Posted: Monday, June 30, 2008 12:00 am
What is the history of the Fourth of July holiday?
Most are aware of the holiday's basis, or at least should be. In 1776, Great Britain ruled the United States, one of its many colonies. The founding fathers' patience eroded with each oppressive English act against America: Taxation without representation, conscription on the high seas, etc.
On June 11, 1776, the colonies' Second Continental Congress met in Philadelphia. The congress formed a committee with the purpose of drafting a document formally severing ties with Great Britain.
After a few weeks of debate and 86 separate changes, the Continental Congress adopted the final version of the Declaration of Independence on July 4.
As a nation, the founding fathers decided we'd reached that point "When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."
In language far less eloquent than that above, which is the introduction to the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776, is the day we figuratively told Great Britain where to go and how to get there.
And then we fought the misnamed event known as the Revolutionary War and celebrated the 4th even in its midst.
Philadelphia marked July 4, 1777, by adjourning Congress and celebrating with bonfires, bells and fireworks.
Gen. George Washington, commander in chief of the Continental Army, told his soldiers to decorate their hats with green boughs, issued double allowances of rum and ordered a Fourth of July artillery salute on July 4, 1778, at the Continental Army's Brunswick, N.J., headquarters.
In 1801, the White House played host to the first public reception honoring the Fourth of July. And Meriweather Lewis and William Clark celebrated the first Fourth of July west of the Mississippi in 1804 at Independence Creek, Idaho.
People use the holiday as an occasion to express joy or make a statement.
New York emancipated its slaves on July 4, 1827. The cornerstone of the Washington Monument was laid on July 4, 1848. France presented the Statue of Liberty to the United States in the Gauthier workshop in Paris in 1884.
The Fourth of July is also an occasion to register dissent.
A large anti-prohibition parade occurred in New York City on July 4, 1921. Anti-war demonstrations marred speeches delivered by Vice President Hubert Humphrey in Philadelphia and Alabama Gov. George Wallace in Minneapolis on July 4, 1968.
And it's a day to mark our freedoms and our triumphs.
President Lyndon Johnson signed The Freedom of Information Act into law on July 4, 1966. On July 4, 1999, 112 people in Philadelphia, all born on the Fourth of July since 1900, gathered in front of Independence Hall for a "Photo of the Century."
The state of Wisconsin officially declared "the fourth day of July" a holiday by Chapter 58, Laws of 1861, published March 8, 1861.
Congress established Independence Day as a holiday in 1870 and in 1938 designated it a paid holiday for federal employees.
We shoot fireworks in part because of John Adams, our first vice president and second president. In a letter to his wife in which he talked about the Fourth of July, Adams said, "I believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival … it ought to be celebrated by pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations from one end of this continent to the other …"
So fireworks, parades, picnics, baseball games, days at the beach, time with family and friends, a day off work for most and contemplation of life in the finest country in the world is how most of us will spend this wonderful holiday, which this year is on Friday.
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