsed to demonstrate with a great deal of thoroughness the value of our institutions and their dependability as rules for the regulation of human conduct and the advancement of civilization. They have been in existence long enough to become very well seasoned. They have met, and met successfully, the test of experience.

It is not so much, then, for the purpose of undertaking to proclaim new theories and principles that this annual celebration is maintained, but rather to reaffirm and reestablish those old theories and principles which time and the unerring logic of events have demonstrated to be sound. Amid all the clash of conflicting interests, amid all the welter of partisan politics, every American can turn for solace and consolation to the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States with the assurance and confidence that those two great charters of freedom and justice remain firm and unshaken. Whatever perils appear, whatever dangers threaten, the Nation remains secure in the knowledge that the ultimate application of the law of the land will provide an adequate defense and protection.

It is little wonder that people at home and abroad consider Independence Hall as hallowed ground and revere the Liberty Bell as a sacred relic. That pile of bricks and mortar, that mass of metal, might appear to the uninstructed as only the outgrown meeting place and the shattered bell of a former time, useless now because of more modern conveniences, but to those who know they have become consecrated by the use which men have made of them. They have long been identified with a great cause. They are the framework of a spiritual event. The world looks upon them, because of their associations of one hundred and fifty years ago, as it looks upon the Holy Land because of what took place there nineteen hundred years ago. Through use for a righteous purpose they have become sanctified.

It is not here necessary to examine in detail the causes which led to the American Revolution. In their immediate occasion they were largely economic. The colonists objected to the navigation laws which interfered with their trade, they denied the power of Parliament to impose taxes which they were obliged to pay, and they therefore resisted the royal governors and the royal forces which were sent to secure obedience to these laws. But the conviction is inescapable that a new civilization had come, a new spirit had arisen on this side of the Atlantic more advanced and more developed in its regard for the rights of the individual than that which characterized the Old World. Life in a new and open country had aspirations which could not be realized in any subordinate position. A separate establishment was ultimately inevitable. It had been decreed by the very laws of human nature. Man everywhere has an unconquerable desire to be the master of his own destiny.

We are obliged to conclude that the Declaration of Independence represented the movement of a people. It was not, of course, a movement from the top. Revolutions do not come from that direction. It was not without the support of many of the most respectable people in the Colonies, who were entitled to all the consideration that is given to breeding, education, and possessions. It had the support of another element of great significance and importance to which I shall later refer. But the preponderance of all those who occupied a position which took on the aspect of aristocracy did not approve of the Revolution and held toward it an attitude either of neutrality or open hostility. It was in no sense a rising of the oppressed and downtrodden. It brought no scum to the surface, for the reason that colonial society had developed no scum. The great body of the people were accustomed to privations, but they were free from depravity. If they had poverty, it was not of the hopeless kind that afflicts great cities, but the inspiring kind that marks the spirit of the pioneer. The American Revolution represented the informed and mature convictions of a great mass of independent, liberty-loving, God-fearing people who knew their rights, and possessed the courage to dare to maintain them.

The Continental Congress was not only composed of great men, but it represented a great people. While its Members did not fail to exercise a remarkable leadership, they were equally observant of their representative capacity. They were industrious in encouraging their constituents to instruct them to support independence. But until such instructions were given they were inclined to withhold action.

While North Carolina has the honor of first authorizing its delegates to concur with other Colonies in declaring independence, it was quickly followed by South Carolina and Georgia, which also gave general instructions broad enough to include such action. But the first instructions which unconditionally directed its delegates to declare for independence came from the great Commonwealth of Virginia. These were immediately followed by Rhode Island and Massachusetts, while the other Colonies, with the exception of New York, soon adopted a like course.

This obedience of the delegates to the wishes of their constituents, which in some cases caused them to modify their previous positions, is a matter of great significance. It reveals an orderly process of government in the first place; but more than that, it demonstrates that the Declaration of Independence was the result of the seasoned and deliberate thought of the dominant portion of the people of the Colonies. Adopted after long discussion and as the result of the duly authorized expression of the preponderance of public opinion, it did not partake of dark intrigue or hidden conspiracy. It was well advised. It had about it nothing of the lawless and disordered nature of a riotous insurrection. It was maintained on a plane which rises above the ordinary conception of rebellion. It was in no sense a radical movement but took on the dignity of a resistance to illegal usurpations. It was conservative and represented the action of the colonists to maintain their constitutional rights which from time immemorial had been guaranteed to them under the law of the land.

When we come to examine the action of the Continental Congress in adopting the Declaration of Independence in the light of what was set out in that great document and in the light of succeeding events, we can not escape the conclusion that it had a much broader and deeper significance than a mere secession of territory and the establishment of a new nation. Events of that nature have been taking place since the dawn of history. One empire after another has arisen, only to crumble away as its constituent parts separated from each other and set up independent governments of their own. Such actions long ago became commonplace. They have occurred too often to hold the attention of the world and command the admiration and reverence of humanity. There is something beyond the establishment of a new nation, great as that event would be, in the Declaration of Independence which has ever since caused it to be regarded as one of the great charters that not only was to liberate America but was everywhere to ennoble humanity.

It was not because it was proposed to establish a new nation, but because it was proposed to establish a nation on new principles, that July 4, 1776, has come to be regarded as one of the greatest days in history. Great ideas do not burst upon the world unannounced. They are reached by a gradual development over a length of time usually proportionate to their importance. This is especially true of the principles laid down in the Declaration of Independence. Three very definite propositions were set out in its preamble regarding the nature of mankind and therefore of government. These were the doctrine that all men are created equal, that they are endowed with certain inalienable rights, and that therefore the source of the just powers of government must be derived from the consent of the governed.

If no one is to be accounted as born into a superior station, if there is to be no ruling class, and if all possess rights which can neither be bartered away nor taken from them by any earthly power, it follows as a matter of course that the practical authority of the Government has to rest on the consent of the governed. While these principles were not altogether new in political action, and were very far from new in political speculation, they had never been assembled before and declared in such a combination. But remarkable as this may be, it is not the chief distinction of the Declaration of Independence. The importance of political speculation is not to be underestimated, as I shall presently disclose. Until the idea is developed and the plan made there can be no action.

It was the fact that our Declaration of Independence containing these immortal truths was the political action of a duly authorized and constituted representative public body in its sovereign capacity, supported by the force of general opinion and by the armies of Washington already in the field, which makes it the most important civil document in the world. It was not only the principles declared, but the fact that therewith a new nation was born which was to be founded upon those principles and which from that time forth in its development has actually maintained those principles, that makes this pronouncement an incomparable event in the history of government. It was an assertion that a people had arisen determined to make every necessary sacrifice for the support of these truths and by their practical application bring the War of Independence to a successful conclusion and adopt the Constitution of the United States with all that it has meant to civilization.

The idea that the people have a right to choose their own rulers was not new in political history. It was the foundation of every popular attempt to depose an undesirable king. This right was set out with a good deal of detail by the Dutch when as early as July 26, 1581, they declared their independence of Philip of Spain. In their long struggle with the Stuarts the British people asserted the same principles, which finally culminated in the Bill of Rights deposing the last of that house and placing William and Mary on the throne. In each of these cases sovereignty through divine right was displaced by sovereignty through the consent of the people. Running through the same documents, though expressed in different terms, is the clear inference of inalienable rights. But we should search these charters in vain for an assertion of the doctrine of equality. This principle had not before appeared as an official political declaration of any nation. It was profoundly revolutionary. It is one of the corner stones of American institutions.

But if these truths to which the Declaration refers have not before been adopted in their combined entirety by national authority, it is a fact that they had been long pondered and often expressed in political speculation. It is generally assumed that French thought had some effect upon our public mind during Revolutionary days. This may have been true. But the principles of our Declaration had been under discussion in the Colonies for nearly two generations before the advent of the French political philosophy that characterized the middle of the eighteenth century. In fact, they come from an earlier date. A very positive echo of what the Dutch had done in 1581, and what the English were preparing to do, appears in the assertion of the Rev. Thomas Hooker, of Connecticut, as early as 1638, when he said in a sermon before the General Court that—

“The foundation of authority is laid in the free consent of the people.”

“The choice of public magistrates belongs unto the people by God’s own allowance.”

This doctrine found wide acceptance among the nonconformist clergy who later made up the Congregational Church. The great apostle of this movement was the Rev. John Wise, of Massachusetts. He was one of the leaders of the revolt against the royal governor Andros in 1687, for which he suffered imprisonment. He was a liberal in ecclesiastical controversies. He appears to have been familiar with the writings of the political scientist, Samuel Pufendorf, who was born in Saxony in 1632. Wise published a treatise, entitled “The Church’s Quarrel Espoused,” in 1710, which was amplified in another publication in 1717. In it he dealt with the principles of civil government. His works were reprinted in 1772 and have been declared to have been nothing less than a textbook of liberty for our Revolutionary fathers.

While the written word was the foundation, it is apparent that the spoken word was the vehicle for convincing the people. This came with great force and wide range from the successors of Hooker and Wise. It was carried on with a missionary spirit which did not fail to reach the Scotch-Irish of North Carolina, showing its influence by significantly making that Colony the first to give instructions to its delegates looking to independence. This preaching reached the neighborhood of Thomas Jefferson, who acknowledged that his “best ideas of democracy” had been secured at church meetings.

That these ideas were prevalent in Virginia is further revealed by the Declaration of Rights, which was prepared by George Mason and presented to the general assembly on May 27, 1776. This document asserted popular sovereignty and inherent natural rights, but confined the doctrine of equality to the assertion that “All men are created equally free and independent.” It can scarcely be imagined that Jefferson was unacquainted with what had been done in his own Commonwealth of Virginia when he took up the task of drafting the Declaration of Independence. But these thoughts can very largely be traced back to what John Wise was writing in 1710. He said, “Every man must be acknowledged equal to every man.” Again, “The end of all good government is to cultivate humanity and promote the happiness of all and the good of every man in all his rights, his life, liberty, estate, honor, and so forth. …” And again, “For as they have a power every man in his natural state, so upon combination they can and do bequeath this power to others and settle it according as their united discretion shall determine.” And still again, “Democracy is Christ’s government in church and state.” Here was the doctrine of equality, popular sovereignty, and the substance of the theory of inalienable rights clearly asserted by Wise at the opening of the eighteenth century, just as we have the principle of the consent of the governed stated by Hooker as early as 1638.

When we take all these circumstances into consideration, it is but natural that the first paragraph of the Declaration of Independence should open with a reference to Nature’s God and should close in the final paragraphs with an appeal to the Supreme Judge of the world and an assertion of a firm reliance on Divine Providence. Coming from these sources, having as it did this background, it is no wonder that Samuel Adams could say “The people seem to recognize this resolution as though it were a decree promulgated from heaven.”

No one can examine this record and escape the conclusion that in the great outline of its principles the Declaration was the result of the religious teachings of the preceding period. The profound philosophy which Jonathan Edwards applied to theology, the popular preaching of George Whitefield, had aroused the thought and stirred the people of the Colonies in preparation for this great event. No doubt the speculations which had been going on in England, and especially on the Continent, lent their influence to the general sentiment of the times. Of course, the world is always influenced by all the experience and all the thought of the past. But when we come to a contemplation of the immediate conception of the principles of human relationship which went into the Declaration of Independence we are not required to extend our search beyond our own shores. They are found in the texts, the sermons, and the writings of the early colonial clergy who were earnestly undertaking to instruct their congregations in the great mystery of how to live. They preached equality because they believed in the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. They justified freedom by the text that we are all created in the divine image, all partakers of the divine spirit.

Placing every man on a plane where he acknowledged no superiors, where no one possessed any right to rule over him, he must inevitably choose his own rulers through a system of self-government. This was their theory of democracy. In those days such doctrines would scarcely have been permitted to flourish and spread in any other country. This was the purpose which the fathers cherished. In order that they might have freedom to express these thoughts and opportunity to put them into action, whole congregations with their pastors had migrated to the Colonies. These great truths were in the air that our people breathed. Whatever else we may say of it, the Declaration of Independence was profoundly American.

If this apprehension of the facts be correct, and the documentary evidence would appear to verify it, then certain conclusions are bound to follow. A spring will cease to flow if its source be dried up; a tree will wither if its roots be destroyed. In its main features the Declaration of Independence is a great spiritual document. It is a declaration not of material but of spiritual conceptions. Equality, liberty, popular sovereignty, the rights of man — these are not elements which we can see and touch. They are ideals. They have their source and their roots in the religious convictions. They belong to the unseen world. Unless the faith of the American people in these religious convictions is to endure, the principles of our Declaration will perish. We can not continue to enjoy the result if we neglect and abandon the cause.

We are too prone to overlook another conclusion. Governments do not make ideals, but ideals make governments. This is both historically and logically true. Of course the government can help to sustain ideals and can create institutions through which they can be the better observed, but their source by their very nature is in the people. The people have to bear their own responsibilities. There is no method by which that burden can be shifted to the government. It is not the enactment, but the observance of laws, that creates the character of a nation.

About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.

In the development of its institutions America can fairly claim that it has remained true to the principles which were declared 150 years ago. In all the essentials we have achieved an equality which was never possessed by any other people. Even in the less important matter of material possessions we have secured a wider and wider distribution of wealth. The rights of the individual are held sacred and protected by constitutional guaranties, which even the Government itself is bound not to violate. If there is any one thing among us that is established beyond question, it is self-government — the right of the people to rule. If there is any failure in respect to any of these principles, it is because there is a failure on the part of individuals to observe them. We hold that the duly authorized expression of the will of the people has a divine sanction. But even in that we come back to the theory of John Wise that “Democracy is Christ’s government.” The ultimate sanction of law rests on the righteous authority of the Almighty.

On an occasion like this a great temptation exists to present evidence of the practical success of our form of democratic republic at home and the ever-broadening acceptance it is securing abroad. Although these things are well known, their frequent consideration is an encouragement and an inspiration. But it is not results and effects so much as sources and causes that I believe it is even more necessary constantly to contemplate. Ours is a government of the people. It represents their will. Its officers may sometimes go astray, but that is not a reason for criticizing the principles of our institutions. The real heart of the American Government depends upon the heart of the people. It is from that source that we must look for all genuine reform. It is to that cause that we must ascribe all our results.

It was in the contemplation of these truths that the fathers made their declaration and adopted their Constitution. It was to establish a free government, which must not be permitted to degenerate into the unrestrained authority of a mere majority or the unbridled weight of a mere influential few. They undertook the balance these interests against each other and provide the three separate independent branches, the executive, the legislative, and the judicial departments of the Government, with checks against each other in order that neither one might encroach upon the other. These are our guaranties of liberty. As a result of these methods enterprise has been duly protected from confiscation, the people have been free from oppression, and there has been an ever-broadening and deepening of the humanities of life.

Under a system of popular government there will always be those who will seek for political preferment by clamoring for reform. While there is very little of this which is not sincere, there is a large portion that is not well informed. In my opinion very little of just criticism can attach to the theories and principles of our institutions. There is far more danger of harm than there is hope of good in any radical changes. We do need a better understanding and comprehension of them and a better knowledge of the foundations of government in general. Our forefathers came to certain conclusions and decided upon certain courses of action which have been a great blessing to the world. Before we can understand their conclusions we must go back and review the course which they followed. We must think the thoughts which they thought. Their intellectual life centered around the meeting-house. They were intent upon religious worship. While there were always among them men of deep learning, and later those who had comparatively large possessions, the mind of the people was not so much engrossed in how much they knew, or how much they had, as in how they were going to live. While scantily provided with other literature, there was a wide acquaintance with the Scriptures. Over a period as great as that which measures the existence of our independence they were subject to this discipline not only in their religious life and educational training, but also in their political thought. They were a people who came under the influence of a great spiritual development and acquired a great moral power.

No other theory is adequate to explain or comprehend the Declaration of Independence. It is the product of the spiritual insight of the people. We live in an age of science and of abounding accumulation of material things. These did not create our Declaration. Our Declaration created them. The things of the spirit come first. Unless we cling to that, all our material prosperity, overwhelming though it may appear, will turn to a barren sceptre in our grasp. If we are to maintain the great heritage which has been bequeathed to us, we must be like-minded as the fathers who created it. We must not sink into a pagan materialism. We must cultivate the reverence which they had for the things that are holy. We must follow the spiritual and moral leadership which they showed. We must keep replenished, that they may glow with a more compelling flame, the altar fires before which they worshiped.

Source:  http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=408

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Is the ‘Independence Day’ Speech the Best Movie Speech Ever?

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Tryst with Destiny – Speech on 15 August 1947 by Nehru

On the eve of 15 th August 1947, the first Prime Minister of India, Pundit Jawaharlal Nehru, gave a famous speech addressed to the Indian Constituent Assembly and the pupils of the country. The speech was delivered in the intervening night of 14 th and 15 th August 1947 and is by far the most impressive speeches of the 20 th century.

In his speech Pt. Nehru spoke about the responsibility of a united and progressive nation, bestowed on the Constituent Assembly. He spoke that instead of resting it is the time for us to move and build the nation, which our great freedom fighters and leaders had aspired.

Speech on 15 August 1947 by Nehru

“Tryst with Destiny” was the title of the speech given on the midnight of 15 th August 1947 by the first Prime Minister of India Jawaharlal Nehru just after the independence of country. He had given speech to the Indian Constituent Assembly in The Parliament in the midnight. The speech given by him is one of the greatest speeches of all times focusing on the history of India and non-violent Indian independence struggle for getting freedom from the British Empire in India.

He gave a message to the nation first time through his speech after independence of the country. His speech was so much inspirational encouraging the mass people of India for the upliftment and development. The aim of his speech was to motivate Indian people in order to build a new and developed India through their hard work, zeal and enthusiasm. His message was to fight and remove all the social evils of the country such as illiteracy, ignorance, poverty, poor health conditions, etc to lead country towards the development.

His speech was to urge Indian people to actively participate in the nation-building process. Through his speech he had also emphasized the concept of equality among the Indian citizens. He paid homage to the Mother India and took pledge to save her in every condition in the future from the rivals. He also made a call to all the Indian citizens to show their togetherness and interest to all the services of Motherland. Following is the exact speech given by the first Prime Minister of India, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, on 15 th of August 1947 in the midnight:

Jawaharlal Nehru

Jawaharlal Nehru’s Speech to the Nation on the Independence Day

Tryst with destiny.

“Long years ago we made a tryst with destiny, and now the time comes when we shall redeem our pledge, not wholly or in full measure, but very substantially. At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends, and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance.

It is fitting that at this solemn moment we take the pledge of dedication to the service of India and her people and to the still larger cause of humanity with some pride.

At the dawn of history India started on her unending quest, and trackless centuries which are filled with her striving and the grandeur of her success and her failures. Through good and ill fortunes alike she has never lost sight of that quest or forgotten the ideals which gave her strength. We end today a period of ill fortunes and India discovers herself again.

The achievement we celebrate today is but a step, an opening of opportunity, to the greater triumphs and achievements that await us. Are we brave enough and wise enough to grasp this opportunity and accept the challenge of the future?

Freedom and power bring responsibility. The responsibility rests upon this assembly, a sovereign body representing the sovereign people of India. Before the birth of freedom we have endured all the pains of labour and our hearts are heavy with the memory of this sorrow. Some of those pains continue even now. Nevertheless, the past is over and it is the future that beckons to us now.

That future is not one of ease or resting but of incessant striving so that we might fulfill the pledges we have so often taken and the one we shall take today. The service of India means the service of the millions who suffer. It means the ending of poverty and ignorance and disease and inequality of opportunity.

The ambition of the greatest man of our generation has been to wipe every tear from every eye. That may be beyond us, but as long as there are tears and suffering, so long our work will not be over.

And so we have to labour and to work, and work hard, to give reality to our dreams. Those dreams are for India, but they are also for the world, for all the nations and peoples are too closely knit together today for anyone of them to imagine that it can live apart.

Peace has been said to be indivisible; so is freedom, so is prosperity now, and so also is disaster in this one world that can no longer be split into isolated fragments.

To the people of India, whose representatives we are, we make an appeal to join us with faith and confidence in this great adventure. This is no time for petty and destructive criticism, no time for ill will or blaming others. We have to build the noble mansion of free India where all her children may dwell.

The appointed day has come – the day appointed by destiny – and India stands forth again, after long slumber and struggle, awake, vital, free and independent. The past clings on to us still in some measure and we have to do much before we redeem the pledges we have so often taken. Yet the turning point is past, and history begins anew for us, the history which we shall live and act and others will write about.

It is a fateful moment for us in India, for all Asia and for the world. A new star rises, the star of freedom in the east, a new hope comes into being, a vision long cherished materialises. May the star never set and that hope never be betrayed!

We rejoice in that freedom, even though clouds surround us, and many of our people are sorrow-stricken and difficult problems encompass us. But freedom brings responsibilities and burdens and we have to face them in the spirit of a free and disciplined people.

On this day our first thoughts go to the architect of this freedom, the father of our nation, who, embodying the old spirit of India, held aloft the torch of freedom and lighted up the darkness that surrounded us.

We have often been unworthy followers of his and have strayed from his message, but not only we but succeeding generations will remember this message and bear the imprint in their hearts of this great son of India, magnificent in his faith and strength and courage and humility. We shall never allow that torch of freedom to be blown out, however high the wind or stormy the tempest.

Our next thoughts must be of the unknown volunteers and soldiers of freedom who, without praise or reward, have served India even unto death.

We think also of our brothers and sisters who have been cut off from us by political boundaries and who unhappily cannot share at present in the freedom that has come. They are of us and will remain of us whatever may happen, and we shall be sharers in their good and ill fortune alike.

The future beckons to us. Whither do we go and what shall be our endeavour? To bring freedom and opportunity to the common man, to the peasants and workers of India; to fight and end poverty and ignorance and disease; to build up a prosperous, democratic and progressive nation, and to create social, economic and political institutions which will ensure justice and fullness of life to every man and woman.

We have hard work ahead. There is no resting for any one of us till we redeem our pledge in full, till we make all the people of India what destiny intended them to be.

We are citizens of a great country, on the verge of bold advance, and we have to live up to that high standard. All of us, to whatever religion we may belong, are equally the children of India with equal rights, privileges and obligations. We cannot encourage communalism or narrow-mindedness, for no nation can be great whose people are narrow in thought or in action.

To the nations and peoples of the world we send greetings and pledge ourselves to cooperate with them in furthering peace, freedom and democracy.

And to India, our much-loved motherland, the ancient, the eternal and the ever-new, we pay our reverent homage and we bind ourselves afresh to her service. Jai Hind.”

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75th Independence Day: English Speech and essay Ideas, Famous quotes from our leaders

75th Independence Day: English Speech and essay Ideas, Famous quotes from our leaders

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best conclusion for independence day speech

77th Independence Day Speech for Kids

We celebrate Indian Independence Day every year on 15 August as a national holiday in India to commemorate the independence of the nation from the British on 15 August 1947. This was the day when the Indian Independence Act of 1947 came into effect, which transferred the legislative sovereignty to the Indian Constituent Assembly. This year, India is celebrating its 77th  Independence Day 2023 as ‘Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav 2023.’

Students can also find Independence Day Long and Short Speech in English here.

Long and Short Independence Day Speech in English for Students

Long independence day speech for students in english.

Good Morning Everyone!

Greetings on this momentous occasion of India's Independence Day! Today, we gather to celebrate the remarkable journey of our nation towards freedom and sovereignty. This year, the 77th Indian Independence Day 2023 is being celebrated as ‘Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav’, It's a day that echoes with the sacrifices of countless heroes who fought tirelessly for our liberty. 

As we look back, August 15, 1947, marked the end of British colonial rule, and India emerged as a sovereign nation. Jawaharlal Nehru became the first Indian Prime Minister to raise the National Flag at the Red Fort near Delhi's Lahore Gate. Our struggle for independence was not just a political movement; it was a testament to the indomitable spirit of our people. From the non-violent resistance led by Mahatma Gandhi to the bravery of countless others, we stood united in our quest for self-determination.

On this auspicious day, let us remember and pay homage to those who laid down their lives for the cause of freedom. Their sacrifices have paved the way for the India we know today – diverse, vibrant, and resilient.

Independence Day is not just about the past; it's also a time to reflect on the present and envision our future. As citizens of this great nation, we bear the responsibility of upholding the principles of justice, equality, and fraternity. Let us work together to build a society where every individual has the opportunity to thrive, regardless of their background.

In the face of challenges, let us draw inspiration from the unity that defined our struggle for independence. Our diversity is our strength, and by embracing it, we can overcome any obstacle that comes our way.

As we hoist our national flag today, let it be a symbol of our shared aspirations and commitment to a better tomorrow. Just like the color of our flag represents:

Saffron signifying courage and sacrifice

White signifies peace and truth

Green signifies faith and chivalry

Happy Independence Day to one and all! Jai Hind!

Short Speech on Independence Day for Kids

Short Speech on Independence Day for Kids

10 Lines Independence Day Short Speech in English

India gained independence on August 15th, 1947.

After independence, Indians acquired all their fundamental rights.

People celebrate Independence Day by hoisting the National Flag and reciting the National Anthem.

We should all be proud to be Indian, and we should admire our fortune to have been born in the land of Independent India.

From 1857 to 1947, the lives of many freedom fighters and several decades of struggle were sacrificed.

For the independence of India, an Indian soldier (Mangal Pandey) in the British force first raised his voice against the British.

Several great freedom fighters later struggled and dedicated their entire lives to India’s freedom. 

The sacrifices of all the freedom fighters like Bhagat Singh, Khudi Ram Bose, and Chandra Sekhar Azad, who lost their lives at an early age just to fight for their country, can never be forgotten.

Gandhiji was a great Indian figure who gave the world a great lesson in non-violence.

We are so lucky to have been given a land of peace and happiness by our forefathers, where we can sleep all night without fear and enjoy the whole day at school or home.

Independence Day Freedom Fighters Speech

Independence Day Freedom Fighters Speech

Here are some of the Independence Day Freedom Fighters Speeches that every student should hear or read once and know the struggle involved during the independence of the country.

Bal Gangadhar Tilak's “Swaraj is my Birthright”.  

In 1917, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, who had spent six times in prison, gave this speech in Nashik. In the ongoing public battle for self-government and eventually full independence, the expression" Swaraj is my birthright" played a significant part. 

Mahatma Gandhi's “Address to Leave India”. 

On August 8, 1942, in Bombay, Mahatma Gandhi gave the "Quit India" address. Also, August Kranti Maidan has been used to relate to the position of Mahatma Gandhi's address at the Gowalia Tank Maidan. 

Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose's “Give Me Blood, and I'll Give You Freedom”. 

This is arguably one of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose's most well-known addresses. In 1944, he gave the Indian National Army members in Burma this speech. 

Mahatma Gandhi's Speech from the Dandi March.  

In this speech, Mahatma Gandhi understood the part of a boycott of British significance and the turndown to pay taxes to the British government at the dusk of the significant Dandi March.

Importance of Independence Day Speech for Children

Following are the points that tell the importance of Independence Day Speech for Children.

It explains to them how our nation freed itself from British rule, and about the sacrifices our freedom fighters made on behalf of the nation. We also do it to teach our kids about our nation's past.

Additionally, it helps kids understand the recent changes that have occurred. Consequently, to encourage them to take their careers and commitment to improve our nation's future seriously.

India is a free nation that attained independence on August 15, 1947. Making the next generation aware of the sacrifices we have made to make this country a better place for them is one of the key goals of celebrating Independence Day. Celebrating Independence Day makes everyone feel proud of the freedom fighters who fought with the Britishers to give freedom to us. It makes everyone happy, and people show respect towards them and the country by hoisting the Indian flag.

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FAQs on India Independence Day Speech in English: Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav 2023

1. How can you write a good speech on Independence Day?

The best method to write a speech is to gather the points you want to mention regarding the topic and follow a standard format. Every speech writing attempt must carry a message to the reader. For instance, the ideal message for this topic is to increase the patriotic feeling among the readers and remind them how much sacrifice our forefathers have done to give us freedom from colonial rule.

2. Is it necessary to mention the historic dates in this topic?

It is necessary to remember and mention the historic dates chronologically to make your speech better. Your speech compilation will become more admirable among the judges or teachers, and you will be able to score well. 

3. Why is this year 77th Independence Day?

India gained independence on 15 August 1947. This year is 2023, which is 76 years after 1947. Therefore, this year is the 77th Independence Day.

4. Who is the No 1 freedom fighter?

There isn't a singular "No 1" freedom fighter, as many people made significant contributions to the Indian independence movement. However, some of the most notable freedom fighters include Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Subhas Chandra Bose, and Bhagat Singh.

5. What are some key points to include in India's Independence Day speech?

Briefly share the historical context of the struggle for independence.

Highlight the contributions of prominent freedom fighters.

Reflect on the challenges and achievements of independent India.

Offer a vision for the future of the nation.

Emphasize the importance of individual responsibility and collective action in building a better India.

6. What are some significant events in the journey to independence? 

Some major milestones include the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857, the rise of the Indian National Congress, the Non-cooperation Movement, the Civil Disobedience Movement, and Quit India Movement.

7. What are the challenges and achievements of independent India? 

Challenges included: poverty, inequality, corruption, environmental issues, and social conflicts. Achievements could encompass economic growth, technological advancements, democratic institutions, and cultural diversity.

8. What is the appropriate length for the speech?  

This depends on the audience and setting. For schools, 3-5 minutes might be suitable, while a public speech could be longer (10-15 minutes).

9. How can I make the speech engaging? 

Use anecdotes, historical references, quotes, and personal stories to connect with the audience. Vary your voice and pace, and use appropriate gestures and expressions.

Independence Day Speech in English for Students

Independence day speech in english.

Independence Day Speech – We celebrate Independence Day as the national festival of India. The Day marks the anniversary of national independence from the British Empire on 15th august 1947.

Furthermore, it is the most auspicious day for the people of India because India becomes independent after lots of hardships and sacrifices of the brave Indian freedom fighters.

From that day onwards 15th August become a very important day in Indian history and in the hearts of every Indian. Also, the entire nation celebrates this day with the full spirit of patriotism.

best conclusion for independence day speech

After the independence, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru was chosen as the first Prime Minister of India. Moreover, he unfurled our tricolor flag at the Red Fort in the national capital, New Delhi for the first time.

From there onwards, every year we celebrate Independence Day at Red Fort New Delhi. In addition, the army performs many tasks that also include a march past cultural programs by school students.

In addition, we celebrate Independence Day to remember the lives that we sacrificed to gain this freedom. As they are the ones who struggled for our country. Furthermore, on his day we forget our differences and unites as one true nation should.

Importance of Independence Day Celebration

We celebrate Independence Day on a vast scale in our country. Also, every government building is decorated with tricolor lights that orange, white, and green just like the national flag.

Furthermore, every official and office staff whether private or government has to be present in the office for the flag hoisting ceremony and singing our National Anthem. Besides, there is a lot of other reasons to celebrate our independence day.

Get the Huge list of 100+ Speech Topics here

Honor the Memory of our Freedom Fighters

Freedom fighters struggled to make our country free from the Britishers. In addition, they were the ones who sacrificed their lives for the country. On this day every citizen of our country pays tribute to them.

Furthermore, the schools and colleges organize various functions to celebrate our independence and to pay tribute to these freedom fighters. Also, students perform in these programs that depict the struggle of our freedom fighters.

In schools and colleges, students give solo and duet performances of patriotic songs. These songs fill our hearts with a feeling of patriotism and love for our country. Usually, in offices, it is a non-working day but all the staff and officials gather to express their patriotism for the country.

In addition, at various offices, employees deliver speeches to enlighten people about the freedom struggle. Also, about the efforts of our freedom fighters to make this country an independent nation.

To spark the spirit of patriotism in youth

The youth of our country has the power to change the nation. By means, someone rightly said that the future hinge on to the young generation. Hence it becomes our duty to serve the nation and make every possible effort to make our county better.

One of the main motives for celebrating Independence Day is to make the young generation aware of the sacrifices we have made to make this country a better place for them.

Most noteworthy, it tells them how our country got independence from the grasps of the Britishers. And about the sacrifices, our freedom fighter has made for the country. Also, we do it to make our children aware of the history of our country.

Furthermore, it makes them aware of the development that took place in the past years. Consequently, to make them serious about our future and careers which they put forth to make our country better.

To sum it up, gaining independence from Britishers was not easy. And it’s because of the struggle and hardship of our freedom fighter that we now live in a free country. On Independence Day we remember the long battle that our freedom fighters fought and sacrifices that they have made.

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Speech on Independence Day 2023 in English for School Students and Children

Independence day speech 2023 in english: india is ready to celebrate its 77th independence day on august 15th, 2023. find easy independence day english speeches in 200 words and 400 words here. also get some independence day slogans in english to use along with your speech. kids from classes 1, 2, and middle school can use these for their school assemblies, speech competitions, independence day programs, assignments, etc..

Pragya Sagar

Independence Day Speech in English: On August 15, 2023, India will celebrate its 77th Independence Day, honouring the sacrifices of its freedom fighters who fought for its freedom from British rule. 15th August in India is marked with nationwide flag hoisting in schools, offices, and government offices to showcase national pride. Independence Day celebrations reflect immense enthusiasm and patriotism, re-affirming India's dedication to building an inclusive and strong nation for future generations. Under the Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav initiative, the government encourages citizens to bring the Indian flag home through the "Har Ghar Tiranga" campaign. Various activities, including speech contests, are held in schools and workplaces to celebrate the nation's freedom. Delivering a speech on Independence Day in your school is a matter of pride. The 76th Independence Day speech should highlight the significance of unity, diversity, and progress, emphasising the country's commitment to democratic values and principles. In this article, we have brought you an Independence Day Speech in English for students. These short as well as long speeches can be used in school assemblies, speech competitions, etc. 

We hope this article proves to be useful for you. The speeches presented above impart national pride, patriotism, and emotional values attached to a person for his/her country. We hope these speeches will fill the eyes of your listeners with joyful tears and swell their chests with pride. Let's make this Independence Day a memorable one with such engaging and emotional speeches. 

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  • How to write 10 lines about Independence Day? + The freedom struggle of India was more than a century long but you can easily capture the essence of India's freedom struggle against the British using the easy speeches on Indian Independence Day given in this article, You can also refer to the slogans given in this article for reference and help.
  • Which edition of Independence Day in 2023? + August 15, 2023 is the 77th Independence Day of India. However, one must note that on 15th August 2023, India will complete its 76 years of independence.
  • How to write an Independence Day speech in English? + To write Independence Day Speech in English, you must have an attractive beginning and end to the speech draft. The body of your speech should have details about India’s Independence struggle. In this article, we have provided Independence day speech in English for school students and children in short and easy language, quick to learn.
  • What is an Independence Day speech? + Independence Day speech is a small address delivered to an audience speaking about India’s freedom struggle against British colonial rule. Usually, Independence Day speeches are delivered in schools in front of the principal, guests, teachers and students.
  • How to start a speech on 15 August in English? + You should always start the 15th August English speech by addressing the audience in a respectful manner. You can also add a quote or slogan to attract the attention of the listeners. 
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  • Essay on Independence Day

Independence Day Essay

500+ words essay on independence day (15 august) for students and children.

India celebrates its Independence Day on 15th August every year. Independence Day reminds us of all the sacrifices that were made by our freedom fighters to make India free from British rule. On 15th August 1947, India was declared independent from British colonialism and became the largest democracy in the world. In this Essay on Independence Day, students will find all the important details of India’s Independence History. They can refer to it for their exam preparation, as essays are mostly asked in the CBSE English paper. Also, they can use this essay as a speech for the Independence Day function at school.

15th August is celebrated as a national festival with flag hoisting, parades and cultural events.

Schools, colleges, offices, society complexes, and government and private organizations conduct functions and celebrate this day with great enthusiasm. On this day, the Prime Minister of India hoists the flag at the Red Fort and addresses the nation with a speech. Doordarshan broadcasts the entire event live on television. Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru performed the first flag-hoisting ceremony on 15th August 1947 .

History of Independence Day

Britishers have ruled India for almost 200 years. Under British rule, the lives of the Indian people were miserable. Indians were treated as slaves and had no right to say anything to them. Indian rulers were mere puppets in the hands of British officers. Indian soldiers were treated inhumanely in British camps, and farmers were dying of starvation as they could not grow crops and had to pay heavy land taxes.

Our freedom fighters struggled for India’s Independence. Famous leaders like Mahatma Gandhi, Subhash Chandra Bose, Bhagat Singh, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Jawaharlal Nehru, Rani Lakshmi Bai, Mangal Pandey, Dada Bhai Naoroji fought fearlessly against the Britishers. Many of them also sacrificed their lives to make India free from British rule. Their contribution and effort are remembered in India’s Independence history.

Why Do We Celebrate Independence Day?

India achieved independence after years of struggle. India got complete freedom from the British and secured full autonomy on 15th August 1947. That’s why the day holds great significance in the heart of every Indian citizen living in India or abroad. India completed 73 years of freedom on 15h August 2020. This day also reminds us of the struggles of freedom fighters and the lives sacrificed by them in achieving independence. The pain that our heroes have gone through reminds us that the freedom we enjoy today has been earned by shedding the blood of lakhs of people. It also awakens a feeling of patriotism inside every citizen of India. It makes the present generation closely understand the struggles of the people at that time and acquaints them with the freedom fighters of India.

Significance of Independence Day

Independence Day generates a feeling of patriotism among people. It unites the people and makes them feel that we are one nation with so many different languages, religions and cultural values. Unity in diversity is the main essence and strength of India. We feel proud to be part of the largest democratic country in the world, where the power is in the hands of the common man.

We hope students found this essay on Independence Day interesting to read and helpful for their studies. For more information and the latest updates on CBSE & other Competitive exams, keep visiting BYJU’S. Also, download the BYJU’S App to watch interactive study videos.

Also Read: Republic Day Essay | Essay On Constitution of India | Essay on Women Empowerment

Frequently Asked Questions on Independence Day Essay

What is the meaning of independence.

Independence means freedom of any type of action without any control or influence.

When does our country India celebrate its Independence?

India was declared an Independent nation on the 15th of August, 1947.

Name a few freedom fighters of India.

Some of the great leaders who fought for India’s Independence were Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Netaji Subash Chandra Bose, Bhagat Singh, Sarojini Naidu and Rani Laxmibai.

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Independence Day 2021: A Look Back At 5 Most Talked-About I-Day Speeches By Prime Ministers Of India

Independence day 2021: every year on independence day, the prime minister of india addresses the nation — talking about india's journey of independence and sharing his vision for the country. .

Independence Day 2021: A Look Back At 5 Most Talked-About I-Day Speeches By Prime Ministers Of India Independence Day 2021: A Look Back At 5 Most Talked-About I-Day Speeches By Prime Ministers Of India

Independence Day 2021: India is all set to celebrate its 75th year of independence on August 15 (Sunday). On this day, the country commemorates its long-due freedom from the British Empire that ruled India for over two centuries. 

On Independence Day, the Red Fort in the national capital is all decked up and the Prime Minister of the country hoists the tricolour from the ramparts of the historic monument. 

Every year on Independence Day, the Prime Minister of India addresses the nation — talking about India's journey of Independence and sharing his vision for the country. 

Here are some of the most noteworthy speeches given by our Prime Ministers on Independence Day:

Jawaharlal Nehru (1947)

"Long years ago we made a tryst with destiny… At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom."

This is what India's first Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru said on the midnight of August 14, 1947 — announcing India’s Independence.

"A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history when we step out from the old to the new when an age ends, and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance. It is fitting that at this solemn moment we take the pledge of dedication to the service of India and her people and to the still larger cause of humanity," he further said in his speech. 

Indira Gandhi (1984)

Indira Gandhi, daughter of Jawaharlal Nehru, became India's first woman Prime Minister in 1966. While Indira Gandhi spoke from the ramparts of Red Fort on Independence Day in the same year, her speech in 1984 is most remembered. 

Ironically, Indira Gandhi was assassinated just two months after her 1984 Independence Day speech. 

"If we have achieved independence, we should not rest peacefully that we have now achieved independence. We have to struggle always to maintain it. We have to protect this flame of independence from every storm, from every gust of wind, we have to save it with our hard work," she said in her last speech from the Red Fort.

Rajiv Gandhi (1985)

Rajiv Gandhi became the Prime Minister of India following the death of his mother and former PM Indira Gandhi. He was India's youngest Prime Minister and the third from the family to take up the top position. 

Rajiv Gandhi gave his first Independence Day speech in 1985 at Red Fort, which became quite iconic. From the ramparts, he not just addressed India, but also spoke about the diversity that makes up India. 

"Being an Indian does not mean we are mere inhabitants of country… We have a diversity of cultures. We belong to different religions- Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, Jains, Parsis and Buddhists… We accord equal respect to all faiths and religions. Our strength and unity flow from this fact. This is the only path we must follow, for our strength lies in our diversity," Rajiv Gandhi said. 

Atal Bihari Vajpayee (1999)

Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Bharatiya Janata Party's patriarch, was known for his long speeches with a mix of poetry. Atal Bihari Vajpayee became the Prime Minister of India in 1996, but his government collapsed in mere 13 days. He again became the PM for a period of 13 months from 1998 to 1999, which was finally followed by a full term from 1999 to 2004.

Out of his many Independence Day speeches, the one in 1999 is said to be the most remembered one. That year, India had just won a war against Pakistan at Kargil and Vajpayee’s speech focussed on economic growth.

"Come, let us make India a nation of high achievers - in every sphere. In business and economy, in education, in science and technology, in arts and culture, and also in sports. Let us make India synonymous with achievement, the achievement of the kind that can be benchmarked globally," Vajpayee said. 

Manmohan Singh (2011)

Manmohan Singh became India's 13th Prime Minister and served on the post from 2004 to 2014. One of his most remembered Independence Day speeches is the one he gave in 2011. This was the year when his government faced some serious corruption allegations. 

During his Independence Day speech, Singh spent almost one-fourth of the time speaking about the challenges and need for a strong Lokpal to curb corruption. 

"I am aware of the differences of opinion on some aspects of the bill. Those who don't agree with this bill can put forward their views to Parliament, political parties and even the press. However, I also believe they should not resort to hunger strikes and fasts-unto-death," Manmohan Singh said in 2011.

Narendra Modi (2014)

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be addressing the nation for the eighth time from the ramparts of the Red Fort on Sunday. Before this, PM Modi has announced several welfare schemes for the people including Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana and Swach Bharat Abhiyaan and others during his Independence Day speeches.

In his first speech from the ramparts of Red Fort, PM Modi talked about nation-building. 

"My dear countrymen, this nation has neither been built by political leaders nor by rulers nor by governments. This nation has been built by our farmers, our workers, our mothers and sisters, our youth. The country has reached here today because of generation-to-generation rigours undertaken by our sages, our saints, our maestros, our teachers, our scientists and social workers," he said.

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Independence Day Speech [15 August]: How to Write a Powerful Speech

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Independence Day Speech : Independence Day is a national holiday celebrated annually on August 15 in India. It marks the end of British rule in 1947, brought about by the Indian Independence Act of July 18 that year , and the establishment of a free and independent Indian nation.

The day is celebrated with great fanfare across India, with parades, flag-hoisting ceremonies, speeches, and cultural events. It is a day to commemorate the sacrifices of those who fought for India’s independence and to celebrate the freedom and democracy that India enjoys today.

The History of Independence Day

  • The history of Independence Day in India can be traced back to the early 20th century when the Indian independence movement began to gain momentum. In 1929, the Indian National Congress (INC), the leading political party in India at the time, declared August 15 as Independence Day.
  • The INC’s declaration was met with widespread support across India, and on August 15, 1929 , people across the country celebrated the day as a symbol of their hope for independence.
  • The INC continued to celebrate Independence Day every year, and in 1947, their dream finally came true. On August 15, 1947 , India gained independence from Britain, and the day was declared a national holiday.

The Importance of Independence Day

  • Independence Day is an important day for India for many reasons. It is a day to commemorate the sacrifices of those who fought for India’s independence and to celebrate the freedom and democracy that India enjoys today.
  • Independence Day is also a day to reflect on the progress that India has made since independence and to look forward to the future. It is a day to reaffirm India’s commitment to democracy, secularism, and equality.

The Celebration of Independence Day

  • Independence Day is celebrated with great fanfare across India. Parades, flag-hoisting ceremonies, speeches, and cultural events are held in all major cities and towns.
  • The prime minister of India gives a speech on Independence Day, and the president of India hoists the national flag at the Red Fort in Delhi.
  • Independence Day is also a day for people to come together and celebrate their shared national identity. People of all faiths and backgrounds gather to celebrate India’s independence and reaffirm their commitment to the country’s future.

The Future of Independence Day

  • Independence Day is a day that is constantly evolving. In recent years, there has been a growing emphasis on celebrating the diversity of India on Independence Day.
  • There is also a growing emphasis on using Independence Day as a platform to promote social change. However, one thing that will never change is the importance of Independence Day to the people of India.

Independence Day is a day that is full of meaning for the people of India. Independence Day is a day that is constantly evolving, but one thing that will never change is its importance to the people of India.

  • Independence Day speeches are a great opportunity to reflect on the history of India’s independence movement and to honor the sacrifices of those who fought for freedom.
  • It is important to keep your audience in mind when writing an Independence Day speech. Make sure to use language that they will understand, and to focus on topics that are relevant to them.
  • Finally, don’t forget to have fun with your speech! Independence Day is a time to celebrate, so make sure your speech is full of energy and enthusiasm.

Here are some additional tips for writing an Independence Day speech:

  • Start by brainstorming a list of topics that you want to cover in your speech.
  • Once you have a list of topics, start to organize your thoughts and ideas.
  • Write a rough draft of your speech, and then revise it several times.
  • Practice your speech in front of a mirror or to a friend or family member.
  • Deliver your speech with confidence and enthusiasm.

Independence Day Speech Faqs:

What is independence day.

Independence Day is a national holiday celebrated annually on August 15 in India. It marks the end of British rule in 1947, brought about by the Indian Independence Act of July 18 that year, and the establishment of a free and independent Indian nation.

What are the most important aspects of an Independence Day speech?

The most important aspects of an Independence Day speech are to commemorate the sacrifices of those who fought for India's independence, to celebrate the freedom and democracy that India enjoys today, and to look forward to the future. The speech should also be inspiring and uplifting, and it should leave the audience feeling proud to be Indian.

What are some good topics to cover in an Independence Day speech?

Some good topics to cover in an Independence Day speech include the history of India's independence movement, the sacrifices of the freedom fighters, the progress that India has made since independence, and the challenges that India still faces. The speech could also include a call to action for the audience to work together to build a better future for India.

How can I write an SEO-friendly Independence Day speech?

To write an SEO-friendly Independence Day speech, you should use keywords throughout your speech, but don't overdo it. You should also use transition words to help your speech flow smoothly, and you should keep your paragraphs short and easy to read. You could also use images and videos to break up your text and make your speech more visually appealing.

What are some tips for delivering an Independence Day speech?

Some tips for delivering an Independence Day speech include practicing your speech in front of a mirror or to a friend or family member, arriving early on the day of the speech, and delivering your speech with confidence and enthusiasm. You should also make eye contact with the audience and speak clearly and loudly.

What are some common mistakes to avoid when giving an Independence Day speech?

Some common mistakes to avoid when giving an Independence Day speech include reading your speech from a script, using too many technical terms, and making your speech too long. You should also avoid making any controversial statements or offending any members of the audience.

What are some resources that can help me write an Independence Day speech?

There are several resources that can help you write an Independence Day speech. You can find examples of Independence Day speeches online, or you can consult with a speechwriter or writing coach. You can also find books and articles on the history of India's independence movement, which can provide you with inspiration for your speech.

What are some of the challenges of giving an Independence Day speech?

Some of the challenges of giving an Independence Day speech include speaking in front of a large audience, staying on topic, and delivering your speech clearly and concisely. You may also feel pressure to deliver a perfect speech, which can add to the challenge.

What are some of the rewards of giving an Independence Day speech?

Some of the rewards of giving an Independence Day speech include the opportunity to share your love of India with others, the chance to inspire and uplift the audience, and the satisfaction of knowing that you have made a difference. You may also receive positive feedback from the audience, which can be very rewarding.

What are some of the future trends in Independence Day speeches?

Some of the future trends in Independence Day speeches include a greater focus on diversity and inclusion, a more interactive format, and greater use of technology. Speeches may also become more personal and reflective, as speakers share their own stories and experiences.

To know more about  Education  Information.

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Thank you much for helping me to prepare on the Independence Day Speech, August 15. I guess using these independence day speech tips helping to write different way to present at my shool.

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An Encouraging Speech On Indian Independence Day

On the 15th of August 2011 India is celebrating its 65th Independence day after having completed its glorious 64 years. The author has prepared a speech for this occasion from the platform of India Study Channel to reach every Indian living in India and abroad to have a national feeling on this lovely day and to say Jai Hind

Introductory speech on Independence day

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Main Speech

Concluding speech.

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Independence Day Speech

The Independence Day speech is given on occasion of the Independence Day.

India got independence from British slavery on 15 August 1947 since then, Independence Day is celebrated on 15 August every year in our country. 

15 August is celebrated with great enthusiasm and pride; various programs are organized in schools, colleges, offices, etc. 

Why do you need an Independence Day Speech?

Independence day speech intent to express gratitude to the soldiers on the borders of the country also reminds the sacrifices of our brave freedom fighters .

It unites all the Indians & fights against problems like unemployment, poverty, corruption, rape, violence, terrorism, crime, etc.

Here we have given various speeches on India’s Independence Day , using these simple speeches, you can actively participate in India’s Independence Day celebrations program.

Independence Day Speech for Kids:

Dear Principal Sir / Madam, Teacher and Friend.

Today we are here to celebrate 74th Independence Day of India.

On 15 August 1947 , the first Prime Minister of India, Chacha Nehru, raised the Indian flag at the Red Fort in New Delhi.

On this day he also made his famous speech and was called “ Trieste with Destiny “.

India became an independent nation on this day, this independence was not easy, many brave freedom fighters had sacrificed their lives.

We must remember their courage and fight. Raise the flag high and sing the national song .

Never keep the flag down, never tear the flag.

Freedom is very important, so protect it. With that, I conclude my speech.

Thanks, everyone and Happy Independence Day !

Independence Day Speech for Students in English :

Happy Independence Day to all of you and I am Rohan.

My respectful greetings to all the distinguished citizens, honourable guests, honourable principals and all my teachers, classmates present here.

On the occasion of Independence Day, thanks to all of you for giving me a golden opportunity to express my Independence Day speech in front of you.

Today, I am going to speak a few words in front of you and after listening to my speech the feeling of patriotism will be awakened in all of you, with it, your blood will boil towards the cruel British rulers.

And with this I begin my speech on Independence Day:

“Let’s wake ourselves up again today, revive the stick of discipline, there are golden colours. With the blood of the martyrs of this Independence Day, we all bow down to such martyrs.”

As we all know that August 15 is celebrated as Independence Day because on this day, our India got independence from the British rule.

It is due to the great freedom fighters of our India that we are able to breathe in peace today and we are completely free to make our own decisions and live a life according to ourselves without any interruption.

Freedom was not achieved easily, many brave sons of our country fought hard for many years, endured the atrocities of the British, shed their blood, devoted their whole lives for the independence of the country.

If our brave sons did not have the courage to fight against the Britishers and if they would not have faced all the battles and struggles , then we might have bounded in slaves and forced to bear the oppression of the British.

Therefore, this special day is to remember and salute the sacrifices of those brave sons of Mother India . At the same time, I would like to remember the sacrifices of the heroes.

We are very fortunate that such brave sons were born in India, who had suffered many troubles to get India free.

Among them Chandra Shekhar Azad, Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev, Lala Lajpat Rai, Mahatma Gandhi, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Rani Laxmi Bai, Mangal Pandey, Nana Saheb, Tatya Tope, Rajguru, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru.

Our country is constantly moving forward in the fields of education, sports, technology, finance, transportation, science etc. and today our country is a nuclear power nation.

But even after so many years of independence, today the women of our country are suffering slavery.

In our country, today peoples are badly involved in corruption, bribery, crime, violence etc., which are highly shameful for our country and it is preventing our country from moving forward.

Take a pledge to end it, as well as becoming a seeker of progress, development of the country and not a hindrance.

At the same time, I stop this speech, in the end, I want to say a few lines- We are the pride of the young nation. We pledge for a united India.” Long live Mother India .”

Independence Day Speech for Teachers:

Best wishes to all of you on our Independence Day. My respectful greetings to the honoured guests, honourable Principal, all the parents and dear students.

I am very happy that today I have been given a chance to express my independence Day speech on the occasion of this holy festival of national unity and harmony .

It is evident that all of us gathered here to celebrate this festival of independence and to remember the sacrifices of the brave sons, whose sacrifice and devotion have made us breathe peacefully in independent India today.

In this speech on the occasion of this festival of the nation, I will mention about the martyrs of the country who not only sacrificed their entire lives for the independence of the country.

Hearing about the bravery of such people of the country, you should feel proud of being born in India. After many years of slavery, our India country was liberated on August 15, 1947 .

Many brave freedom fighters such as Chandra Sheikh, Azad, Bhagat Singh, Mahatma Gandhi, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Rani Laxmi Bai, Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, Tatya Tope, fought for freedom throughout their lives to liberate the country.

While many amongst these gave up their martyrdom for the independence of the country.

On this occasion, I would like to present a few lines, remembering the sacrifices of my brave soldiers “Come together and honour our country, remember the martyrdom of the martyrs today, Once again the nation’s empire, we Indians hold our hands, let’s all respect the Independence Day.”

The result of the sacrifice and devotion of the great freedom fighters, we are living happily and peacefully in our country.

Today, August 15 is the day to remember the sacrifices of these brave freedom fighters, a day to pay homage to the martyrdom of the martyrs and hoist the tricolour flag and honour the nation.

It is a day to salute the spirit of those soldiers who guard our lives by being deployed on the border and are always ready to sacrifice their lives.

Living in a country where national unity is its real, despite having much diversity in the customs, culture, language, way of life, dress, etc. of people of different caste, religion, creed and sect.

However, even after so many years of independence, our country is still tied in the shackles of terrorism , most women of the country are not free to make their own decisions and decisions related to them are still taken by their father, brother or husband.

 Every department of the country is involved in bribery and corruption , even today in our democratic country, politicians contest elections on the basis of caste which is highly condemnable.

We all Indians should take a united resolve to end all these evils spread in the country, along with every citizen of the country should take an oath to become a responsible, decent and educated citizen, to speed up the development of the country.

We should always struggle and consider it our duty to maintain national unit y and integrity .

Only then our India will be able to develop more and called the most advanced and progressive country in the world. Thank you.

Independence Day Speech for Principal:

My respectful greetings to the honourable chief guest, teachers, parents, students. Congratulations to all of you on this festival of independence.

As we all know that today is 15 August , all of us have gathered to celebrate to Independence Day.

I feel very proud that on this golden day of August 15, I have got an opportunity to express my views in front of you. I sincerely thank all of you.

This festival of Independence Day instils a sense of love, respect, loyalty, harmony etc. towards the country among all Indians and reminds all of us, our duties for our country.

At the same time, this festival reminds the sacrifices of the freedom fighters of the country, who had completely dedicated their lives to liberate the country .

This festival also creates respect for the soldiers of the country who are always ready to sacrifice their lives to protect us.

Apart from this, the festival of nationalism also teaches us to respect and protect our freedom.

All of us Indians are very fortunate to have a chance to celebrate the festival of independence.

On this festival, we begin the celebration of independence by hoisting the national flag of our country, the tricolour flag.

As we all know, on 15 August 1947 , our country of India was liberated from the clutches of the British rulers after many years of slavery.

First independence was announced by the country’s first Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru in his speech, and after that hoisted the tricolour flag on the Red Fort .

Since then, till today the Prime Ministers of the country on the Red Fort on this festival the national flag is hoisted and many programs are organized on this occasion.

During this time, three forces such as water, land and air displayed their amazing power, as well as their culture and heritage, is also displayed by all the states of the country.

On this day, there is an atmosphere filled with patriotism on every side and the whole country is immersed in the celebration of independence.

All Indians remember the martyrdom of the country’s freedom fighters and pay homage to them on this occasion.

The great freedom fighters and true heroic sons of India devoted themselves fully to the country and fought for the independence of the country till their last breath, to make our India land free from the clutches of the cruel British rulers .

Due to the sacrifice and dedication of these brave freedom fighters, today we are able to breathe happiness and peace in independent India.

On the occasion of Independence Day, I salute the martyrs and brave sons of India, who died for our homeland and salute them.

Our country as the largest democracy in the world, today is on the right path of development to new heights of success.

But even after so many years of independence , I still have a question from inside my mind that whether even after so many years of independence, we have been able to achieve the goals of the constitution of our country!

I feel very shy to say that in our country today, all the problems like unemployment, poverty, corruption, rape, violence, terrorism, crime, increasing atrocities on women, theft, riots, strike have come to the fore.

 Continuously increasing terrorism and extremism is challenging the pride of our tricolour.

Not only this, for not getting the right price for crops, most of the debt-ridden farmers of our country being forced to commit suicide today.

Many people are forced to sleep hungry due to lack of food, many people in our country are losing their lives due to daily hunger.

At the same time, our country is awash with people who do not have clothes to wear on their bodies, there is no house to live, and there is no money for the treatment of disease.

Women and girls are not safe in the country. No day without the reports of terrible crimes like rape and murders in the newspapers and news channels.

Today, our country is once again bound into slaves because of rising crimes.

In order to secure the country from such slavery, we all need to be together again and raise our voice against it.

Because such crimes are preventing our country from moving forward and in the progress of our country.

If you are creating obstacles, then let us all together take an oath on the favourable occasion of this Independence Day that-

“May the victorious tricolour be lovely, may the flag be elevated, no matter what its life maybe?”

Thank you, Jai Hind, Jai Bharat!!

Also read: 1. Republic day speech 2. Independence Day Essay

Independence Day Speech in English 2022:

My best regards to all the honourable and all my classmates, friends and all the younger siblings present here.

First of all, I heartily congratulate all of you on this festival of national unity, love and harmony on Independence Day .

On this occasion, we have all gathered to celebrate independence.

All of us on the day of August 15 are eagerly waiting for the whole year because on this day we unfold our national flag and remember the sacrifices of the brave sons of the motherland, who have spent many years to bring freedom to the country.

On this occasion, we all salute the courage of the great freedom fighters of our country, I am feeling very happy that today I have got a golden opportunity to express my views during this festival of nationality .

I want to start my speech with a few lines written on the martyrs .

“Let’s remember that scene again today, remember the flame that was in the hearts of the martyrs, remember the stream of patriot’s blood on the shore that swept the freedom”.

As we all know that on 15 August 1947, our India country was free from the clutches of the British.

On this day, Indians were liberated from British rule after suffering many years of domination, so we all celebrate this day as Indian Independence Day with joy and fun.

The freedom fighters of our country fought throughout their lives to get India free and many martyrs had even sacrificed their lives then our country got independence.

The cruel British rulers had also tried unsuccessfully to weaken the spirits of the brave freedom fighters of our country.

Along with this, many evil tricks and cruel policies were adopted, but the British rulers could not let the integrity of these true sons of Mother India.

They bounce back for a moment, rather these cruel policies of the British ignited the freedom of the freedom fighters of the country and had also provoked more, which made the road to freedom easier.

The freedom fighter, through his influential and revolutionary speeches, make all the Indians unite and fight for freedom.

Seeing the power of Indian unity , the British rulers were also weakened and eventually forced to leave India and thus we were all liberated from the shackles of Indian slavery.

Today is a very proud day for all the Indians and a day to celebrate independence .

Independence Day reminds us of the sacrifices of our brave soldiers, who sacrificed their entire lives to give us a free and peaceful life.

Along with this, this festival of independence gives an opportunity to express gratitude to the soldiers on the borders of the country.

On this national festival, the youth who do excellent work for the country are honoured and their spirits are also encouraged.

On this occasion, we must also pledge to protect our freedom .

Today, India has reached this milestone of success, due to the hard work and severity of many distinguished citizens including scientists, teachers, social workers, politicians, officials of India.

At the same time, there has been tremendous development in the health, education, medical, transport departments of the country.

Today there is no area in the country that has not progressed and our country is constantly on the path of progress .

However even today, there are problems of black marketing, corruption, hoarding, bribery etc. in our country, which we all Indians citizens should jointly overcome.

And all of us should protect our freedom and on this festival, all of us should take a pledge to uphold the unity and integrity of our India, so that our country can move forward on the path of continuous progress and a role model for the whole world .

RELATED SPEECHES:

Conclusion:

Every year on 15 August, the Prime Minister of India addresses the country from the ramparts of the Red Fort; found in the documents of the Secretariat of the Lok Sabha.

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Speech on the Journey of Independence Day for School Students

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  • Jan 15, 2024

Speech on the Journey of Independence Day

The Journey of Independence Day Speech: India’s path to freedom was not easy. The country gained independence because of our freedom fighters who exhibited immense courage and determination. This journey began somewhere around the 1800’s and ended in 1947. From the 1st war of Independence in 1857 to the Quit India Movement in 1942, India lost many lives to achieve freedom. 

best conclusion for independence day speech

Thereafter, with the conclusion of the Quit India Movement in 1945 and the implementation of the Lord Mountbatten Plan on 3 June 1947, India achieved its independence on 15 August 1947. 

Also Read: Essay On Kalpana Chawla In 500 Words

Speech on the Journey of Independence Day

Hello everyone, and I welcome you all to an independent and warm sunshine. Today, we are all gathered here to celebrate India’s journey til 15 August 1947. This journey is a celebration of the human spirit and the power of hope. This journey of independence begins with a desire for freedom that later burns in the hearts of our forefathers, who dared to dream of and achieve as a sovereign nation.

India’s quest for independence started with the Revolt of 1857 which is considered as the 1st War of Independence. The revolt was fueled by the discontent among Indian soldiers in the British East India Company’s army. Mangal Pandey, an Indian soldier ignited the spark in the army and made a courageous attempt to reclaim our rights and dignity. Later on, General Bakht Khan (Delhi), Begum Hazrat Mahal (Lucknow), Rani Lakshmibai (Jhansi), Nana Saheb (Kanpur), Kunwar Singh (Bihar) and many more joined the revolt. Though we did not succeed, the seed of resistance was sown into the hearts of people and helped pave the way for future struggles.  

The Lucknow Pact of 1916 was another landmark moment in the history of India’s journey to Independence Day. As a landmark moment, the pact showcased the unity among Hindus and Muslims against British rule. Indian leaders like Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Muhammad Ali Jinnah worked together for constitutional reforms. Moreover, this pact helped lay the foundation for a united front against colonial oppression.

Also, the massacre of Jallianwala Bagh in 1919 can never be forgotten in India’s journey to independence. The merciless act of General Dyer claimed hundreds of innocent lives. This ruthless act sparked outrage in our people who wanted to break the chains of colonialism.

This chain of revolutions in the journey of independence started scaring the British. Another landmark event in the freedom struggle was the Mahatma Gandhi-led Non-Cooperation Movement. In this movement, he urged his fellow Indians to boycott British goods and institutions. The mass protest was successful and saw millions of people participating in the movement. The mass participation highlighted not only the unity but also reflected the yearning for freedom among the Indian population. 

Later on, the Quit India Movement on August 8, 1942, saw a huge crowd rallying behind Mahatma Gandhi with a call for an immediate end to British rule. During this uprising, famous freedom fighter leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Vallabhai Patel, Chakravarti Rajgopalachari, and others were imprisoned. But as it is said, the torch of freedom never extinguished, and the spirit of resistance remained unbroken.

After years of struggles by freedom fighters, India saw a bittersweet moment in the history of freedom on August 14 and 15, 1947, which marked the end of colonial rule and also led to the creation of India and Pakistan as two separate nations. As India celebrated its freedom on 15 August 1947, the country faced communal tensions, mass migration, and the division of properties and financial assets. 

As a student, we should never forget the struggles and sacrifices made by the freedom fighters of India. To make the journey of Independence more memorable and meaningful, all these incidents can be included in the curriculum of the syllabus students so that they can know more about them comprehensively. Also, students can depict scenes of freedom struggle through various activities, such as dramas, skits, dance, and songs.  

In conclusion, the journey to independence has shown the world that our country is a land of sacrifice, dedication, and the value of honor. The struggles and fights will inspire future generations to celebrate the freedom that was hard fought. Though we enjoy and celebrate Independence with pomp and show, the journey was still more memorable than one might think.

Also Read: NCERT Class 8 Making of National Movement Notes

10 Lines on Speech on the Journey of Independence Day 

Here are simple 10 lines that you can include in your Speech on the Journey of Independence Day:

1. Independence Day is celebrated on August 15 every year magnificently.

2. The colonized rule of Britishers not only tortured the people of India but also took every right that was required of every human.

3. The year 1857 blew the trumpet of independence with the revolt in India.

4. Mangal Pandey, an Indian soldier, ignited the spark in the army and made a courageous attempt to reclaim our rights and dignity in the revolt for independence. Later on, General Bakht Khan (Delhi), Begum Hazrat Mahal (Lucknow), Rani Lakshmibai (Jhansi), Nana Saheb (Kanpur), Kunwar Singh (Bihar), and many more.

4. The Lucknow Pact of 1916 was another incredible moment in the history of India’s journey to Independence Day.

5. It has strengthened Hindu-Muslim unity in the national political history of India.

6. The Amritsar massacre, or Jallianwala Bagh massacre, which took place in 1919 filled the people with range.

7. To fuel the journey to independence, Mahatma Gandhi led the Non-Cooperation Movement in 1922 and urged Indians to boycott British goods and institutions.

8. The Quit India Movement of 1942 to 1945 was the nail in the coffin of British rule. 

9. The struggles and fights will inspire future generations to celebrate the freedom that was hard fought. 

10. Though we enjoy and celebrate Independence with pomp and show, the journey was still more memorable than one might think.

Also Read: Essay on Indian Army in 500+ Words

Ans : To start a speech on Independence Day, greet the present gathered people and fellow people, and then start with an introduction to the history of Independence, the struggles of freedom fighters, and their journey.

Ans: Some of the best slogans for Independence Day are: Violent means will give violent freedom. That would be a menace to the world and to India herself, according to Mahatma Gandhi and If your blood does not rage, then it is water that flows in your veins. For what is the flush of youth if it is not of service to the motherland by Chandra Shekhar Azad?

Ans: The format of the introduction while writing an Independence Day speech can be Hello everyone, and I welcome you all to the independent and warm sunshine. Today, we are all gathered here to celebrate the journey of independence that rises above time and echoes the resilience of a nation. This journey of independence begins with a desire for freedom and later burns in the hearts of our forefathers, who dared to dream of a sovereign nation.

Ans: The Indian Prime Minister delivers a speech on Independence Day to address the nation with his speech to motivate the spirit of independence and keep reminding the people about the struggles as well as the determination of the freedom fighters.

Ans: Independence Day is celebrated on August 15 every year. Many freedom fighters sacrificed their lives, fought courageously, and showed determination to achieve independence. From the colonial rule of Britishers, we emerged as a nation that did not turn down. The Journey of Independence Day believed in the inherent right to self-determination.

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Deepika Joshi is an experienced content writer with expertise in creating educational and informative content. She has a year of experience writing content for speeches, essays, NCERT, study abroad and EdTech SaaS. Her strengths lie in conducting thorough research and ananlysis to provide accurate and up-to-date information to readers. She enjoys staying updated on new skills and knowledge, particulary in education domain. In her free time, she loves to read articles, and blogs with related to her field to further expand her expertise. In personal life, she loves creative writing and aspire to connect with innovative people who have fresh ideas to offer.

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