"Independence, declared David Ramsay in a memorable Fourth of July oration in 1778, would free Americans from that monarchical world where 'favor is the source of preferment,' and where 'he that can best please his superiors, by the low arts of fawning and adulation, is most likely to obtain favor.' The revolutionaries wanted to create a new republican world in which 'all offices lie open to men of merit, of whatever rank or condition.' They believed that 'even the reins of state may be held by the son of the poorest men, if possessed of abilities equal to the important station.' They were 'no more to look up for the blessings of government to hungry courtiers, or the needy dependents of British nobility'; but they had now to educate their 'own children for these exalted purposes.'" Gordon Wood