Hypocrisy within the Declaration

What is the purpose of honoring the Declaration of Independence when the message of equality is nothing more than a hypocritical statement? Why would you write about equality and then do nothing to promote it? The delegates’ inability to follow the Declaration’s call for equality leads one to believe that they were only thinking of themselves and their counterparts when writing/reviewing the Declaration.

In Takaki’s text he analyzes how various minority groups view the Declaration of Independence. By doing this, he brings forth the hypocrisy of the Declaration and how the Declaration did not serve the needs of all Americans at various points in time.

“Thomas Jefferson declared to the Kaskaskias that whites and Indians were both ‘Americans, born in the same land,’ and that he hoped the two peoples would ‘long continue to smoke in friendship together.’” (pg. 45)

“Seeking to do more than demonstrate and affirm the intelligence of blacks, Banneker also scolded the author of the declaration of Independence for his hypocrisy on the subject of slavery,” (pg. 66)

“They were taught that honest labor, fair play, and industriousness were virtues. But they ‘saw that it wasn’t so on the plantation.’ They saw whites on the top and Asians on the bottom,” (pg. 250)

In recent events, I feel like hypocrisy within the Declaration was most notable this past summer when Muslims in New York City wanted to expand on a mosque. There was one day when I was watching CNN and they were interviewing a construction worker and he said that if there was a job regarding the expansion, he would not take it because it was un-American to support Muslims. Does it not say in the Constitution that there is the freedom of religion? Does it not say in the Declaration that every person is created equal? By suppressing one’s freedom of religion, you are suppressing their ability to have equality. Every person should be considered equal in the sense that they have the freedom to practice their own religion.