Ask any school-aged child and he or she will tell you that July 4th is the day that America won its independence from England. The truth is a bit more in-depth.
The seeds of the struggle for our independence were actually planted in 1763. At that time George Grenville’s ministry in Great Britain created colonial policy meant to tighten political control over the colonies. He also strived to make the colonies pay Great Britain for their defense by levying a tax on molasses and sugar in 1764. For Americans, it was a slap in the face.
The situation worsened in 1765 when Great Britain passed the Stamp Act. This marked the first tax that directly targeted colonial Americans. It specifically required that all colonial newspapers, pamphlets, legal documents, commercial bills, advertisements, and any other papers printed and distributed in the colonies have a ‘stamp’ bought essentially from the British government. Revenues from the Stamp Act were earmarked for the defense of the colonies but to the colonists it represented Great Britain once again forcing its governmental will on the colonists without the input of the colonists.
It was after the Stamp Act was enacted that the Sons of Liberty, secret groups of colonial rebels created by and made up of businessmen, lawyers, journalists and others affected by the Stamp Act, were created
The Sons of Liberty forced the resignation of stamp distributors, the destruction of stamped papers and were instrumental in creating the Stamp Act Congress which met for the first time in October of 1765.
The Stamp Act Congress, made up of delegates from New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Delaware, South Carolina, Maryland, and Connecticut adopted the Declaration of Rights and Grievances, stating that freeborn Englishmen “could not be taxed without their consent.” They reasoned that because the colonists had no Parliamentary representation any tax imposed on them without the consent of their colonial legislatures was unconstitutional. From this Declaration grew the battle cry “Taxation without representation.”
Faced with the blatant disregard of the Stamp Act as well as a loss of trade from colonists boycotting English goods, Parliament repealed the Stamp Act in 1766. However, Parliament chose to also pass a new act reasserting Great Britain’s claim to and rule over the American colonies.
In the months and years that followed Great Britain attempted to create several indirect taxes. These attempts lead to a renewed rebellion which resulted in the seizing of one of John Hancock’s ships in 1768, the Boston Massacre in 1770 and the burning of HMS Gaspee in 1772.
On June 7th 1776, at a meeting of the Second Continental Congress attended by representatives from the 13 colonies, Richard Henry Lee called for a resolution of independence declaring America free from British rule.
A committee made up of John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Robert R. Livingston, and Roger Sherman was instructed to draw up the resolution. After its completion the resolution was sent to Congress and changed again before it was formally adopted on July 2nd 1776. On July 4th 1776 Congress merely justified the resolution already adopted using the Declaration of Independence.
It is interesting to note that although the 4th of July 1776 has been designated as the birth of our nation the Declaration of Independence was not signed on that date. In fact, the vast majority of the signatures weren’t affixed until August 2nd of 1776.
Our true freedom, however, wasn’t won until many years later. From 1775 to 1783 the Continental Army fought the British in the War of Independence to create and maintain our ability to govern ourselves, free from the rule and taxation of Great Britain. It was the Treaty of Paris signed on September 3rd of 1783 that officially ended the War for Independence when Britain officially recognized the independence of the thirteen colonies. This would not, however, mark the end of the skirmishes between America and Great Britain.
Americans continued to have periodic disputes with Great Britain such as the British attack on the USS Chesapeake, the battle over the Northwest Territories, the Canadian border and the attempts of the British to blockade France during the Napoleonic wars.
On June 18th of 1812 President James Madison signed a declaration of war against Great Britain but by December of 1814 both the Americans and the British realized that the time had come to end the bloody wars and, at a summit in Belgium on December 24th 1814, both parties signed the Treaty of Ghent ending the war and restoring the boundaries between our fledgling country and the British territories in North America.
An interesting side note: It was during the war of 1812 when Francis Scott Key penned the poem that would become our national anthem. In August of 1814 Key’s friend, Dr. William Beanes, was taken prisoner by the British soon after its departure from Washington. Key enlisted the help of Colonel John Skinner, the government's prisoner of war exchange agent, to arrange for the return of his friend. They sailed to meet the British fleet under a flag of truce and, after meeting with the British, successfully won Beanes’ release. The British, however, detained all three on their ship until after the attack on Baltimore was over. It was while Key was on the British Ship watching the bombardment of Baltimore from the sea that he was inspired to write the lyrics to the Star Spangled Banner. It wasn’t until 1931 that Congress enacted legislation to make the Star Spangled Banner our national anthem.
So, yes, the 4th of July does mark the dawn of our country, so to speak, but it is important to remember that simply having the Continental Congress recognize a resolution did not automatically and immediately create our independence from British rule
The Declaration of Independence was merely the beginning. We as Americans truly believed then and still believe to this day that we have been endowed by our “...Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and 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 to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
We had to prove to Great Britain and the World that our rights and our freedom were valuable enough to justify the sacrifice of the blood and lives of our own people; rights and freedom that we continue to fight for to this day.
So, this Independence Day, put aside the labels of ‘Republican’ and ‘Democrat’, forget about ‘conservatives’, ‘progressives’ and ‘liberals’, do away with your hyphenated heritage, let politics fall by the wayside, and simply be Americans. Be proud of who we are and honor those that have paid with their blood and their lives to ensure that we can forever be free Americans.
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