Common Sense with Paul Jacob

Today

July Fifth

The Liberty Bell left Philadelphia by special train on its way to the Panama–Pacific International Exposition, on July 5, 1915 — the last trip outside Philadelphia that the custodians of the bell intend to permit.

In 1937 on this date, Spam, the luncheon meat, was introduced into the market by the Hormel Foods Corporation.

The Twenty-sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution, lowering the voting age from 21 to 18 years, was formally certified by President Richard Nixon on July 5, 1971.

On July 5, 1995, Armenia (flag, above) adopted its constitution, four years after the country’s independence from the Soviet Union.

general freedom

A Declaration

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.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their 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.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Thought

Paul A. Rahe

Fortunately for all of us, the Cold War ended not with a bang but with a whimper. It is surprising, however, that its cessation inspired so little elation.
First two sentences from the introduction to Paul Anthony Rahe’s Soft Despotism, Democracy’s Drift: Montesquieu, Rousseau, Tocqueville & The Modern Prospect (2009).

Today

Supernovae

July Fourth events include:

1054 – A supernova was spotted by Chinese, Arab, and possibly Amerindian observers. The celestial event occurred near the star Zeta Tauri, remaining, for several months, bright enough to be seen during the day. Its remnants form the Crab Nebula.

1776 — The Second Continental Congress approved the Declaration of Independence, thus formalizing its policy of secession from the rule of the Kingdom of Great Britain.

1803 — The Louisiana Purchase was announced to the American people.

1804 – Nathaniel Hawthorne, American author of The Scarlet Letter, House of Seven Gables, The Blithesdale Romance, and other classics, was born. Hawthorne became part of the Young America literary movement spawned by Loco-Foco political activism in New England.

1826 – Thomas Jefferson, third president of the United States, died a few hours before John Adams, second president of the United States, on the fiftieth anniversary of the adoption of the United States’ Declaration of Independence.

1826 – Stephen Foster, composer of “Old Black Joe,” “Beautiful Dreamer,” and many other classic American songs, was born.

1827 – Slavery was abolished in New York State.

1831 – Samuel Francis Smith wrote “My Country, ’Tis of Thee” for Boston’s July 4th festivities, set to the tune of Great Britain’s national anthem, “God Save the King/Queen.”

2009 – The Statue of Liberty’s crown re-opened to the public after eight years of closure that resulted from security concerns following the September 11, 2001, attacks.

Common Sense general freedom ideological culture

Two Days & 50 Years

American Independence, July 4, July 2, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson

Tomorrow is Independence Day in these United States.

But so was yesterday.

It was in the papers:

This day the Continental Congress declared the United Colonies Free and Independent States.
Pennsylvania Evening Post, July 2, 1776.

For it was two days before revising and accepting Thomas Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence that Congress officially declared its independence from King George III.

This Common Sense site has explained this quirk of history before. The Lee Resolution of July 2 declared that

the colonies should be “free and independent States”
they were “absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown” and that the connections should be “totally dissolved”
New “foreign Alliances” should be formed
And a “plan of confederation be prepared and transmitted to the respective Colonies for their consideration and approbation.”

Congress also commanded that a declaration be drawn up, and it was done quickly, accepted two days later.

The confederation document, on the other hand, took another year to work up, and four years beyond that to adopt.

John Adams, for all his faults as the Second President under the later U.S. Constitution, was a true friend of liberty and regarded the day as historic. “The second day of July, 1776,” he prophesied, writing to his wife on July 3, 1776,

will be the most memorable epoch 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 shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more.

He was off by two days. It was the Fourth that would be celebrated.

Fifty years later he was off by much less: he died on July 4, 1826, uttering “Thomas — Jefferson — still surv —”

Jefferson had died a few hours earlier.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Thought

Gerald R. Ford, Jr.

A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have.
President Gerald R. Ford, Jr., address to a joint session of Congress (August 12, 1974).

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