Give Me What or What Now?

Inspirational phrase…or most inspirational phrase ever?

We're going with the latter. Because in our humble opinion, nothing is as stirring, spine-chilling, or blood-pumping as the phrase "Give me liberty or give me death." Not "Do…or do not. There is no try," not "I am the one who knocks," not even Mel Gibson wailing freeeeedooooom in Braveheart.

Once more, for effect: give me liberty or give me death. This ain't a negotiating tactic. This ain't a plea. This is one man out-and-out defying the powers that be and stating that he's willing to kick the bucket for his principles.

Patrick Henry: definitely the most metal of the Founding Fathers.

You might have heard of a little conflict we like to call the American Revolution. (It's the one with the tri-cornered hats and George Washington on a horse.)

But before that actually took place—although old G-Dubs was definitely already horseback riding—it was by no means inevitable that the United States of America would ever be a thing.

The British Invasion…But Not The Cute One That Brought Us The Beatles

In 1775, what we now know as the U.S. of A. was a disorganized group of thirteen very different colonies with very different concerns and very different relationships with the Mothership—er, Great Britain. This ragtag group of colonies was disgruntled over a whole slew of things (mainly taxes), but they didn't want to rock the boat by actually picking up weapons. After all, Great Britain was one of the most powerful countries in the world, with a correspondingly mighty military.

But Patrick Henry, like a certain internet-famous honey badger, didn't care…which brings us to his most noteworthy bit of speech-making.

In March 1775, the Second Virginia Convention met at Henrico Parish (now St. John's) Church in Richmond to talk about what was on everyone's minds: the fact that people were starting to really, really be resentful of the Brits.

The Second Virginia Convention was divided into two factions: those who wanted to keep the peace with Great Britain by working to solve their problems through the usual diplomatic channels, and those who said "We've been trying that for ten years, and it hasn't worked so far. Let's try something else."

Guess which side Patrick Henry was on?

On March 23rd, 1775, Patrick Henry stood up to encourage the Second Virginia Convention to approve raising and arming a militia for "self-defense." He argued that the colonies had sought redress of grievances (a fancy term for the king saying sorry and fixing things) peacefully for as long as possible. He argued that all those soldiers Great Britain had been sending were clearly not on a peacekeeping mission. He argued that the longer the colonies waited to start a war, the weaker their position would be. And he wound up with the most famous line of the speech—you know, where he says he's willing to die for liberty.

It worked.

Not Quite Word For Word

After Henry spoke, the Second Virginia Convention approved five of his resolutions, with the result that Virginia formed a militia. The first shots of the American Revolution were fired at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts less than a month later, and within a few hours of those battles (and before he could have heard of them), Henry mobilized the Virginia militia to force Virginia governor Lord Dunmore to give back the gunpowder he had seized in response to Henry's speech.

But here's the thing about the speech we have today: it's not necessarily the one Henry gave. He didn't write his speech down, and no one else did either. So how do we have it? In 1808, nine years after Patrick Henry's death, William Wirt, who was three years old in 1775, began research for a Henry biography. He asked people who were there what Henry had said.

And, while most of the speech is a reconstruction based on other people's fuzzy, twenty-five-year-old memories, everyone seemed to recall the last line verbatim. That's probably because the last line of the speech is "Give me liberty or give me death," (we had to put it in one more time). And nobody—not after twenty-five years, not after two hundred and fifty—forgets a sentence that insanely inspirational.

Because of that kick-butt last line.

If you walk up to an average American Joe or Josephine—you know, someone who's not a Revolutionary War nerd and doesn't read Founding Father biographies for fun—and ask them about the Second Continental Congress, they'll probably look at you like you just asked them to state the GDP of Botswana circa 1972.

But if you ask them if they know who Patrick Henry is, their eyes will probably light up. And if you ask them, "Complete the sentence: give me liberty or…" they'll probably jump up onto the nearest table, shout "Give me death!" put on a tri-cornered hat, wave an American flag, and start weeping in a fit of patriotic fervor.

Everyone knows this line. It's seemingly programmed into the brains of all Americans along with a knowledge of the complete lyrics of Don McLeans "American Pie," the compulsion to eat candy corn at Halloween even though candy corn is kind of gross, and very strong opinions about the great Shake Shack/In-N-Out rivalry.

And there's a really good reason for this: if Thomas Paine was the written word of the Revolution, Patrick Henry was its spoken voice. The idea that liberty is more important than life—and is maybe the most important thing about the United States of America—entered the American imagination with Patrick Henry's words.

It's this idea that has defined most of the awesome things that America has done. (Yeah, we're going to get patriotic on you for a hot second.) Playing a major part in defeating Hitler and fascism? Fueled by the ideology of liberty or death. The right to practice your chosen religion? That's liberty in a nutshell. The fact that we're pretty amazing when it comes to social equality—you know, that whole "land of opportunity" thing? Liberty. Jazz? Jazz is basically distilled musical liberty, guys. Inventing airplanes? Um, you don't get much more liberated than when you're flying like a dang bird.

This isn't to say that America—or even Patrick Henry—is 100% freedom-fueled awesomeness. America has done some shameful things (like, say, slavery) and so did Patrick Henry (like, say, owning slaves).

But this is to say that both America and Henry's awesomeness is all about the liberty. What we've done that's great has been infused with the spirit of liberty or death. We're so amped up about getting our freedom on that we remember Patrick Henry's words two hundred and fifty years after he uttered them…and these words still give us the shivers.