On July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress officially adopted the Declaration of Independence, signing and sealing the United States as a sovereign, independent nation. Not only did the Declaration of Independence proclaim the ideas at the nexus of the American experiment—namely, that an American government with the consent of the governed must protect the unalienable rights endowed to its citizens by their Creator—but it also serves as a foundational text for how the United States engages with the world. The Declaration asserted that the United States must defend territory, contract alliances, and embark in commercial relationships with other nations, based on mutual respect as sovereign states. At the same time, the Founders’ universal and particularistic claims regarding unalienable rights associate the United States with the cause of liberty for many around the world, which serves as an important asset for America’s ability to project power today. In this video, Elliott Abrams, Chairman of The Vandenberg Coalition and Senior Fellow for Middle Eastern Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, and Michael Auslin, author of National Treasure: How the Declaration of Independence Made America, explore the legacy of the Declaration of Independence on its 250th anniversary.