The signers of the Declaration of Independence pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor to the cause of American freedom.

They said so in the famous final line of the document whose 250th anniversary arrives on July 4, 2026.

For many of them, this means they also pledged their farms.

That’s because so many of our founding fathers were founding farmers, as my colleague Mark Wagoner of the Global Farmer Network pointed out in a recent column.

The 56 signers of the Declaration came from many backgrounds and labored in many professions. The primary author of the document, Thomas Jefferson, was a lawyer and politician as well as a farmer in Virginia. About 15 of the signers were at least part-time farmers.

I’m a full-time farmer, here in Illinois. I’m also looking forward to celebrating America’s big birthday. My family usually goes to a city park in Bloomington and watches a fireworks show that features patriotic music. We’ve done this for years. I expect that we’ll do it again for the upcoming semiquincentennial.

The Declaration that we’ll commemorate says nothing about farming, at least not directly. The word “farm” does not appear in the text. Neither do “agriculture,” “cultivation,” or “crop.”

Yet one part of it resonates with me as a corn and soybean grower in 2026. It’s in the list of grievances against King George III: The colonists accuse him of “cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world.”

This is a reference to Britain’s severe restrictions economic activity, which stopped the colonists from engaging in the voluntary exchange of goods across borders. Blocking trade hurt many sectors of the economy, including colonial farmers who depended on exports for their livelihood. Southerners exported tobacco, rice, and wheat. Northerners exported grain and flour.

Today’s farmers still need these markets. Some of the commodities have changed. We grow much less tobacco, for example. Yet American farmers continue to grow far more food than the United States needs to feed itself. Many of the crops I’m raising this summer will ship abroad.

This is good for everyone. It keeps my family farm in business. It supports jobs in my fields. It enables me to buy tractors from manufacturers that employ factory workers. It brings money into the United States, improves the balance of trade, and supports rural economies.

A second passage in the Declaration also speaks to me as a farmer today. It’s the penultimate line—the one that precedes the sentence about lives, fortunes, and sacred honor. It announces that the new and independent nation will begin to “contract Alliances [and] establish Commerce.”

In other words, our government promises to build the trading relationships that allow farmers and others to flourish. This matters as much today as it did in 1776. Exports support the jobs of about 10 million Americans, according to the Department of Commerce.

And let’s not forget that consumers depend on imports, grown by farmers far away. If you drink coffee, you need farmers in South America and Africa. They harvest the beans that become your morning drink.

The same is true for our year-round supply of fruits and vegetables. We eat well even in the dead of winter because we have so many choices. We live better because we exchange goods and services with farmers who grow avocados in Mexico, bananas in Guatemala, and cocoa in the Ivory Coast.

Despite the enormous benefits of trade, we live in an era of protectionism. Many public figures believe that we should rely more on ourselves and less on foreigners. In some cases, this makes sense. Homegrown manufacturing and energy production build U.S. resilience in a tumultuous world.

Yet we can’t become isolationists. This would in fact make us poorer and weaker. When people in different countries can focus on what they do well, in a system of specialization and comparative advantage, everyone can thrive.

That’s a lesson from Adam Smith and “The Wealth of Nations,” the most important book of economics ever written. It was published, coincidentally, in that momentous year of 1776.

As America approaches its major milestone, let’s be grateful for the blessings of liberty—and let’s remember that one of the blessings that the founders have bestowed on us is international trade.