This intimate guided reading invites participants to engage closely with one of the nation’s foundational texts: the United States Declaration of Independence. Together with scholars and fellow participants, the session focuses especially on the document’s preamble and its list of grievances—sections that articulate both the ideals of liberty and the concrete frustrations that gave rise to revolution.

Through close reading and open discussion, the workshop considers how the language of equality, rights, and accountability has been interpreted, challenged, and reimagined over time. Rather than treating the document as a fixed artifact, the program approaches it as part of an ongoing civic conversation—an evolving story about the promises and tensions at the heart of American democracy.

Participants are encouraged to read the Declaration in advance and to arrive with questions, reflections, and perspectives of their own. In a small-group setting, the workshop creates space to think collectively about how the document’s ideals resonate—and resonate differently—today.

Discover more exhibition programs
Explore programs connected to Life, Liberty, and Los Angeles and other exhibitions across the museum—each offering a different point of entry into the histories, ideas, and communities that shape the American West. https://theautry.org/events/inspired-galleries

This program is part of the LA2026 Project, which brings together members of the public and humanities scholars for eighteen conversations at six partnering institutions in the Los Angeles region. Each discussion frames conversations about the anniversary of 1776 from the perspective of California and the West, encouraging public discussion about national identities, relationships between regional and national narratives, participation in democracy, and human relationships to the land.

The EMSI LA2026 project has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities