July 4th, 1776

[Sdiver]

A bit long, but well worth the read.


"Our Lives, Our Fortunes, Our Sacred Honor"

It was a glorious morning. The sun was shining and the wind was from the
southeast. Up especially early, a tall bony, redheaded young Virginian
found time to buy a new thermometer, for which he paid three pounds,
fifteen shillings. He also bought gloves for Martha, his wife, who was
ill at home.

Thomas Jefferson arrived early at the statehouse. The temperature was
72.5 degrees and the horseflies weren't nearly so bad at that hour. It
was a lovely room, very large, with gleaming white walls. The chairs
were comfortable. Facing the single door were two brass fireplaces, but
they would not be used today.

The moment the door was shut, and it was always kept locked, the room
became an oven. The tall windows were shut, so that loud quarreling
voices could not be heard by passersby. Small openings atop the windows
allowed a slight stir of air, and also a large number of horseflies.
Jefferson records that "the horseflies were dexterous in finding necks,
and the silk of stockings was nothing to them." All discussing was
punctuated by the slap of hands on necks.

On the wall at the back, facing the president's desk, was a panoply --
consisting of a drum, swords, and banners seized from Fort Ticonderoga
the previous year. Ethan Allen and Benedict Arnold had captured the
place, shouting that they were taking it "in the name of the Great
Jehovah and the Continental Congress!"

Now Congress got to work, promptly taking up an emergency measure about
which there was discussion but no dissension. "Resolved: That an
application be made to the Committee of Safety of Pennsylvania for a
supply of flints for the troops at New York."

Then Congress transformed itself into a committee of the whole. The
Declaration of Independence was read aloud once more, and debate
resumed. Though Jefferson was the best writer of all of them, he had
been somewhat verbose. Congress hacked the excess away. They did a good
job, as a side-by-side comparison of the rough draft and the final text
shows. They cut the phrase "by a self-assumed power." "Climb"
was
replaced by "must read," then "must" was eliminated, then the
whole
sentence, and soon the whole paragraph was cut. Jefferson groaned as
they continued what he later called "their depredations." "Inherent
and
inalienable rights" came out "certain unalienable rights," and to
this
day no one knows who suggested the elegant change.

A total of 86 alterations were made. Almost 500 words were eliminated,
leaving 1,337. At last, after three days of wrangling, the document was
put to a vote.

Here in this hall Patrick Henry had once thundered: "I am no longer a
Virginian, sir, but an American." But today the loud, sometimes bitter
argument stilled, and without fanfare the vote was taken from north to
south by colonies, as was the custom. On July 4, 1776, the Declaration
of Independence was adopted.

There were no trumpets blown. No one stood on his chair and cheered. The
afternoon was waning and Congress had no thought of delaying the full
calendar of routine business on its hands. For several hours they worked
on many other problems before adjourning for the day.

"Much To Lose"

What kind of men were the 56 signers who adopted the Declaration of
Independence and who, by their signing, committed an act of treason
against the crown? To each of you, the names Franklin, Adams, Hancock
and Jefferson are almost as familiar as household words. Most of us,
however, know nothing of the other signers. Who were they? What happened
to them?

I imagine that many of you are somewhat surprised at the names not
there: George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, Patrick Henry. All were
elsewhere.

Ben Franklin was the only really old man. Eighteen were under 40; three
were in their 20s. Of the 56 almost half - 24 - were judges and lawyers.
Eleven were merchants, nine were landowners and farmers, and the
remaining 12 were doctors, ministers, and politicians.

With only a few exceptions, such as Samuel Adams of Massachusetts, these
were men of substantial property. All but two had families. The vast
majority were men of education and standing in their communities. They
had economic security as few men had in the 18th Century.

Each had more to lose from revolution than he had to gain by it. John
Hancock, one of the richest men in America, already had a price of 500
pounds on his head. He signed in enormous letters so that his Majesty
could now read his name without glasses and could now double the reward.
Ben Franklin wryly noted: "Indeed we must all hang together, otherwise
we shall most assuredly hang separately."

Fat Benjamin Harrison of Virginia told tiny Elbridge Gerry of
Massachusetts: "With me it will all be over in a minute, but you, you
will be dancing on air an hour after I am gone."

These men knew what they risked. The penalty for treason was death by
hanging. And remember, a great British fleet was already at anchor in
New York Harbor.

They were sober men. There were no dreamy-eyed intellectuals or draft
card burners here. They were far from hot-eyed fanatics yammering for an
explosion. They simply asked for the status quo. It was change they
resisted. It was equality with the mother country they desired. It was
taxation with representation they sought. They were all conservatives,
yet they rebelled.

It was principle, not property, that had brought these men to
Philadelphia. Two of them became presidents of the United States. Seven
of them became state governors. One died in office as vice president of
the United States. Several would go on to be U.S. Senators. One, the
richest man in America, in 1828 founded the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad.
One, a delegate from Philadelphia, was the only real poet, musician and
philosopher of the signers. (It was he, Francis Hopkinson not Betsy Ross
who designed the United States flag.)

Richard Henry Lee, a delegate from Virginia, had introduced the
resolution to adopt the Declaration of Independence in June of 1776. He
was prophetic in his concluding remarks: "Why then sir, why do we longer
delay? Why still deliberate? Let this happy day give birth to an
American Republic. Let her arise not to devastate and to conquer but to
reestablish the reign of peace and law.

"The eyes of Europe are fixed upon us. She demands of us a living
example of freedom that may exhibit a contrast in the felicity of the
citizen to the ever-increasing tyranny which desolates her polluted
shores. She invites us to prepare an asylum where the unhappy may find
solace, and the persecuted repost.

"If we are not this day wanting in our duty, the names of the American
Legislatures of 1776 will be placed by posterity at the side of all of
those whose memory has been and ever will be dear to virtuous men and
good citizens."

Though the resolution was formally adopted July 4, it was not until July
8 that two of the states authorized their delegates to sign, and it was
not until August 2 that the signers met at Philadelphia to actually put
their names to the Declaration.

William Ellery, delegate from Rhode Island, was curious to see the
signers' faces as they committed this supreme act of personal courage.
He saw some men sign quickly, "but in no face was he able to discern
real fear." Stephan Hopkins, Ellery's colleague from Rhode Island, was
a
man past 60. As he signed with a shaking pen, he declared: "My hand
trembles, but my heart does not."

--cont.--

[Sdiver]

pg. 2

"Most Glorious Service"

Even before the list was published, the British marked down every member
of Congress suspected of having put his name to treason. All of them
became the objects of vicious manhunts. Some were taken. Some, like
Jefferson, had narrow escapes. All who had property or families near
British strongholds suffered.

* Francis Lewis, New York delegate saw his home plundered -- and his
estates in what is now Harlem -- completely destroyed by British
Soldiers. Mrs. Lewis was captured and treated with great brutality.
Though she was later exchanged for two British prisoners through the
efforts of Congress, she died from the effects of her abuse.

* William Floyd, another New York delegate, was able to escape with his
wife and children across Long Island Sound to Connecticut, where they
lived as refugees without income for seven years. When they came home
they found a devastated ruin.

* Philips Livingstone had all his great holdings in New York confiscated
and his family driven out of their home. Livingstone died in 1778 still
working in Congress for the cause.

* Louis Morris, the fourth New York delegate, saw all his timber, crops,
and livestock taken. For seven years he was barred from his home and
family.

* John Hart of Trenton, New Jersey, risked his life to return home to
see his dying wife. Hessian soldiers rode after him, and he escaped in
the woods. While his wife lay on her deathbed, the soldiers ruined his
farm and wrecked his homestead. Hart, 65, slept in caves and woods as he
was hunted across the countryside. When at long last, emaciated by
hardship, he was able to sneak home, he found his wife had already been
buried, and his 13 children taken away. He never saw them again. He died
a broken man in 1779, without ever finding his family.

* Dr. John Witherspoon, signer, was president of the College of New
Jersey, later called Princeton. The British occupied the town of
Princeton, and billeted troops in the college. They trampled and burned
the finest college library in the country.

* Judge Richard Stockton, another New Jersey delegate signer, had rushed
back to his estate in an effort to evacuate his wife and children. The
family found refuge with friends, but a Tory sympathizer betrayed them.
Judge Stockton was pulled from bed in the night and brutally beaten by
the arresting soldiers. Thrown into a common jail, he was deliberately
starved. Congress finally arranged for Stockton's parole, but his health
was ruined. The judge was released as an invalid, when he could no
longer harm the British cause. He returned home to find his estate
looted and did not live to see the triumph of the Revolution. His family
was forced to live off charity.

* Robert Morris, merchant prince of Philadelphia, delegate and signer,
met Washington's appeals and pleas for money year after year. He made
and raised arms and provisions which made it possible for Washington to
cross the Delaware at Trenton. In the process he lost 150 ships at sea,
bleeding his own fortune and credit almost dry.

* George Clymer, Pennsylvania signer, escaped with his family from their
home, but their property was completely destroyed by the British in the
Germantown and Brandywine campaigns.

* Dr. Benjamin Rush, also from Pennsylvania, was forced to flee to
Maryland. As a heroic surgeon with the army, Rush had several narrow
escapes.

* John Martin, a Tory in his views previous to the debate, lived in a
strongly loyalist area of Pennsylvania. When he came out for
independence, most of his neighbors and even some of his relatives
ostracized him. He was a sensitive and troubled man, and many believed
this action killed him. When he died in 1777, his last words to his
tormentors were: "Tell them that they will live to see the hour when
they shall acknowledge it [the signing] to have been the most glorious
service that I have ever rendered to my country."

* William Ellery, Rhode Island delegate, saw his property and home
burned to the ground.

* Thomas Lynch, Jr., South Carolina delegate, had his health broken from
privation and exposures while serving as a company commander in the
military. His doctors ordered him to seek a cure in the West Indies and
on the voyage, he and his young bride were drowned at sea.

* Edward Rutledge, Arthur Middleton, and Thomas Heyward, Jr., the other
three South Carolina signers, were taken by the British in the siege of
Charleston. They were carried as prisoners of war to St. Augustine,
Florida, where they were singled out for indignities. They were
exchanged at the end of the war, the British in the meantime having
completely devastated their large landholdings and estates.

* Thomas Nelson, signer of Virginia, was at the front in command of the
Virginia military forces. With British General Charles Cornwallis in
Yorktown, fire from 70 heavy American guns began to destroy Yorktown
piece by piece. Lord Cornwallis and his staff moved their headquarters
into Nelson's palatial home. While American cannonballs were making a
shambles of the town, the house of Governor Nelson remained untouched.
Nelson turned in rage to the American gunners and asked, "Why do you
spare my home?" They replied, "Sir, out of respect to you." Nelson
cried, "Give me the cannon!" and fired on his magnificent home himself,
smashing it to bits. But Nelson's sacrifice was not quite over. He had
raised $2 million for the Revolutionary cause by pledging his own
estates. When the loans came due, a newer peacetime Congress refused to
honor them, and Nelson's property was forfeited. He was never
reimbursed. He died, impoverished, a few years later at the age of 50.

Lives, Fortunes, Honor

Of those 56 who signed the Declaration of Independence, nine died of
wounds or hardships during the war. Five were captured and imprisoned,
in each case with brutal treatment. Several lost wives, sons or entire
families. One lost his 13 children. Two wives were brutally treated. All
were at one time or another the victims of manhunts and driven from
their homes. Twelve signers had their homes completely burned. Seventeen
lost everything they owned. Yet not one defected or went back on his
pledged word. Their honor, and the nation they sacrificed so much to
create is still intact.

And, finally, there is the New Jersey signer, Abraham Clark.

He gave two sons to the officer corps in the Revolutionary Army. They
were captured and sent to that infamous British prison hulk afloat in
New York Harbor known as the hell ship Jersey, where 11,000 American
captives were to die. The younger Clarks were treated with a special
brutality because of their father. One was put in solitary and given no
food. With the end almost in sight, with the war almost won, no one
could have blamed Abraham Clark for acceding to the British request when
they offered him his sons' lives if he would recant and come out for the
King and Parliament. The utter despair in this man's heart, the anguish
in his very soul, must reach out to each one of us down through 200
years with his answer: "No."

The 56 signers of the Declaration Of Independence proved by their every
deed that they made no idle boast when they composed the most
magnificent curtain line in history. "And for the support of this
Declaration with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence,
we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred
honor."




May we always remember these men, and the self sacrifices they made, for this nation.

[82ndtrooper]

Nice read. Thanks for sharing SDIVER.

What's everyones plans for tomorow ? Personally I'm going to see Heart at the Blue Ash Red and White festival. Heart hits the stage at 8:15 pm and the fireworkds are at 11:00 Pm. I cant wait to hear "Barricuda" live once again. The last time I saw Heart perform was at the Cumberland County Arena back in 1986. Go Nancy and Anne Wilson !!! There's no charge for the concert, so if your going to be up this way you catch it for free !!!

[Five-O]

Terrific read...hairs on neck stand up in certain paragraphs.

Tomorrow will be spent surveilling a house followed by a no-knock warrant service early in the am. immediately following will be prisoner/evidence processing. 12 miler after that and then BBQ with the family by 5 or 6pm.

Happy 4th to all..especially to those deployed and away from home and family.

[The Reaper]

Gentlemen-

Thank you for your selfless service and your sacrifice that your children for many generations have enjoyed as freedom.

There was no model for this republic, you wrote the instructions and built a shining example in this legacy that lives on today, 231 years later.

The world owes you a debt that will not be easily repaid.

TR

[Texian]

Indeed, many thanks, prayers, cheers, and much honor to the brave souls who fought for the creation of this great Nation. God bless America.

[nmap]

Thank you, Sdiver. A most inspirational reminder of part of our national history.

[MoonAngel]

I really appreciate you posting this. Happy 4th America!

[jevo1976]

Definitely well-worth the read. Thank you for the post.

[82ndtrooper]

Originally Posted by jevo1976

Definitely well-worth the read. Thank you for the post.

Lord ! Another "Cubbies" fan.........................My advice, since our Cincy Reds are no better, is to drink more beer !

As for the Da Bears...................THEY ROCK !!!!

Happy 4th of July Jevo and welcome to the site. I missed the intro thread.

[jevo1976]

Thanks for the welcome 82ndtrooper and Happy 4th of July. BTW - Don't count my Cubbies out yet. This could be our year.

[The Reaper]

http://www.opinionjournal.com/editor...l?id=110010290

'Wonderfully Spared'
Our Founders were talented men--and lucky ones too.

BY JOYCE LEE MALCOLM
Wednesday, July 4, 2007 12:01 a.m. EDT

"You and I have been wonderfully spared," Thomas Jefferson wrote John Adams in 1812. "Of the signers of the Declaration of Independence I see now living not more than half a dozen on your side of the Potomak, and, on this side, myself alone." Jefferson and Adams were not merely signers of the Declaration. Both sat on the committee that drafted the document, and Jefferson wrote it. And while they later became bitter political opponents, they reconciled in their last years.

Adams, the Yankee lawyer, revolutionary, Founding Father and ex-president, was 77 in 1812; Jefferson, the Southern aristocrat, revolutionary, Founder and ex-president, was 69. Both were mentally acute but frail. Jefferson spent three to four hours a day on horseback and could scarcely walk, Adams walked three to four miles a day and could scarcely ride.

They would never see each other again. But from a modest farm in Quincy, Mass., and a plantation in Virginia they corresponded and reminisced about the days when they were "fellow laborers in the same cause, struggling for what is most valuable to man, his right of self-government."

It's easy now, in a nation awash with complaints about what our Founders did not do, what imperfect humans they seem to 21st century eyes, to overlook how startlingly bold their views and actions were in their own day and are, in fact, even today. Who else in 1776 declared, let alone thought it a self-evident truth, that all men were created equal, entitled to inalienable rights, or to any rights at all? How few declare these views today or, glibly declaring them, really intend to treat their countrymen or others as equal, entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?

Certainly not America's 20th century enemies, the Nazis and communists; certainly not today's Islamic radicals, who consider infidels unworthy to live and the faithful bound by an ancient and brutal code of law. We are fortunate that the Founders of our nation were enlightened, generous, jealous of their rights and those of their countrymen, and prepared to risk everything to create a free republic.

Breaking with Britain was a risky and distressing venture; could the American colonies go it alone and survive in a world of great European powers? If not, what better empire than the British? It took a year of fighting before the Continental Congress and the states were prepared to declare independence. "We might have been a free and a great people together," Jefferson sighed.

But if we were angry at British treatment, we were also lucky that Britain was our mother country. The British taught us respect for the rights of individuals, for limited government, for the rule of law and how such values could be realized. "An Englishman is the unfittest person on earth to argue another Englishman into slavery," Edmund Burke insisted, pleading our cause before Parliament in March, 1775.

Scores of distinguished British officers refused commissions to fight against us. Some, who were willing, were reluctant to press their advantage over our literally rag-tag army. The British parliament wrangled day after day over the fitful progress of the war. And when it was over and, thanks to French assistance, we had won, Britain was careful in negotiating the peace treaty for fear we would fall under the influence and control of the French or the Spanish. We would fight against Britain again, but over the centuries the common heritage that connects our two peoples has brought us together as close allies.

We were lucky in our generals. Unlike the commanders of nearly all revolutionary armies before and since, George Washington resisted the temptation to seize power. After England's civil war between King Charles I and parliament, Oliver Cromwell, Parliament's leading general, evicted what remained of parliament and made himself "Lord Protector." The great expectations of the French Revolution ended when Napoleon Bonaparte staged a coup against the republican government and later crowned himself emperor.

Not only do victorious generals have a nasty habit of taking over, but once an army becomes entangled in politics it is extraordinarily difficult to remove it from public affairs. Numerous modern countries have tried to control their armies and failed.

Washington prevented a coup by his officers; and when the war was over, he bid a moving farewell to his men and staff before appearing before Congress to resign his commission: "Having now finished the work assigned to me, I retire from the great theatre of Action . . . and take my leave of all the employments of public life." Then he hurried off to spend Christmas with Martha and their family. Although it sounds sentimental, trite even, it happened that way.

In their correspondence, Adams wrote Jefferson that the future would "depend on the Union" and asked how that Union was to be preserved. "The Union is still to me an Object of as much Anxiety as ever Independence was," he confided.

He was right to worry. The union has always been difficult, from the first fears that the 13 separate states would behave as competing countries or bickering groups, through a brutal and painful civil war whose wounds have yet to entirely heal, to a vast, modern land whose residents, taking for granted the blessings bestowed upon them, are deeply divided and quick to vilify each other.

More tragically, some seem to enjoy vilifying America, everything it has been and stands for, seeking and finding fatal shortcomings. Adams and Jefferson were not blind to those shortcomings. "We think ourselves possessed or at least we boast that we are so of Liberty of conscience on all subjects and of the right of free inquiry and private judgment, in all cases and yet," Adams admitted, "how far are we from these exalted privileges in fact." Recent moments of real unity after 9/11, when members of Congress stood together on the steps of the Capitol and sang "God Bless America," have been fleeting.

In 1825 Jefferson wrote to congratulate Adams on the election of his son John Quincy to the presidency--an election so close it was decided in the House of Representatives. "So deeply are the principles of order, and of obedience to law impressed on the minds of our citizens generally that I am persuaded there will be as immediate an acquiescence in the will of the majority," Jefferson assured him, "as if Mr. Adams had been the choice of every man." He closed: "Nights of rest to you and days of tranquility are the wishes I tender you with my affect[iona]te respects."

On July 4 the following year, as the nation celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, its two frail signers died within hours of each other. Their cause, "struggling for what is most valuable to man, his right of self-government," continues in the nation they launched, still fraught with aspirations and anxieties, flaws and divisions but, one hopes, with the ability to reconcile as they did, to work together for the joint venture.

Ms. Malcolm teaches legal history at George Mason University School of Law and is the author of several books, including "Stepchild of the Revolution: A Slave Child in Revolutionary America," forthcoming from Yale University Press.

[82ndtrooper]

"The struggle for mans right to self-government"

Maybe the Dems should read this article, remember what oath they took and what that oath was meant to defend.

I once heard a joke that said "Iraq is looking for a Constitution, maybe we should give them ours, besides we dont seem to be using it anymore"

[Sdiver]

Originally Posted by jevo1976

Thanks for the welcome 82ndtrooper and Happy 4th of July. BTW - Don't count my Cubbies out yet. This could be our year.

YES !!!! Another Cubbies Fan !!!!

And Yes, This could be our year.

[JGarcia]

Thanks for this thread! Take the time to think about these Men, our ancestors. Conviction, principles, duty, honor, brotherhood, and sacrifice beyond imagination, for us - the beneficiaries. Let providence find us worthy and able Americans.