We’re coming up on the 4th of July which is my favorite holiday to explain to my friends here in Scotland. Most of them know that it’s a big celebration in the US but they’re a little bit fuzzy on the ‘why’. If I’m honest, I think some folks in the US are also a little bit unclear about why we celebrate it. Or maybe they remember the general gist of it, but not too many of the particulars.
To put it simply: July 4th, 1776 was the day that the American colonies formally declared their independence from Great Britain. And they declared their independence by signing a document titled, conveniently, ‘The Declaration of Independence.’ This document was mailed to the King who was, understandably, not too happy about it. But who is ‘they’? Who signed this world-changing document?
Well the folks who signed the Declaration of Independence were a group of men elected to represent each of the 13 colonies, who had been sent to Philadelphia to figure out what to do about the ongoing tensions with Great Britain. Together they made up the Continental Congress. Among them were some famous names, such as Benjamin Franklin, representing Pennsylvania, and Thomas Jefferson, who wrote the Declaration itself, from Virginia (For more about the Declaration and also the founders’ diverging positions on American slavery, see this post from a few years back).
Another member of the Continental Congress was my personal favorite of America’s founders: John Adams. I’ve written a lot about John Adams in the past, so this will come as no surprise to longtime readers. One of my first ever posts was on the HBO John Adams miniseries. I also wrote this post in November 2020, during the last US Presidential election, about John and his wife Abigail Adams’ advice for living through turbulent times. Adams wrote in his diary in 1774 about his own feelings of inadequacy and his fears that none of the men around him were up the challenges they faced:
I muse, I mope, I ruminate (…) The Objects before me, are too grand, for me and multifarious for my Comprehension. – We have not Men, fit for the Times. We are deficient in Genius, in Education, in Travel, in Fortune – in every Thing. I feel unutterable Anxiety.
I absolutely love reading their diary entries and their letters back and forth between each other. Both John and Abigail were highly literate and their relationship was very progressive for the time (they considered each other dear ‘friends’ and trusted each other’s opinions). I wanted to share a passage I absolutely love from one of John Adams’ letters home to her while he was at the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, from July 3, 1776. In it, he predicts what we would think of as ‘4th of July’ celebrations:
But the Day is past. The Second Day of July 1776, will be the most memorable Epocha, in the History of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival (…) It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade with shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more.
You will think me transported with Enthusiasm but I am not. I am well aware of the Toil and Blood and Teasure, that it will cost Us to maintain this Declaration, and support and defend these states. Yet through all the Gloom I can see the Rays of ravishing Light and Glory.
Though the date is slightly off (he mentions the 2nd of July) the sentiment is weirdly prescient. Another fascinating detail from this letter is that he predicts an entire American continent many years before this would be the case. Remember that at the time the colonies were a small cluster of states in the northeast.
Another thing that I have to point out in this passage is the confident, almost reckless, optimism that it shows. He is excited about a future, but there is a very real possibility that this rebellion could have failed, in which case all of the men who had ‘declared independence’ would have been killed. They would have been executed for treason. They knew this as they were signing the paper. I recall Ben Franklin’s dark joke: ‘We must all hang together or surely we will all hang separately.’
So, for John Adams to be so excited about this prospect of an American country celebrating generations into the future…it’s pretty incredible.
So that’s something to think about, if you’re in the United States and attending 4th of July celebrations, that your parties were predicted, and in many ways brought about, by a little man from Massachusetts 250 years ago.
Thanks for reading! Today’s featured image is a photograph I took a few years ago of Independence Hall, where the Declaration was signed, in Philadelphia.
If you’re wanting more 4th of July themed reading, check out these previous posts:
Recommended Reading:
- My Dearest Friend: Letters of Abigail and John Adams edited by Margaret A. Hogan and C. James Taylor
- 1776 by David McCullough
- Read The Declaration of Independence itself from the National Archives
Madeira Mondays are posted on the first Monday of every month and explore history and historical fiction. If you enjoyed this post please share it, subscribe to the blog, or you can support the blog by buying me a coffee on Kofi! Thanks so much for reading! 🙂
Carly Brown 