As America celebrates 250 years of independence, three conservative Supreme Court justices are pointing [1] to a central responsibility for preserving the nation’s founding freedoms. Americans, they said, must understand the country’s history, embrace civic education and participate in their system of government.
Justices Brett Kavanaugh, Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett each urged citizens to learn how the American system works and why it was created. Their message placed responsibility for the nation’s future squarely on each generation.
The justices spoke in interviews filmed by the Federalist Society and obtained by Fox News Digital. The videos were released ahead of the Federalist Society’s 2026 National Lawyers Convention this week, which spotlights “250 Years of American Exceptionalism.”
Although the three justices shared a commitment to civic education, they approached the subject from different directions. Gorsuch emphasized the religious foundation of the principles expressed in the Declaration of Independence.
“I think it’s very easy to take the rights granted in our Constitution and the ideals expressed in the Declaration for granted,” Gorsuch said. He compared those freedoms to essential parts of life that Americans rarely stop to notice.
“The ideas in the Declaration of Independence that all of us are created equal, that every one of us has God-given rights — they don’t come from government, they come from God,” Gorsuch said.
Gorsuch was appointed to the Supreme Court by President Donald Trump in 2017 following the death of Justice Antonin Scalia. He also stressed that studying history is essential to preserving the American way of life.
“Our country is a blessing from God, and that we owe great thanks for it, and we have great responsibility for it,” Gorsuch said. He argued that the Constitution and Declaration have endured because Americans repeatedly choose their principles.
“The reason why our Constitution and Declaration have survived is because people choose it anew in every generation,” Gorsuch said. He added that citizens need to understand both the history and the system they are preserving.
Gorsuch invoked Daniel Webster’s observation that it took 6,000 years to produce such a system of government. “Don’t expect that to happen easily or again,” he said.
Kavanaugh focused closely on schools and the broader education system. He said education would be fundamental to preserving and improving the republic during the next 250 years.
“I think our education system is absolutely fundamental to ensuring that in the next 250 years, we preserve this republic and improve upon this republic,” Kavanaugh said.
He called for teaching American history, the country’s values, the reasons for its existence and the ways it has been preserved and improved. His examples included the constitutional amendment process and other developments over time.
Kavanaugh, who joined the Supreme Court following a tumultuous confirmation process in 2018, also said civic learning cannot stop with young people. “And I think all of us should be constantly striving to ensure civics education, not only for our youth, but for all of us, and that we constantly are learning and participating in our system of government,” he said.
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The Federalist Society filmed the interviews before its National Lawyers Convention, an event bringing together figures from across the conservative legal movement. The gathering is intended to examine matters considered pressing within that movement.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor was not interviewed by the Federalist Society, but she discussed America’s 250th anniversary during an event at Mount Vernon’s Washington Library. Her comments, centered largely on civic engagement, took a darker view of the country’s current position.
Sotomayor said the United States is in a rough place and that returning to an “even keel” would require “some hard work.” She also warned, “There are some norms we may have lost forever.”
“But I don’t think that we will fail as a democracy,” Sotomayor said. “But I think we’re going to have a hard patch figuring out what that means.”
Barrett turned to the Declaration of Independence and its call for active civic commitment. “We’re not passive observers in the American project,” she said.
“We’re participants in it. It is our project,” Barrett continued. She pointed to the Declaration’s final line, where its signatories mutually pledged their lives, fortunes and sacred honor to the American project.
Barrett noted that some signatories lost fortunes and property to loyalists while remaining committed to the promises made by signing the Declaration. “Surely that’s the kind of commitment that it takes to have it keep going forward,” she said.