Well, it’s almost the Fourth of July! In Omaha, that means several days of excessively loud noises; bright, flashy lights; a number of burned hands and other sorts of traumatic circumstances (hopefully without the loss of any eyes or too many burned kids); and veterans and dogs (among those) being upset by and, therefore, hiding from the racket. It always seems like celebrating the establishment of our country’s founding shouldn’t really require quite so much noise, but whatever. Now, I DO like fireworks in their place, but on into the night in my neighbor’s driveway and the street in front of of my house, doesn’t seem to me to be all that necessary, or appropriate. But, what do I know.
Well, he said, actually I think I know something. I’m quite sure that our forefathers had some idea of the exceptionally radical step they were taking in suggesting that the English colonies in America had the right to declare that they were unhappy being ruled by what had become, at least to their point of view, an essentially despotic foreign power, and that they wanted to be able to establish a government for themselves which, in their opinion, would better serve their needs.
Now, I offer this discussion as one of those who is descended (at least in part) from among those who were VERY early settlers in the English colonies in North America. I admit that I haven’t done ALL of the research supporting that idea myself, but a good deal of that work has been done by my sister, who I’m quite confident has consulted actual, publicly available sources and hasn’t just made it up. And, I know that this research has been reinforced by long-standing family records and stories.
So, I’m pretty comfortable in suggesting that I can trace members of my mother’s family back to the Mayflower in 1620, and, from it, to the Plymouth, Massachusetts “Plantation”, and from there to early Boston and Salem, MA. My father’s side is less clear, at least to me, but (apparently) can be traced back to pre-revolutionary Pennsylvania with a good deal of security, and it’s likely that there are connections to colonial Virginia on Dad’s side, as well. These known ancestors (both sides), contain at least ten, possibly more, who actually fought on the American side during the Revolutionary War. It’s also true that no slave-holders have been discovered on either side, although we can’t be absolutely certain that there couldn’t have been some. After all, owning slaves was a pretty common (and widely accepted) practice in many (if not ALL) of the colonies, including Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. Remember that Tituba, the slave of the Rev. Samuel Parris, the minister of Salem Village, was one of the first accused of witchcraft in the infamous Salem “Witch Trials,” so slavery WAS accepted at that time even in New England and by members of the clergy.
I don’t offer this as any sort of suggestion that I’m a better American (shouldn’t that really be “United Stater?”, since the people of Central and South American have just as much claim as we do to being “Americans”) than anybody else, but as minimal evidence that I have given these things some thought and have some knowledge about those times and the ideas which were common then. I have reached the conclusion that our Declaration of Independence (which is what we are supposed to be celebrating on the Fourth) isn’t generally understood very well and that there seem to be a lot of people who don’t have much knowledge of the reasoning behind its creation. That’s perhaps because we, as a people, have chosen to deemphasize the study of the FACTS of our history, in order to concentrate on the myths we would like to think of as true, but, all too often, weren’t (and still aren’t).
This MIGHT be due (at least in part) to the fact that we tend to look at the British government today, with it’s (largely ceremonial) monarch and it’s two-chamber Parliament (even though the House of Lords has, virtually, no legislative authority of any significance), and we assume that that government (which does resemble ours, superficially) is (and was) much like ours back in “those days.”. I would suggest that it really isn’t now, and, at that time, was even less like what we ended up with during the latter days of the Eighteenth Century.
One doesn’t have to look much further than the documents of the time, including the text of the Declaration (at the parts most people don’t read because they are “boring”) to discover that one really can’t honestly suggest that England could actually be considered anything approaching a “democracy” during this period, and the American colonies were even less so, as they were directly ruled by George III (the KING) at that point. By this I mean that George, personally, appointed the governors of the colonies to do his bidding (including not allowing any laws of which he, the KING, had not, personally, approved); HE established “legislative” bodies for these colonies which he (almost completely) controlled; HE levied taxes on the colonies without any representation of the colonies in ANY, meaningful, legislative body (locally in the colonies OR in England); HE refused to establish a neutral system of justice (which was, sort of, available in England, by making judges dependent on HIS good will for appointment, salary, etc.; HE sent the BRITISH army (solely answerable to him) to be housed, fed, and cared for by the colonies, but NOT subject to civilian justice, during a time of peace; and quite a raft of other actions which HE refused to even explain (let alone justify) to HIS colonies; etc. This, as it is argued in the Declaration, seems to establish that the King is (was) in fact, a TYRANT, and that HE, therefore, was “… unfit to be the ruler of a free people.” Of course, the notions of “free” people and self-rule were quite UNcommon (and rather radical) at that time, but they were growing in popularity, philosophically.
I mention this about this specific moment in our current history in response to the seeming current popularity of the notion that what this country currently needs is “a good, strong leader to take charge and solve our problems, once and for all.” I would suggest that this concept might be compared to the ideas which the so-called “Loyalists” among the colonists at that time might have espoused while suggesting that this “good, strong leader” was, of course, quite properly George III. Currently, someone else is being suggested as a plausible contemporary substitute for that position, and is, in fact, being advocated as an appropriate, and desirable, choice for such.
Perhaps we should remember what the British public discovered between 1649 and 1660, (when THEY declared themselves to be a republic and abolished the monarchy with, according to an unproven family legend, one of my ancestors believed to have been among the executioners, if not, in fact, the one who actually swung the axe on then King Charles I’s head.) You see, the English of the time discovered that it’s fairly easy to declare a republic, but somewhat harder to maintain one!
In fact, by 1653, a “Protectorate” was declared with Oliver Cromwell as the Lord Protector, who, essentially, “reigned” (much as a King would) until he died in 1658, at which point his son, Richard, became the next Lord Protector. The facts appear to be, however, that the Lords Protector hadn’t actually done much to keep the British people especially satisfied with their “rule,” so Richard was soon forced out due to Parliament’s asserting (and getting away with) establishing control not only of the legislative mechanism, but the military, as well. This would, eventually, lead to the Restoration of the Monarchy (which returned Charles II (son of Charles I) to a somewhat power reduced English throne in 1660.
In any case, I would suggest that the English (almost certainly including the colonists) had some understanding of the problems involved in abolishing a monarchistic system and establishing a more democratic one, but, apparently, enough of those colonists were sufficiently annoyed with George III’s autocratic rule that they figured that it was worth the effort to try to change it. And so, they did so by declaring their independence and fighting a Revolutionary War against the forces of the King. That war ended, for all intents and purposes at Yorktown in 1783, although the question of American independence wasn’t really settled until after the War of 1812, if you wish to be “picky.”
However, having declared Independence in 1776 (and fought a war to establish it, even if it wasn’t completely successful) they had to figure out what form a more satisfactory government might take. They first created a document known as “The Articles of Confederation.” It was ratified in 1781. It allowed for quite a high level of independence for the individual colonies (called “states” now) and established quite a weak, minimalistic, central government. As all US citizens should know, this form of government lasted only until 1789 because it lacked the ability to establish any sense of a unified country (let alone a real NATIONAL government) to deal with the challenges of an expanding nation. The delegates to the Confederation Congress soon discovered that the limitations they had placed upon the central government (such as in assembling delegates, raising funds, regulating commerce, or having any sort of functional NATIONAL military) rendered it quite ineffective. Among other issues, the individual states had little stake in supporting any notion with which they might disagree. And, as some states were more rural and others more industrial, there was a sort of divide which created other sorts of problems from the very beginning.
As a result of that fiasco, a Constitution was written and finally adopted in 1789. This, if you include the Amendments which have been made to it over the years since its adoption, is the document we have today. And, I would argue that it’s worked reasonably well. I do NOT think that it’s perfect and there are some changes which I would suggest that might allow it to work more smoothly in modern times. I think that the Electoral College, for example, is an anachronistic remnant of a bygone time. It’s worth noting, for example, that, while they couldn’t be “citizens,” slaves were counted (as three fifths of a person each) in establishing the rules for both taxation and for the numerical membership of the House of Representatives (and, therefore, the number of Presidential Electors) which a state might have. Of course, “Indians” were not counted as “people” at all, they were simply not counted. Here’s the actual quote from the original text related to that:
Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.
Excerpt From:The Constitution of the United States of America
https://books.apple.com/us/book/the-constitution-of-the-united-states-of-america/id985765595
This material may be protected by copyright.
This, of course, meant that states where slavery was common had a larger representation in the legislative arena than they would have had by just counting those who were actually considered to be “real” people (white males who owned property). Note that even “indentured servants” (at least the male ones), who, I believe, were, mostly Caucasian, were counted as “full people,” in spite of their, essentially, slave-like position in society. The true slaves were, obviously, not considered to be “real people,” but they were each counted as 3/5ths of one, which seems pretty obvious to have been a sop thrown to the “slave states” in order to gain a greater likelihood of adoption of the document.
It’s also true, of course that only property-owning, “white” males were actually “real” citizens, who were deemed capable of having the right to actually vote (or serve in public office), although I don’t think that is actually stated in the Constitution, although it DOES state that “Indians” were not counted at all (see above), so, apparently THEY were not to be considered as “people” either. There are some of these sort of issues (like female citizenship) which have been “modified” (corrected?) in Amendments, but I would suggest that some still remain, if we truly consider the facts.
Anyway, I have wandered through this history lesson because there seem to be a fair number of people running around the country these days claiming to be “Patriots” who don’t seem to have any real idea of what the Constitution actually says, why it says that, nor why their statements supporting someone who is (from his own statements) a real fan of autocratic leaders around the world and seems to be quite certain that the United States would be a much better place (at least for him and his friends) if everybody would just shut up and do what HE tells them to do (which, apparently, consists of abolishing the Constitution and letting “our great, fearless leader” just “solve” all questions which are government-related because of his “superior intelligence, knowledge, and hairstyle.”
Personally, I’m not buying it. I really don’t believe in just voting for a political party (ANY of them) and I do try to take a look at a candidate’s statements regarding the policies she/he supports and his/her track record (if any). I’ve yet to discover any candidate for any office for whom I have COMPLETE support, but I do believe (like Mark Twain) that:
Well, he said, actually I think I know something. I’m quite sure that our forefathers had some idea of the exceptionally radical step they were taking in suggesting that the English colonies in America had the right to declare that they were unhappy being ruled by what had become, at least to their point of view, an essentially despotic foreign power, and that they wanted to be able to establish a government for themselves which, in their opinion, would better serve their needs.
Now, I offer this discussion as one of those who is descended (at least in part) from among those who were VERY early settlers in the English colonies in North America. I admit that I haven’t done ALL of the research supporting that idea myself, but a good deal of that work has been done by my sister, who I’m quite confident has consulted actual, publicly available sources and hasn’t just made it up. And, I know that this research has been reinforced by long-standing family records and stories.
So, I’m pretty comfortable in suggesting that I can trace members of my mother’s family back to the Mayflower in 1620, and, from it, to the Plymouth, Massachusetts “Plantation”, and from there to early Boston and Salem, MA. My father’s side is less clear, at least to me, but (apparently) can be traced back to pre-revolutionary Pennsylvania with a good deal of security, and it’s likely that there are connections to colonial Virginia on Dad’s side, as well. These known ancestors (both sides), contain at least ten, possibly more, who actually fought on the American side during the Revolutionary War. It’s also true that no slave-holders have been discovered on either side, although we can’t be absolutely certain that there couldn’t have been some. After all, owning slaves was a pretty common (and widely accepted) practice in many (if not ALL) of the colonies, including Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. Remember that Tituba, the slave of the Rev. Samuel Parris, the minister of Salem Village, was one of the first accused of witchcraft in the infamous Salem “Witch Trials,” so slavery WAS accepted at that time even in New England and by members of the clergy.
I don’t offer this as any sort of suggestion that I’m a better American (shouldn’t that really be “United Stater?”, since the people of Central and South American have just as much claim as we do to being “Americans”) than anybody else, but as minimal evidence that I have given these things some thought and have some knowledge about those times and the ideas which were common then. I have reached the conclusion that our Declaration of Independence (which is what we are supposed to be celebrating on the Fourth) isn’t generally understood very well and that there seem to be a lot of people who don’t have much knowledge of the reasoning behind its creation. That’s perhaps because we, as a people, have chosen to deemphasize the study of the FACTS of our history, in order to concentrate on the myths we would like to think of as true, but, all too often, weren’t (and still aren’t).
This MIGHT be due (at least in part) to the fact that we tend to look at the British government today, with it’s (largely ceremonial) monarch and it’s two-chamber Parliament (even though the House of Lords has, virtually, no legislative authority of any significance), and we assume that that government (which does resemble ours, superficially) is (and was) much like ours back in “those days.”. I would suggest that it really isn’t now, and, at that time, was even less like what we ended up with during the latter days of the Eighteenth Century.
One doesn’t have to look much further than the documents of the time, including the text of the Declaration (at the parts most people don’t read because they are “boring”) to discover that one really can’t honestly suggest that England could actually be considered anything approaching a “democracy” during this period, and the American colonies were even less so, as they were directly ruled by George III (the KING) at that point. By this I mean that George, personally, appointed the governors of the colonies to do his bidding (including not allowing any laws of which he, the KING, had not, personally, approved); HE established “legislative” bodies for these colonies which he (almost completely) controlled; HE levied taxes on the colonies without any representation of the colonies in ANY, meaningful, legislative body (locally in the colonies OR in England); HE refused to establish a neutral system of justice (which was, sort of, available in England, by making judges dependent on HIS good will for appointment, salary, etc.; HE sent the BRITISH army (solely answerable to him) to be housed, fed, and cared for by the colonies, but NOT subject to civilian justice, during a time of peace; and quite a raft of other actions which HE refused to even explain (let alone justify) to HIS colonies; etc. This, as it is argued in the Declaration, seems to establish that the King is (was) in fact, a TYRANT, and that HE, therefore, was “… unfit to be the ruler of a free people.” Of course, the notions of “free” people and self-rule were quite UNcommon (and rather radical) at that time, but they were growing in popularity, philosophically.
I mention this about this specific moment in our current history in response to the seeming current popularity of the notion that what this country currently needs is “a good, strong leader to take charge and solve our problems, once and for all.” I would suggest that this concept might be compared to the ideas which the so-called “Loyalists” among the colonists at that time might have espoused while suggesting that this “good, strong leader” was, of course, quite properly George III. Currently, someone else is being suggested as a plausible contemporary substitute for that position, and is, in fact, being advocated as an appropriate, and desirable, choice for such.
Perhaps we should remember what the British public discovered between 1649 and 1660, (when THEY declared themselves to be a republic and abolished the monarchy with, according to an unproven family legend, one of my ancestors believed to have been among the executioners, if not, in fact, the one who actually swung the axe on then King Charles I’s head.) You see, the English of the time discovered that it’s fairly easy to declare a republic, but somewhat harder to maintain one!
In fact, by 1653, a “Protectorate” was declared with Oliver Cromwell as the Lord Protector, who, essentially, “reigned” (much as a King would) until he died in 1658, at which point his son, Richard, became the next Lord Protector. The facts appear to be, however, that the Lords Protector hadn’t actually done much to keep the British people especially satisfied with their “rule,” so Richard was soon forced out due to Parliament’s asserting (and getting away with) establishing control not only of the legislative mechanism, but the military, as well. This would, eventually, lead to the Restoration of the Monarchy (which returned Charles II (son of Charles I) to a somewhat power reduced English throne in 1660.
In any case, I would suggest that the English (almost certainly including the colonists) had some understanding of the problems involved in abolishing a monarchistic system and establishing a more democratic one, but, apparently, enough of those colonists were sufficiently annoyed with George III’s autocratic rule that they figured that it was worth the effort to try to change it. And so, they did so by declaring their independence and fighting a Revolutionary War against the forces of the King. That war ended, for all intents and purposes at Yorktown in 1783, although the question of American independence wasn’t really settled until after the War of 1812, if you wish to be “picky.”
However, having declared Independence in 1776 (and fought a war to establish it, even if it wasn’t completely successful) they had to figure out what form a more satisfactory government might take. They first created a document known as “The Articles of Confederation.” It was ratified in 1781. It allowed for quite a high level of independence for the individual colonies (called “states” now) and established quite a weak, minimalistic, central government. As all US citizens should know, this form of government lasted only until 1789 because it lacked the ability to establish any sense of a unified country (let alone a real NATIONAL government) to deal with the challenges of an expanding nation. The delegates to the Confederation Congress soon discovered that the limitations they had placed upon the central government (such as in assembling delegates, raising funds, regulating commerce, or having any sort of functional NATIONAL military) rendered it quite ineffective. Among other issues, the individual states had little stake in supporting any notion with which they might disagree. And, as some states were more rural and others more industrial, there was a sort of divide which created other sorts of problems from the very beginning.
As a result of that fiasco, a Constitution was written and finally adopted in 1789. This, if you include the Amendments which have been made to it over the years since its adoption, is the document we have today. And, I would argue that it’s worked reasonably well. I do NOT think that it’s perfect and there are some changes which I would suggest that might allow it to work more smoothly in modern times. I think that the Electoral College, for example, is an anachronistic remnant of a bygone time. It’s worth noting, for example, that, while they couldn’t be “citizens,” slaves were counted (as three fifths of a person each) in establishing the rules for both taxation and for the numerical membership of the House of Representatives (and, therefore, the number of Presidential Electors) which a state might have. Of course, “Indians” were not counted as “people” at all, they were simply not counted. Here’s the actual quote from the original text related to that:
Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.
Excerpt From:The Constitution of the United States of America
https://books.apple.com/us/book/the-constitution-of-the-united-states-of-america/id985765595
This material may be protected by copyright.
This, of course, meant that states where slavery was common had a larger representation in the legislative arena than they would have had by just counting those who were actually considered to be “real” people (white males who owned property). Note that even “indentured servants” (at least the male ones), who, I believe, were, mostly Caucasian, were counted as “full people,” in spite of their, essentially, slave-like position in society. The true slaves were, obviously, not considered to be “real people,” but they were each counted as 3/5ths of one, which seems pretty obvious to have been a sop thrown to the “slave states” in order to gain a greater likelihood of adoption of the document.
It’s also true, of course that only property-owning, “white” males were actually “real” citizens, who were deemed capable of having the right to actually vote (or serve in public office), although I don’t think that is actually stated in the Constitution, although it DOES state that “Indians” were not counted at all (see above), so, apparently THEY were not to be considered as “people” either. There are some of these sort of issues (like female citizenship) which have been “modified” (corrected?) in Amendments, but I would suggest that some still remain, if we truly consider the facts.
Anyway, I have wandered through this history lesson because there seem to be a fair number of people running around the country these days claiming to be “Patriots” who don’t seem to have any real idea of what the Constitution actually says, why it says that, nor why their statements supporting someone who is (from his own statements) a real fan of autocratic leaders around the world and seems to be quite certain that the United States would be a much better place (at least for him and his friends) if everybody would just shut up and do what HE tells them to do (which, apparently, consists of abolishing the Constitution and letting “our great, fearless leader” just “solve” all questions which are government-related because of his “superior intelligence, knowledge, and hairstyle.”
Personally, I’m not buying it. I really don’t believe in just voting for a political party (ANY of them) and I do try to take a look at a candidate’s statements regarding the policies she/he supports and his/her track record (if any). I’ve yet to discover any candidate for any office for whom I have COMPLETE support, but I do believe (like Mark Twain) that:
Unfortunately, that doesn’t appear to be a very common notion these days, when the desire for maintaining personal political power seems to be the major motivating force for many of our so-called political leaders, especially the ones who have aligned themselves in “the cult of the orange Jesus.” Perhaps they need some advice from Non Sequitur’s Obviousman.
Oh, well. I suppose that I have to have faith that the American Electorate won’t allow the political ne’er-do-wells to actually succeed in destroying our Constitution and (by that means) our at least somewhat democratic government. I am even naive enough to think that we, as a country, just MIGHT actually learn something from recent experiences and take at least some small steps towards actually achieving “a more perfect union.” I confess that it is pretty easy to doubt that much is going to happen along those lines, however.
As a couple of the ladies suggested in a Shoe not too long ago,
As a couple of the ladies suggested in a Shoe not too long ago,
I’ll be back in a couple of weeks, I hope. If the Good Lord’s willing and the Proud Boys don’t get me! In the meantime, I intend to follow the advice of Stephen Hopkins quoted below.
🖖🏼 LLAP,
Dr. B
🖖🏼 LLAP,
Dr. B
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