As Above, So Below: Why a Person’s Birth Time Matters, and the First Breath of a Nation

​For years, David A. Wheatley has been the voice behind our Astrology Corner blog articles, helping our community navigate the cosmos with insight, wit, wisdom, and clarity.
As the universe moves in cycles, so do our personal journeys. Now, it’s time for David to step back from regularly writing astrological blogs to focus his incredible talent on other professional and creative endeavors.
David, may your journey forward be enriched and nourished with our gratitude for the wisdom you have shared. 
❤️ THANK YOU! ❤️ 
The great news is that this isn't a permanent goodbye. While he won't be writing on a regular schedule, you can still look forward to occasional guest posts and special feature articles from David – like this one.

by David A. Wheatley

​A natal or birth chart for anyone, person, or pet requires a birth date, time, and place on this planet. The time is converted to a zodiacal time; the town or location is converted to longitude and latitude. Once this information is put together, usually by a program designed to render a birth or natal chart, every other kind of astrological chart is produced. Once you have your birth chart printed on paper on the classic circular 12-sign zodiac, you can hold it up over your head and align north and east on the chart to north and east of your location. Now your printed chart shows approximately where all the planets and asteroids, if you include them, are at the exact moment of your birth. Every other kind of chart, such as an annual transit chart, secondary progressions, synastry, etc., all rely on the accuracy of your natal information and chart. 

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​There should be no shame in fudging the chart rising sign or Ascendant, moving it a couple degrees this way or that. Your intuition may suggest it's a little off, and that's often true because the recorded moment of our birth isn't always precise. 
Nurses are angelic people, but they are usually not astrologers, and recording your exact time of birth is not essential to them. Close is good enough very often. Consequently, a natal astrology chart may be a little off even though your birth certificate or your mother promises she was looking at her wristwatch at the exact moment you were born. Too often to be believed, I have been told by someone they were born exactly on the hour.
Ya, I bet you were. 

​Or the city commissioner says the official signing of the city's founding was exactly at 10 AM on a bright, sunny day. It was planned that way, but an extended speech or two later, contrary to the recorded minutes, results in the city’s founding moment at 10:13. A chart cast for 10 AM will be good but not great; the ascendant and midheaven will be wrong. The parts of signs that the 12 houses fall into will be off; the planets could be located in the completely wrong houses. The Moon moves through a whole 30-degree sign in less than three days; an error of minutes can locate the Moon in a natal chart in the wrong house and the wrong sign. 
So, when a natal chart is done without confidence in the birth certificate time, sometimes a rectification can be helpful to at least verify or put the planets in the correct houses:  this is a critical detail. A rectification chart for an established adult entity or person can be used to examine past events. In a person's chart, you would look for a wedding, funeral, a child's birth, a promotion, getting fired, being dumped by a partner, buying a new house or car, graduation, etc. These events show up in a natal chart and are telltale indicators of where, for example, an ascendant, descendant, or midheaven should be. 
​Having an approximate birth time is a helpful start, but in the case of a city or country, it can get very difficult to agree when the formal naming and signing of the event was. ​

For quite a long time, astrologers have agreed that the USA natal chart consensus was the Sibly chart. Some astrologers claim that other prior birth dates are relevant, days and weeks prior. There are some striking connections to these charts, which I would say, since we are always dealing with abstract multidimensional energies, make sense for a chart of a nation that these other charts from days or weeks before would be relevant, spread over time, not just one moment. Nevertheless, astrology is vague enough already, and to strive for precision is a noble intent. 
In the case of the USA natal chart, there's long been agreement that the Sibly chart gets the most votes. It seems to work. But could it work better? 

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This is the reason for my presenting this discussion. The US natal chart may have been refined because of work by historians without a care in the world for astrology. It appears to me that very good work has been done to clarify the historical moment at which the official birth, seal, and signing take place. The signing of a document is like a baby taking its first breath. The baby has been alive for nine months, but finally it is fully in the world breathing on its own. The nation's founding authors have been arguing and scribbling the founding documents, and finally the moment has come to gather with a finished document to sign and seal. Putting aside all the ceremony, just tell me the exact time that seal was put on the paper. 

In-depth research by a brilliant astrologer into the precise time used to cast the birth chart for the USA has led to significant changes that I believe are correct refinements to what astrologers should regard as the USA natal chart. And we have historians to thank for this, who continue to delve into letters and notes left by those involved in the production of the Declaration of Independence or the birth of the USA. 
The details are broadcast here:
https://theastrologypodcast.com/2026/08/07/the-libra-rising-birth-chart-of-the-united-states/

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David Wheatley can be reached at [email protected] for a personal astrological consultation.
​David is a gifted fine artist, muralist, and versatile "art detective".  
His professional art website is:  davidist8.wixsite.com/davidfinearts
He is also a musician, singer, songwriter, author, and an exceptional Tarot reader. 

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