Letters of the Third of July
John Adams and American Independence
John Adams’ most famous failure of prediction occurred on July 3, 1776, but it concerned the second of July, the day on which the Continental Congress voted for independence. Adams wrote to his wife, Abigail:
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 commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. 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 Treasure, 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. I can see that the End is more than worth all the Means. And that Posterity will tryumph in that Days Transaction, even altho We should rue it, which I trust in God We shall not.
Adams’ so-close-to-correct prediction ranks with Ben Franklin’s bid to enshrine the turkey as America’s national bird and Lincoln’s assertion that “The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here” in the annals of amusing historical miscalculations. But the rest of the substance of Adams’ letter — so often overlooked — deserves not to be forgotten, as it largely has been.
Adams had favored independence months before the Continental Congress approved it. He believed an earlier vote to break free from Britain would have furthered the revolutionary cause.
However, he told Abigail this:
But on the other Hand, the Delay of this Declaration to this Time, has many great Advantages attending it. — The Hopes of Reconciliation, which were fondly entertained by Multitudes of honest and well meaning tho weak and mistaken People, have been gradually and at last totally extinguished. — Time has been given for the whole People, maturely to consider the great Question of Independence and to ripen their judgments, dissipate their Fears, and allure their Hopes, by discussing it in News Papers and Pamphletts, by debating it, in Assemblies, Conventions, Committees of Safety and Inspection, in Town and County Meetings, as well as in private Conversations, so that the whole People in every Colony of the 13, have now adopted it, as their own Act. — This will cement the Union, and avoid those Heats and perhaps Convulsions which might have been occasioned, by such a Declaration Six Months ago.
Republican politics requires time and consideration — among the consenting governed, not just those in office. The people must be allowed time to mull over proposals and decide for themselves whether the policy in question merits pursuing. The colonists had to ready themselves for independence, and for this they required a few more months than John Adams would have preferred.
Forgive the lengthy quotation, but Adams expounded on these matters in his famous 1818 letter to Hezekiah Niles:
But what do We mean by the American Revolution? Do We mean the American War? The Revolution was effected before the War commenced. The Revolution was in the Minds and Hearts of the People. A Change in their Religious Sentiments of their Duties and Obligations.
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This radical Change in the Principles, Opinions Sentiments and Affection of the People, was the real American Revolution.
By what means, this great and important Alteration in the religious, Moral, political and Social Character of the People of thirteen Colonies, all distinct, unconnected and independent of each other, was begun, pursued and accomplished, it is surely interesting to Humanity to investigate, and perpetuate to Posterity.
To this End it is greatly to be desired that Young Gentlemen of Letters in all the States, especially in the thirteen Original States, would undertake the laborious, but certainly interesting and amusing Task, of Searching and collecting all the Records, Pamphlets, Newspapers and even hand Bills, which in any Way contributed to change the Temper and Views of The People and compose them into an independent Nation.
The Colonies had grown up under Constitutions of Government, So different, there was so great a Variety of Religions, they were composed of So many different Nations, their Customs, Manners and Habits had So little resemblance, and their Intercourse had been so rare and their Knowledge of each other So imperfect, that to unite them in the Same Principles in Theory and the Same System of Action was certainly a very difficult Enterprize. The compleat Accomplishment of it, in So Short a time and by Such Simple means, was perhaps a Singular Example in the History of Mankind. Thirteen Clocks were made to Strike together; a perfection of Mechanism which no Artist had ever before effected.
The politics of a republic consists not of the imposition of law and policy by a ruler on the ruled. Repubican governance is a participatoy activity, even though such participation can frustrate overeager lawmakers and bureaucrats.
As Calvin Coolidge put it, “The American Revolution represented the informed and mature convictions of a great mass of independent, liberty loving, God-fearing people who knew their rights, and possessed the courage to dare to maintain them.”
(There is, moreover, an epistemological element to all this. Rash and quickly formed opinions must not be followed quixotically in whatever direction they impell overeager politicians. Reflection and choice, argument and reason, must take their course. The process of a (pardon the phrase) national conversation about contentious issues allows for the refinement of public sentiments and the formation of better opinions. If the Constitution produced by a fractious and divided convention teaches anything, it teaches that the process of debate, negotiation, and bargaining — the process of politics — will yield a better outcome than any lone speculative theorist can manage sequestered in his study. The Constitution advanced out of convention, after which it was once again subjected to a vigorous public scrutiny. The result of this public debate: a wiser consclusion was secured; the document was found worthy of ratification, but the people demanded the inclusion of a bill of rights, which the convention had chosen to omit. The ratification debates corrected the error of the framers.)
Earlier in the day on July 3rd, John sent another letter to Abigail, in which he was less sanguine than one might expect, writing:
It is the Will of Heaven, that the two Countries should be sundered forever. It may be the Will of Heaven that America shall suffer Calamities still more wasting and Distresses yet more dreadfull. If this is to be the Case, it will have this good Effect, at least: it will inspire Us with many Virtues, which We have not, and correct many Errors, Follies, and Vices, which threaten to disturb, dishonour, and destroy Us. — The Furnace of Affliction produces Refinement, in States as well as Individuals. And the new Governments we are assuming, in every Part, will require a Purification from our Vices, and an Augmentation of our Virtues or they will be no Blessings. The People will have unbounded Power. And the People are extreamly addicted to Corruption and Venality, as well as the Great. [The letterbook copy of this letter includes the following sentence:] [ I am not without Apprehensions from this Quarter.] — But I must submit all my Hopes and Fears, to an overruling Providence, in which, unfashionable [ as] the Faith may be, I firmly believe.
“I am not without Apprehensions from this Quarter.” A self-governming nation is not the sort of thing that runs on autopilot. Tyrannies are far easy to live under than free regimes, insofar as submitting to the whims of a king or oligarch or adminstrator requires far less of the everyday person than the unending, exacting, and often dissapointing work of directing one’s own destiny as a free citizen. To employ Aristotelian terminology, the virtue of the subject of a tyranny is submission; the citizen of a free republic must develop a far more comprehensive kind of virtue, personal, familial, political, etc. To choose to be good — and to manifest that goodness in day-to-day action — is very difficult, and is often attended by failure.
The pressures of liberty are only increased by modernity and modern technology. In an essay about the American West, I wrote: “Most obviously…many Americans’ loss of the Western virtues begins with the fact that survival no longer requires their practice.” New technologies and new prosperity bring new opportunities — mostly good, but with the concommitant hazard that choosing something other than the good life has become easier. Freedom and free will permit the latitude for self-destruction. Abraham Lincoln: “If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.”
Winston Churchill wrote this:
We have the spectacle of the powers and weapons of man far outstripping the march of his intelligence; we have the march of his intelligence proceeding far more rapidly than the development of his nobility. We may well find ourselves in the presence of “the strength of civilization without its mercy”.
It is therefore above all things important that the moral philosophy and spiritual conceptions of men and nations should hold their own amid these formidable scientific evolutions.
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Without an equal growth of Mercy, Pity, Peace and Love, Science herself may destroy all that makes human life majestic and tolerable. There never was a time when the inherent virtue of human beings required more strong and confident expression in daily life; there never was a time when the hope of immortality and the disdain of earthly power and achievement were more necessary for the safety of the children of men.
But Churchill continued:
No material progress, even though it takes shapes we cannot now conceive, or however it may expand the faculties of man, can bring comfort to his soul. It is this fact, more wonderful than any that Science can reveal, which gives the best hope that all will be well.
Projects undreamed-of by past generations will absorb our immediate descendants; forces terrific and devastating will be in their hands; comforts, activities, amenities, pleasures will crowd upon them, but their hearts will ache, their lives will be barren, if they have not a vision above material things.
Each year, this “news”letter traditionally shares a portion of Calvin Coolidge’s famous Independence Day speech.1 This year, I will include another exerpt, Coolidge’s peroration:
Our forefathers came to certain conclusions and decided upon certain courses of action which have been a great blessing to the world. Before we can understand their conclusions we must go back and review the course which they followed. We must think the thoughts which they thought. Their intellectual life centered around the meetinghouse. They were intent upon religious worship. While there were always among them men of deep learning, and later those who had comparatively large possessions, the mind of the people was not so much engrossed in how much they knew, or how much they had, as in how they were going to live. While scantily provided with other literature, there was a wide acquaintance with the Scriptures. Over a period as great as that which measures the existence of our independence they were subject to this discipline not only in their religious life and educational training, but also in their political thought. They were a people who came under the influence of a great spiritual development and acquired a great moral power.
No other theory is adequate to explain or comprehend the Declaration of Independence. It is the product of the spiritual insight of the people. We live in an age of science and of abounding accumulation of material things. These did not create our Declaration. Our Declaration created them. The things of the spirit come first. Unless we cling to that, all our material prosperity, overwhelming though it may appear, will turn to a barren scepter in our grasp. If we are to maintain the great heritage which has been bequeathed to us, we must be like-minded as the fathers who created it. We must not sink into a pagan materialism. We must cultivate the reverence which they had for the things that are holy. We must follow the spiritual and moral leadership which they showed. We must keep replenished, that they may glow with a more compelling flame, the altar fires before which they worshiped.
Adams’ hope, Churchill’s hope, Coolidge’s hope — that hope is our hope. That hope is America’s hope.
“About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.”