On its 250th Fourth of July, most Americans think the founders would be disappointed

WASHINGTON (MNTV) — As the United States marks 250 years of independence this Fourth of July, most of its people have concluded that the men who signed the Declaration would not be pleased with what the country has become.

In a Gallup survey released this week, 77 percent of Americans said the founders would be disappointed by the nation’s current state. Just 19 percent believed they would be satisfied — a striking verdict to carry into the semiquincentennial celebrations.

The gloom has deepened sharply over a generation.

The share who think the founders would be let down has climbed from 42 percent in 2001 to 71 percent in 2013 and now to more than three in four. Whatever divides Americans, this feeling is not one of them: the pessimism runs across party lines, and while Republicans were somewhat less downbeat than Democrats, no more than a quarter of either group said the founders would approve of the country today.

Other surveys released this week sketch the same unsettled mood beneath the fireworks.

A Marquette Law School poll found that 66 percent of Americans remain at least somewhat proud of their country, yet barely more than half said they feel optimistic about the future of American democracy.

A Fox News poll pointed to a similar split, with voters more willing to call themselves patriotic than to say they are proud of the United States as it is now.

Taken together, the numbers describe a country able to honor the idea of 1776 while doubting how far the reality has strayed from it — celebrating the promise on its 250th birthday even as most of its citizens suspect the people who made that promise would not recognize, or approve of, what it has grown into.