Educational freedom is not a modern policy debate. It is the same inheritance that shaped the American mind long before the Declaration of Independence was ever signed, and as the nation marks 250 years since that document was written, homeschool families are living proof that the inheritance is still being carried forward.
Lauren Gideon has spent years tracking legislation and defending that freedom as Director of Government Relations for Classical Conversations, and she has watched firsthand how families choose, morning after morning, to exercise it. The anniversary invites a question worth sitting with: Is the thing being commemorated still alive in our homes? The days we have to shape and guide our children are numbered. This is how families are making them count.
Educational Freedom: A Founding American Value
As we mark 250 years since the Declaration of Independence, it’s worth contemplating the origin of its content. We know it was not an expression of a single mind in June of 1776, but of generations of families and communities of families who had already been forming minds and consciences long before Jefferson put words to parchment. The experiences of the colonial families are what culminated in what he later called “an expression of the American mind.”
In an 1825 letter to Henry Lee, Jefferson explained what he had set out to do in drafting the Declaration of Independence. He wrote that it was “neither aiming at originality of principle or sentiment, nor yet copied from any particular and previous writing,” but “intended to be an expression of the American mind.”[1] In other words, Jefferson did not invent the American mind. He articulated it. The formation had already happened, generation by generation, family by family.
Passing Down the American Mind
Education means that we must pass down the American mind. As writer G.K. Chesterton phrased it: “Education is simply the soul of a society as it passes from one generation to another,” he wrote. “Whatever the soul is like, it will have to be passed on somehow, consciously or unconsciously, and that transition may be called education.” [2] The American mind that Jefferson gave voice to in 1776 did not appear out of nowhere. It was the soul of a people, formed and handed down through generations of families, individually and through free associations, exercising the freedom to educate their own.
That inheritance is what made the Declaration’s own words possible: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” [3] The right of parents to form the mind and conscience of the next generation is bound up in the same unalienable bundle as life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is not an addition to those rights. It is both contained within them and what made the expression of the American mind possible in the first place.
Listen to how to instill a legacy for your family through Peace Talks on the Everyday Educator podcast
America’s 250th: What the Semiquincentennial Means for Families
Like all anniversaries, this occasion is an opportunity to revisit and renew a commitment: the free exercise of educational freedom. It is not simply the exercise of a right endowed by our Creator, though it is that, and an important one. As Senator Margaret Chase Smith said, “Freedom unexercised may be freedom forfeited.” [4] Let us not forfeit our freedom through lack of exercising it.
This practice is the necessary element for the revival, formation, and expression of the timeless principles known as the American mind of 1776.
An anniversary causes us to ask whether the thing being commemorated is still alive. The Declaration itself was the fruit of generations of families forming minds and consciences in freedom. If that formation stops, the anniversary becomes a memorial rather than a celebration.
For families today, the 250th is a reminder that the American mind was not a one-time experiment in 1776, and left to run on its own. It has to be “passed down from one generation to another,” the same way it was formed in the first place: in homes, in communities of families, through the ordinary, daily work of educating children. This passing is not a side project to civic life. It is the thing that forms civic life and preserves the principles that undergird it.
Listen to Everyday Educator: Robert Bortins, Multi-Generational Homeschooling and Educational Independence
The Homeschool Connection: Choice, Freedom, and Classical Education
The terrifying thing about freedom is that there is no way to guarantee its future. Freedom requires people to voluntarily choose what is often perceived as the harder path. There is no mechanism to force a nation of free people to choose, vote, or live rightly. As John Adams wrote to the Massachusetts militia in 1798, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” [5]
An economy of freedom depends on voluntary choice. It cannot compel virtue. It can only be sustained by people who steward their freedom well, generation after generation. That is a heavy weight to place on parents.
Homeschooling as the Exercise of Freedom
That is where choice enters. Homeschooling is not simply one educational option among many, and the ongoing school choice conversation makes that distinction worth naming clearly. Homeschooling is the direct exercise of the freedom the founding generation depended on, parents choosing, deliberately and daily, to form the mind and conscience of the next generation themselves rather than relinquishing that right and responsibility. At first glance, this may seem like a hard path. It is the same pattern that produced the American mind in the first place, brought forward into the present. Every family that chooses to homeschool is exercising the freedom Chase Smith warned could be forfeited if left unused.
But there is hope on the horizon. Millions of families have embraced the opportunity of home education, and within that context, are forming souls capable of shouldering the weight of freedom. Just like political freedom, the hard path may be the best path. Its fruit is produced only after seasons of hard work. For those of us who think freedom is hard, it is time well spent to consider the alternative. Homeschooling follows the same pattern. The course that seems hard today rewards those who choose it.
Even within the choice to homeschool, there is choice. Christian classical education uniquely focuses on the formation of wisdom and virtue, shaping citizens capable of shouldering the weight of freedom. The classical arts of education train students to see the world and the human experience in relationship to all its parts, and to its Creator, and how those parts can be woven together in pursuit of the true, the good, and the beautiful. It does not simply transfer information. It forms the kind of mind freedom requires, one capable of discerning the good and choosing it, generation after generation.
Read Why Homeschooling: A Family’s First Option
Celebrating Freedom in Your Homeschool Year
Every academic year is an opportunity to exercise the freedom this article has been tracing all along, not just to believe in educational freedom, but to live it out in the (extra)ordinary work of teaching your children. Freedom unexercised may be freedom forfeited. Here are a few ways to expand your knowledge and grow your commitment to this freedom:
- Join the Education Independence Initiative, a program of Classical Conversations, as a member of a growing network of families, elected officials, and organizations committed to the four pillars of Education Independence. As a member, you will:
- Stay informed with Legislative Updates, tracking the latest developments affecting educational freedom in your state.
- Receive a Monthly Newsletter with timely, relevant information delivered directly to you.
- Have access to monthly Virtual Seminars, a place for community and conversation with others protecting this same freedom.
- Become a member at chooseeducationindependence.com/join-us.
- Explore the articles archive at chooseeducationindependence.com/articles to keep wrestling with these ideas.
- Sign Leigh Bortins’s declaration. This initiative began when Leigh Bortins, founder of Classical Conversations, gathered a room of seasoned education advocates to articulate a positive vision of educational freedom. Their declaration can be read and signed at educationalindependence.net.
Every day you make choices. Make them with wisdom and virtue. Choose to exercise the freedom that the founding generation depended on. Choose to preserve and practice that American mind, so that, once formed, it can be handed to the next generation.
Frequently Asked Questions about Educational Freedom
What is America’s 250th anniversary?
The 250th anniversary, or semiquincentennial, marks 250 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. Communities and families across the country are commemorating the milestone throughout 2026.
What does educational freedom mean for homeschool families?
Educational freedom is the right of parents to direct the upbringing and education of their children. For homeschool families, that freedom is exercised daily in the choice to teach their own children rather than defer that responsibility elsewhere.
How does school choice affect homeschooling rights?
School choice conversations often center on vouchers and public funding, which is a different question from the parental right homeschooling exercises. Homeschool families have historically guarded their independence from government funding and regulation precisely to protect that freedom. For a closer look at how funding and oversight can intersect, see Refining Rhetoric: Arizona’s ESA Reality: What School Choice Really Looks Like.
Why does America’s 250th anniversary matter for homeschoolers?
The anniversary is a natural moment to ask whether the founding generation’s vision for educational freedom is still alive. Homeschool families answer that question every academic year through the ordinary work of teaching their children at home.
Continue the conversation about Educational Freedom in Homeschooling with these resources:
- Homeschooling: Freedom from Responsibility
- Are We Thankful for Our Freedom to Homeschool?
- Classical Education Curriculum: Learning the Ancient Way
- Refining Rhetoric: The America We Never Knew with Jane Hampton Cook (podcast)
[1] Thomas Jefferson to Henry Lee, May 8, 1825, in “From Thomas Jefferson to Henry Lee, 8 May 1825,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/98-01-02-5212.
[2] G. K. Chesterton, “Our Note-Book,” Illustrated London News, July 5, 1924.
[3] Declaration of Independence (1776), para. 2.
[4] Margaret Chase Smith, quoted in NEA Journal: The Journal of the National Education Association 41 (1952): 300.
[5] John Adams to the Officers of the First Brigade of the Third Division of the Militia of Massachusetts, October 11, 1798, in “From John Adams to Massachusetts Militia, 11 October 1798,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/99-02-02-3102.
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