Reception at 5:00 pm | Lecture at 6:00 pm

Matthew Spalding will tell the story of the creation of the Declaration of Independence and consider its intellectual origins and meaning, with a particular focus on the contributions of James Wilson, the greatest jurisprudential mind among the signers of that great document.

This event is supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities as part of the James Wilson Institute's celebration of the 250th Anniversary of the Signing of the Declaration of Independence.

Matthew Spalding is the Kirby Professor in Constitutional Government and Dean of the Van Andel Graduate School of Government at Hillsdale College and oversees the Allan P. Kirby, Jr. Center for Constitutional Studies and Citizenship at Hillsdale’s Washington, D.C. campus. His new book, The Making of the American Mind: The Making of Our Declaration of Independence, was released in December 2025. Spalding is also the best-selling author of We Still Hold These Truths: Rediscovering Our Principles, Reclaiming Our Future and the original executive editor of The Heritage Guide to the Constitution, the first line-by-line analysis of each clause of the U.S. Constitution.

Appointed executive director of the President’s Advisory 1776 Commission, which produced The 1776 Report, he is currently a senior academic advisor for America250 projects. Prior to joining Hillsdale, Spalding was vice president for American Studies at The Heritage Foundation and founding director of its B. Kenneth Simon Center for Principles and Politics.

He is a senior fellow at the Claremont Institute for the Study of Statesmanship and Political Philosophy and serves on the boards of The Steamboat Institute, Faith & Law, the James Wilson Institute, and New College of Florida. He received his BA from Claremont McKenna College and his MA and PhD from the Claremont Graduate School.