The column below reflects the views of the author, and these opinions are neither endorsed nor supported by WisOpinion.com.

The older I get, the more history matters to me. As we have gotten closer to America’s 250th birthday, I have spent a lot of time thinking about our Founding Fathers and those who laid the foundation for this great country. 

When we think about leaders like George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson, we think about them as larger than life figures that we see in paintings and read about in history books. However, it is important to remember that these were real people. Many of our founding fathers enjoyed high status and positions. Some had successful businesses and others had farms. They all had everything to lose.

It is easy to look back and think that freedom was inevitable. History tells us this was not the case. The fight for independence was an uphill fight for a scrappy, underdog group of colonists. The safest thing for them to do was nothing. It would have been easier to stick with the status quo, enjoy their lifestyles as citizens of the richest empire on earth, deciding that the price of rocking the boat was too great. But they stuck their necks out and attempted something that the world had never seen on such a large scale before: a nation that was self-governing.

Many of them suffered. They lost status, property, fortune, friends and neighbors, and for some, even their own lives. That is real courage. Courage to take a risk without the benefit of knowing if they would succeed.

After winning, they had a blank slate. There was no template for creating their new nation. There was no instruction manual for building a government capable of preserving liberty while remaining accountable to its people. The creation of the branches of government, how much power to give the executive branch, what powers should be reserved for the states – these questions were all the product of debate, disagreement, compromise, and careful thought.

This experiment, which we call democracy, gives us a lot of freedom. Along with this freedom comes immense responsibility. As I have been reflecting on America 250, that is a theme that sticks out to me. The freedoms that we enjoy and the success of the American experiment were not guaranteed. They were not handed to us by history. 

In our lives today, we have always known these things, so we take them for granted. If you study history, you realize how lucky we are. For nearly all of human history people did not enjoy the freedoms that we do today in America. In many parts of the world, they still don’t. This is part of what makes our story so remarkable. The effort did not end in 1776. 

As Ronald Reagan said, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it on to our children in the bloodstream. The only way they can inherit the freedom we have known is if we fight for it, protect it, defend it, and then hand it to them with the well fought lessons of how they in their lifetime must do the same.” Every generation since the founding has continued the fight in some way. Whether they built institutions and community cornerstones, immigrated to seek a better life, fought for freedom overseas, or fought for equality here at home, we are here now because those who came before us fought tirelessly and selflessly to protect our liberties and freedoms. 

Now, on America’s 250th anniversary, it is our turn. It is up to us to continue the legacy of the great American experiment. A free society only survives when we choose to preserve it. Freedom is not inevitable, it is fragile.

The question facing us is the same one that has faced every generation before us: What legacy will we leave behind? Will we leave our children and grandchildren a country that is stronger and freer than the one we inherited? Will we work hard to ensure our communities thrive and our state is in good hands? This responsibility belongs to each of us as Americans.

250 years ago, a great generation of Americans took a big risk for the idea of freedom, and left us with the greatest country the world has ever seen. Do not take that for granted. Do your part to make sure that future generations can celebrate America’s 275th, 300th, and 350th anniversary. 

When future Americans celebrate this great country, let them look back on us and say that we were good stewards of the inheritance we received and that we did our part to keep the flame of liberty burning for generations to come.

Howard Marklein represents Wisconsin’s 17th Senate District in the state legislature. The district includes all of Crawford, Grant, Green, Iowa and Lafayette counties, as well as the southwest corner of Dane County.