In honor of our country’s 250th anniversary, I’d like to share with all my readers some contributions that several women have made to America.

Perhaps the biggest struggle remaining in this country is the advancement of inclusion for the disability community.

At their core, the American women I am about to discuss will leave you more committed to investing in life than you ever were before. It will expand your desire to keep going and challenging yourselves and to make possible societal transformation. These actions will invite you to become your best self. They will cause you to become engaged in making life better for you and for others in our world. Your determination and passion will become an offering and an investment in the world, as you long for it to be.

The first person we’re going to look at is Emma Lazarus. She wrote the poem that has stood on the Statue of Liberty since 1903. This poem symbolized the United States welcoming immigrants from around the world to its home. She showed her Jewish spiritual values.

As my grandmother used to say every day since she came to America to escape the pogroms of Russia in 1900, “This is the golden land. And we should welcome everyone with open arms, as we used to.”

We are now exploring Alice Paul, the woman who finally got the Nineteenth Amendment passed. This gave women the right to vote in the United States. She was so committed to that task that she endured imprisonment and forced feeding. Just as I endured a lifetime of mental, emotional, and physical demoralization.

Even though Karen Lynn-Chlup of Whispers of Hope crossed the emotional bridge by being labeled and facing the degradation and humiliation of it all and that horrible diagnosis—‘Mentally Retarded’—it affected her, rather than the entire country. There are strong similarities. Society limited voting for women. Society misunderstood immigrants. Society also misunderstood and still misunderstands the disabled population with cerebral palsy and a learning disability (dyslexia).

These organizations wanted and still want people with disabilities to be isolated outcasts, out of the public’s eye, isolated in workshops and institutions. Those two women taught me how to fight the good fight and stand up for myself in a world that did not accept me at all. I would not be the example and person I am today if it were not for these women who came before me. They gave me the courage and strength to move my own life’s mountain forward. That gallantry gave me the fearlessness to inspire the men and women, brothers and sisters around the world who have come after me to do the impossible and believe in themselves.

In this world today, we must look at the past in order to learn from and move through our lens of discrimination. For the last seventy years and more, we have fought the good fight but never really resolved any of the issues at hand fully. The struggle has continued because the experts refuse to acknowledge that they are wrong or when they are wrong. And they refuse to understand that the person living with the disability actually knows more than they do, despite their advanced education.

In order to become a more perfect person and union, we must protect, practice our principles, and recognize the contributions of many people. By demonstrating these principles, we are creating a more perfect union.

Each has led us in our country, rededicated themselves, to living up to the country and its best self.

Have you stood up to adversity? Are you transforming your life or someone close to you? And, are you making a difference and contributing to society’s causes? Bravo to all of you! Keep doing the very best you can. One day it will come to pass. That’s all that any of us can do. Right! I am confident that your actions are making a huge difference. If you have contributed, please share with our community in the comments below.

Text ©2026 by Karen Lynn-Chlup. Image courtesy of Wikimedia.