L&T Publisher Earl Watt

Versus Signs started the Fourth of July weekend right by hanging a massive star spangled banner on a crane on Kansas Avenue Friday morning that remained flying throughout the weekend, and what a weekend it was.

John Adams said that America’s independence would be celebrated across the entire continent one day, and he was right. He wrote his wife Abigail that the day would be celebrated with “pomp and parade, with shoews, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations from one end of this continent to the other from this time forward forever more.”

How many years the celebrations will last is unknown, but they have now reached 250.

And Liberal didn’t disappoint with the Fourth of July Committee sponsoring another great day of events beginning with the Sons and Daughters of the American Revolution Parade to the celebration in Light Park, and after that a picnic at Brent Gould Field followed by the Bee Jays baseball game and the community fireworks display.

I also want to extend a special thank you to our Hispanic community.

I will admit that sometimes some of us feel we are losing our heritage because of the large amount of immigration our nation experienced in a very short time. We usually don’t say it out loud for fear of being labeled racist when it has nothing to do with race. It has to do with tradition, history and supporting a system that has led to the most prosperous nation in the history of the world.

We have grown as a community to accept celebrations like Cinco de Mayo and others. Our largest pageants and many of our public events have a Latin theme.

It’s understandable since a majority of our population is Hispanic.

When I see the flags of other nations flying in my hometown, I get concerned about the future. All of our families that made their way to the United States of America did so because there was something missing where we left, whether that be economic opportunity, religious freedom, security from crime and political persecution just to name a few. When I see other flags flying, it is not a recognition of a new culture becoming part of American culture. It is a foreign nation’s banner flown as a symbol of national pride — pride in another nation, not in blending with and becoming part of American culture.

It’s not resentment for those who are coming to be a part of America but resentment toward the reluctance to become one of us by embracing the United States.

What I saw this weekend in Liberal was heartwarming. So many of our Hispanic community members flying the American flag, participating in American traditions and celebrating American independence.

From the Little Miss Firecracker competition to the floats coming down Kansas Avenue, many of the participants were of Hispanic descent.

I am much more inclined to go to bat for those who are embracing the country that is providing an opportunity they didn’t have elsewhere.

Liberal is a different community than it was when I roamed the streets in the 1970s and ’80s. We have lost a large part of our African American residents and gained a large Hispanic community. But the jobs, the schools, the commitment to faith remain the same.

America is not the same nation is was 250 years ago, either, but the core values of freedom, justice, economic opportunity and individual liberty remain.

Seeing the flag flying proudly throughout Liberal touched my heart. Watching a Hispanic family across the street bring their young children outside to light a fireworks display made me smile.

While many tell us to distrust one another, to work against one another, weekends like this one tell us why those voices are not to be trusted.

We can come together and celebrate freedom. We can come together under one flag as one people regardless of the color of our skin or the language we speak. We can celebrate the fact the colonists 250 years ago had the courage to declare that we were all created equal in the image of God with rights no other person can take from us.

Long live America, or Viva America, it’s all the same. Thanks for being a part of it.