By Rick Jones

I'd like to take a look at what this day might mean to some people…a day off with pay, just a day off, family, friends, cookouts, reunions or just a day to lounge and watch the fireworks. As for me, I think of our Constitution, our founding fathers, our Bill of Rights, our military men and women who are performing their duties to protect our freedom.

“FREEDOM”. We say it often, exclaiming our rights by the Constitution and Bill of Rights, but is it really free? Daily, there are people who are ready, willing and able to chip away at
our most basic freedoms as guaranteed by the First and Second Amendments to the Constitution, and it is these people who we must fight against. The one that is the most often spoken of, is the First Amendment…the right to free speech, the right to
choose the way we want to worship, the right of free press, the right of peaceable assembly, and the right to petition the government for a redress of grievances. This freedom in the First Amendment is the main reason that our forefathers came to this country … to get away from a ruler who wouldn’t allow such freedoms. The First Amendment was of the utmost importance to our founding fathers, and that is the reason it is listed first!

With such freedoms now in place, how will you be able to protect them? It is with the Second Amendment that these freedoms are protected!