Five things I most like about the fourth of July:
1) fireworks
2) memories of people with whom I’ve watched fireworks
3) memory fragments of July 4 picnics when I was a kid
4) the history of American Independence
5) modern air conditioning
1) Despite my empathy for all the pets and people who are jolted and panicked by the explosives, I still enjoy the colorful displays against a darkened sky: reds and greens, blues and whites, oranges and yellows…dancing and floating… flittering and streaking across the firmament.
2) Even more pleasant to me than the thought of color in the sky is the remembrance of people who’ve joined me in the audience. When I was almost 10, we took a major family camping trip to South Dakota, setting up our tent in Custer State Park. You’ve heard the phrase, God willing and the creek don’t rise…? Well, the creek rose. And the rains kept coming. We were forced to pull up our tent and lodge with my grandmother’s cousin who lived in nearby Rapid City. From her house atop a hill I sat with my parents and brothers and watched the fireworks below.
In 1976, the 200th anniversary of the Independence Day, I was in front of the White House in Washington D.C., along with a million other people, watching the fireworks. Later on, as the kids were growing up, we saw fireworks all over the country, as we were usually somewhere on vacation: Vermont, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Iowa… In Urbana, we organized picnics for Chinese scholars every July 4. I would give a talk on the history of the day, thank them for the invention of fireworks (invented in China), and we would all look upward while the skies exploded in glory.
3) I have a few childhood memory fragments of July 4 church and family picnics. The Pierce E.U.B. church, which my dad served during my early elementary years, had an annual July 4 picnic at a county park. There were probably 150 people there. We kids hiked the trails while the adults fussed getting food on the tables. At noon, my dad gave the prayer and we joined the long line to fill our plates: dish after delicious dish spread out on a row of picnic tables lined up in the middle of the picnic shelter. It was a glorious bacchanal of dietary anarchy. The ritual in the afternoon was the church softball game. At least 50 of us, all ages, split into two teams. You would think it is really hard to get a base hit when there are 25 people playing defense. But only about three players on each team were any good. And so a fun time was had by all.
4) Okay, enough of the lofty language and the fond memories of the Fourth: it’s time to get down and dirty with history. From the beginning, we Americans have never liked someone else telling us what to do. Consequently, we’ve always harbored antagonism against the government. We also have an attitude about cops, teachers, preachers, parents, bosses, and experts of all kinds. We are a young country at heart, and to be an American is to live in a constant state of pubescent rebellion against authority in general. If we do not get our way, we are ever protesting, whether it be with lofty rhetoric, ultimatums for entitlement, or outright insurrection. And of course, the more alcohol we’ve imbibed, the more boorish our behavior.
American independence began in colonial taverns and drinking houses, as men sat around and complained about King George, the parliament, and the British lackies running the colonial governments. Alcohol fueled skirmishes between colonists and British soldiers were common. But the rowdiness remained disorganized for many years
By 1774, however, King George was about to honk off even his most devoted supporters in the colonies: men like Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, and John Adams. These were the conservatives of their day: men of means, education, and savvy. Instead of cracking down on the crackpots (such as the perpetrators of the Boston Tea Party), King George decided to punish everyone in the colonies. The Americans responded by calling a “Continental Congress” in 1774. Thus was the “revolution” shepherded out of the taverns and into Carpenter’s Hall in Philadelphia. For the first time, Americans from distant colonies met each other and collaborated face to face.
The First Continental Congress tried to humor King George. But he would have none of it. In 1775, the Second Continental Congress was called. Meanwhile, Americans re-organized local militia for their protection. In Massachusetts, townships drafted all men between 16 and 50. Only students, professors, Quakers, clergymen, and the mentally incompetent were exempt. Certain men were known as “Minutemen,” ready at a minute’s notice to ambush the British soldiers if they offended. Thus, when the British tried to confiscate a stash of militia weapons in Concord, Massachusetts, in the spring of 1775, the minutemen attacked. King George sent more soldiers, including 18,000 rented German soldiers. German princes were paid seven pounds for each soldier on loan, double for those who got killed.
By the summer of 1775, the war was on. For the Americans, Virginian George Washington was appointed by the Second Continental Congress to lead the colonists in a united effort against the British. While total British forces were never less than 50,000 (often as high as 90,000), Washington had to make do with hastily organized militias. He never had more than 18,000 men at his command, and often had to work with less than 5,000. Quantity wasn’t his only problem. He also complained about the quality of his men, noting their “unaccountable kind of stupidity…a mixed multitude…with very little discipline, order, or government.” In other words, while the inebriated no longer led the revolution, some did join the fight in the field.
Simultaneous to the meetings of the continental congresses, hotheads such as Patrick Henry and Thomas Paine gave speeches and wrote pamphlets that created a critical mass for change.
John Adams was the driving force of the Second Continental Congress. On May 15, 1776, he managed to pass a resolution calling for new governments in each colony, governments that would NOT be controlled by the King. On June 7, Henry Lee of Virginia made a motion that “these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states.” The motion passed, finally, on July 2, 1776. Meanwhile, a committee was selected to draw up the reasons for this independence. Led by Thomas Jefferson, the committee presented its work to the Continental Congress after the vote for independence. The congress spent three days amending it. Finally, on July 4, 1776, the Second Continental Congress approved the declaration, a rationale for its July 2 vote.
In addition to the lofty words about human rights, the declaration also blamed King George for everything wrong in the world except bad weather. In fact, the Declaration of Independence is 90% negative political advertising. Read the whole thing: it’s kind of an embarrassment in some places! But we overlook its problems because of its soaring rhetoric at the beginning.
A printer was hired to make 200 copies of the document. Only 35 or so survive until today. Only one handwritten copy was signed by the delegates (in August): it can be seen in the National Archives building in Washington D.C. The congress threw a party for independence on July 8 in Philadelphia. George Washington and his troops heard the news on July 9. Word didn’t make it to Georgia until August 10. And King George didn’t get word that the Americans had flown the coop until August 30.
John Adams always felt that our true independence day was July 2, the day the congress first voted for independence. He wrote, “The second day of July, 1776… ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other.”
Adams was to be elected the president of the United States 20 years later. And true to the American spirit, we rebelled against his suggestion that July 2 be the celebration. We’ll celebrate when we’re good and ready, like the Fourth of July… not when some authority tells us to.
And so America was born in a most unruly fashion. John Adams had a perfectly sensible script for American independence. But none of it worked out as he had strategized. While the colonies won their freedom in the Revolutionary War, most people living in them continued to be unfree… due to one demographic deficiency or another. We’re still trying to work it all out. We’re still angry. We’re still occasionally eloquent. We’re still puddled into self-interest groups, each demanding some sort of entitlement. And we’re still vulnerable to the coarsest among us toppling the whole system. The story of July 4 is where we see all the heat, and not just because it’s July.
5) Which brings me to that last thing I like about July Fourth: air conditioning, a respite for cooling off, a literal relief for July’s weather… and a metaphorical relief for this combustible quality we can’t live without: independence. The words of John Greenleaf Whittier still resonate with me: Drop thy still dews of quietness, till all our strivings cease; take from our souls the strain and stress, and let our ordered lives confess the beauty of thy peace. Breathe through the heats of our desire thy coolness and thy balm... speak through the earthquake, wind, and fire, O still small voice of calm."
Happy Fourth.
