This should be an easy post to write, but somehow it isn’t. Despite the fact that we’re living in times of prosperity unimaginable even twenty years ago, there’s still a kind of fin de siecle feeling in the air, a feeling filtering down somehow from our elites. Peggy Noonan wrote a dreary piece some months back about how families are taking their children to the mall to buy them one more pair of faded jeans - not that they need any more jeans, mind: It’s just that they’re doing what they can while they can. Getting it while the getting’s good. As though it might soon be over. We’re at war overseas. We seem to be at war with each other. What’s to celebrate?
And that’s the problem I’m having with this post - it’s just that this kind of pessimism is so not us. After all, the document whose birthday we celebrate today famously promised us the optimistic ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. You wonder how many of the Signers swallowed a bit at that: They had to be all too familiar with life in the late 18th century (nasty, brutish and short, as a rule), liberty (except in the south, for people of color, and in the north, for indentured servants regardless of color) and those pursuits of happiness (available certainly to the landed gentry, but rather down-rung on the hierarchy of needs for those looking to 1) keep their scalps, while 2) finding some land to 3) grow a little sustenance on). But that was the world they knew, and the Signers took it on the volley, and hit it back cross-court. At the famous risk of their lives, their fortune and their sacred honor, it must be remembered. They had a vision of perfection in mind, I think, but they also took pragmatic satisfaction in the achievable good.
Oh, the old scrap also fussed a bit about old King George, and his naughty habits, his quartering of soldiers, and his propensity to call “together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.” But it must also be pointed out that the opening paragraphs dealing with “self-evident” rights was blatant false advertising - it bore no relation to the world as it was then known. There were very few “rights” which adhered to the governed, apart from those that lesser nobles had prised from the dead hand of murdered royals over the centuries, and which they had, in turn, conceded in some small portion to those unhappy souls whose quietude might be purchased by the favor of an uncertain voice in Parliament, along with the sense that, in any private disagreement, the common man might get a fair hearing from a jury of his peers.
It was a long way from there to here, and John Adam’s “country of laws, not men.”
It purchased us a fight, that scroll, and a near-run fight at that. The Continental Army lost nearly every battle - nearly every one that is, until the last. They won by refusing to be entirely defeated, by remaining in the field and, it must be admitted, by virtue of the emerging sentiment among the upper and middle British classes that all of this hideously expensive inter-familial butchery was not at all the thing. One does not slaughter one’s cousins, if one can avoid it.
But having won the greater victories along the very short trajectory of our nationhood - the destruction of slavery, fascism, and communism, to name just a few mouldering abominations - we still find it within ourselves to frown across the table at each other here at home. “We are a nation divided,” comes the common lamentation, along with the broad hint that we could be more unified, if only.
If only you hadn’t voted for Bush. Twice.
If only you wouldn’t burn the flag.
If only you were in favor of single-payer health care.
If only you believed in personal responsibility.
If only Europe loved us more.
If only you didn’t care so much what Europe thought.
If only the war was over.
If only the war was won.
If only gays had full marriage rights.
If only they got back in the closet.
And more along these lines, but little that really matters any more than these. Look back up at that list - it’s silly, isn’t it? These are our “divisions”? These are the things that send partisans to the barricades? Piffle.
“Divided” was Cold Harbor, where on a foggy morning in early June, 1863, 7000 bold bluecoats marched down to meet my Virginian forefathers, who laid them low at little cost, to little gain. Divided was Antietam, where on a single day, 23,000 American casualties fell to American fire. Divided was Chancellorsville, where 30,000 Americans on either side fell over four days.
Much was lost in those bloody years, but much more remained besides. Enough to send 115,00 Americans to their deaths 50 years later, and another 400,000 Americans some 30 years after that. Men who died to give back to Europe, and to others, the liberties that they themselves could not acquire, or could not maintain.
If it’s true that our future is uncertain, it’s equally true that it always has been thus. We weren’t promised liberty, we wrested it away from those who would withhold it from us. We weren’t given the rule of law, we created it. We’ve gotten nothing from this world that we haven’t built with our own hands, or hacked out of the ground. Despite all the little things that divide us - amplified by the new megaphone that allows even the most wretched among us an equal voice - so many more things unite us, even when we take them for granted. We still have that vision of the city on the hill, even when we can’t agree exactly what it looks like.
In the face or unimaginable darkness, our forefathers somehow gave us hope. They deeded to us the ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Over the centuries, we successfully passed these on to others, some by dint of example, others by force of arms. Not all of them were grateful at the time, not all of those who once were grateful are grateful still, but never mind - it is the nature of man to forget a kindness, and nurture a grievance.
Today, we have young men and women willing to give their last full measure of devotion to ensure our children have those hopes too. They stand atop the shoulders of young men and women who gave their all over the years to give us the right to frown across the table at each other. Who stand upon the shoulders of those who pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor to the prospect
That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do.
Celebrate that.
17 responses so far ↓
1
Don D
// Jul 3, 2006 at 5:04 pm
Happy Birthday to the USA.
Maybe not perfect, but by far the best.
2 Marvin's Word // Jul 3, 2006 at 5:31 pm
The Gettysburg Address…
It is rather for us the living, we here be dedicated to the great task remaining before us–that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion–that we here highly resolve …..
3
Ima Fake
// Jul 3, 2006 at 6:30 pm
Nice post. It is unusual to see slavery and indentured servitude treated as the same. There is an attitude that ignores the plight of the indentured servants as if chopping cotton was easer if you would get your freedom the year after you died.
Once I turned an Irish soccer buddy on to a spliff and the Wailers. ?¢‚Ǩ?ìFour hundred years! That?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s it, only four f?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢ing hundred years. Lightweights.?¢‚Ǩ¬ù
?¢‚Ǩ?ìWe hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their creator with inherent and inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, & the pursuit of happiness: that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, & to institute new government, laying it’s foundation on such principles, & organizing it’s powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety & happiness.?¢‚Ǩ¬ù
4
Skippy-san
// Jul 3, 2006 at 7:11 pm
I’m a big reader of alternative history. Many consider it a pointless endeavor, but I find it a great way to see how random acts come together and make a nations destiny. Americans tend to forget how fortunate they are; the declaration and the outcome of the revolution were both near run things. A couple of breaks the other way and God Save the Queen would be playing over Richmond these days……….
That alone is something to celebrate…….
5
riceburner147
// Jul 3, 2006 at 8:51 pm
I live in Washingtons Crossing. I consider Him to be (with all His human faults) to be the greatest American to ever live. 8* years of struggle with 2/3’s of the nation against him and His cause. Amen to your post !
6 Anonymous // Jul 4, 2006 at 5:09 am
Happy 4th Lex and, as I wrote to my Marine pen pal one Christmas, “It is people like you that allow me to light my tree and gather my loved ones in peace and joy.”
It is going to rain here today but, our BBQ WILL go on and, we will think of all our fellow American’s so far away that would be delighted to be on American soil, enjoying some ribs and corn in a driving rain storm. Hoist a cool, frosty one for those that can’t…
7
tblubrd
// Jul 4, 2006 at 7:49 am
Great post Lex. Yes, maybe a little pessimistic but sometimes the truth hurts? It’s good to see the perspective of our differences in a much bigger picture. Makes them seem smaller, for sure. You are correct in that our future is uncertain and that it always has been. That is missed by many who look back and don’t see what those risks were and the chances we took as we got here. And we are doing it again - but as one commenter on another blog noted - “We are forgetting September 10th.”
8
Kris, in New England
// Jul 4, 2006 at 9:20 am
“…We?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢ve gotten nothing from this world that we haven?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢t built with our own hands, or hacked out of the ground…”
Lex, this is the crux of how I feel being an American. We’ve done it on our own - at great peril many times - and it’s what makes us unique.
A hearty toast to all those who ensured that the earliest sacrifices made for this great nation were not wasted.
Happy Birthday America! God Bless You and all who seek shelter here.
9 The Glittering Eye » Blog Archive » Catching my eye on the Fourth of July, 2006 // Jul 4, 2006 at 12:31 pm
[...] Neptunus Lex posts a reflection on the things that divide us and what should unite us. [...]
10
Paul Powondra
// Jul 4, 2006 at 1:30 pm
Lex, the descendants of those who fought for the Stars and Bars at Cold Harbor, Antietam, Shiloh, Gettysburg and many other engagements are today some of the staunchest, proudest, and loudest supporters of the Red, White, and Blue.
I reflect often about the loss of those 600,000 Americans (on both sides).
11
CPT J
// Jul 4, 2006 at 1:58 pm
echoing Pauls’s thoughts:
Our Civil War reenactors, the “living historians” who volunteer their time to educate the public and make historicaly accurate movies and TV documentaries, perform a vital public service in this age when most Americans don’t know their own story. Many reenactors say that when the mock “battle” is over and the “dead” rise up once more, that they experience an immediate emotional connection with the past. And also the personal grace of reconciliation.
“The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.” –Abraham Lincoln
12
Ima Fake
// Jul 4, 2006 at 2:15 pm
CPT,
We never had a civil war.
13
CPT J
// Jul 4, 2006 at 2:26 pm
Ima, guess you’re right there–wasn’t much “civil” about it.
Call it the “War of Northern Aggression”, as I learned it growing up in Virgina, or the “War of the Rebellion” as the bronze plaques say up here in Vermont.
Whatever it was, the granite statues leaning on their muskets ain’t saying. They just watch the seasons go by and the generations follow in their turn.
And maybe that’s the way it should be.
14
Paul Powondra
// Jul 4, 2006 at 5:28 pm
CPT J, I guess it’s all a matter of perspective. I was in England in 1976 during the Bicentennial and went down to London to see the British honoring the event. Imagine my surprise to see their view on our Revolution - the Patriots were referred to as “rebels”. Took a bit for that to sink in, but by God, that’s indeed what they were! Never heard of a rebel yell in the Revolution though.
15
badbob
// Jul 4, 2006 at 5:30 pm
Happy Bithday America!
I am unapologetic when I say that the USA is the best nation mankind has ever produced by far! Precious liberty may often be taken for granted by a sizeable portion of the citizenry but when hasn’t it always been so?
As it took less than a majority to create it, it still takes less folks to truly sustain it. For those past, present and future who make it work as grateful and participating citizens, soldier and civilian alike, I salute you.
B2
16
Jeff
// Jul 4, 2006 at 7:43 pm
“The American Revolution was a beginning, not a consummation. ”
-Woodrow Wilson
17
Barb
// Jul 5, 2006 at 9:05 am
Excellent post, Lex — So much more to unite us, if we would but remember it. Thank you and yours for wearing the uniform and standing tall to defend the US!
Leave a Comment