Good point. My favorite examples is when people try to make the Declaration of Independence about slavery. This is a very bad case of historical malpractice.
The Declaration of Independence is about the right of a collective people to declare independence from a government they see as no longer representing their interests.
Subsequent generations have reinterpreted it to be a condemnation of slavery, which is absolutely misrepresenting it's purpose and intent.
Please stop re-litigating the Civil War with me. You know I don’t care at all about that.
I’m asking nicely. Please?
The Declaration of Independence is about the right of a collective people to declare independence from a government they see as no longer representing their interests.I have a similar beef with misunderstandings about "all men are created equal" -- the point wasn't that every man (and, yes, Howiedoody Zinn, that includes women) is equal (key word leftists miss is "created") but that a king, too, is created equal (key word "all"). It justified separation from the King by denying divine rule, something that the great John Milton had affirmed a hundred years earlier in his argument that kings serve only at the consent of the people.