Today brought the terrible news of the death of historian Gordon Wood. National Review was proud to publish his piece “The Five Greatest Words in the Declaration” earlier this year, in our special issue on America at 250. It’s mournful now to know that it was one of his last.

In the Declaration of Independence, the 250th anniversary of which we are celebrating this year, the Founders put down five significant words that came to define America’s culture — “all men are created equal.” No phrase could have been more radical, more momentous. Even the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen in 1789, with its statement that “men are born and remain free and equal in rights,” does not have the same power and significance. Equality was based on a new understanding of people’s capacity to........

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