Whether you choose to enjoy your holiday by going to a parade, watching fireworks, attending a community festival, grilling, or just enjoying a quiet day off from work, I would like to wish everyone a safe and happy Fourth of July.
I started this page (and website) to try to bring discussion back into politics. I firmly believe that it is essential for us to be able to speak civilly and candidly to one another about the issues facing us. We should be able to have an open conversation and ask questions, even hard questions, without immediately devolving into hatred and yelling at one another.
I hear a lot of people talk about how divisive the United States has become, and I have to agree that recently it feels like we are moving further apart than any time I can remember, but we should also recognize that there has been disagreement in America longer than it has even been a country.
There was disagreement on whether we should declare independence.
The First Continental Congress convened in 1774 to talk about how to respond to perceived overreach by the British Monarchy in the wake of the Boston Tea Party. At the conclusion of their meeting in 1774, they decided to meet again in 1775 if the Intolerable Acts were not repealed.
By the time the Declaration of Independence was signed, the colonies had already been at war with Britain for over a year as the battle of Lexington and Concord was in April 1775.
When we learn history, we often speak from a unified perspective – saying things like the colonists rebelled, or the 13 colonies stood together to take on the British Empire. In reality, many colonists did not believe independence was required – that is why essays like Thomas Paine’s Common Sense were necessary to convince enough of the population to fight. There are also numerous examples of essays written against a fight for independence, like James Chalmers’ Plain Truth, which was written in opposition to Thomas Paine’s work and talked about the necessary stability provided by the British Monarchy.
In the end, many American colonists were loyalists, estimated at between 15-20% of the white population, while 40-45% of the white population were patriots who supported the fight for independence. This leaves around 35-45% of the population who were on the fence about the American Revolution. As the British promised freedom to slaves who fought for them in the Revolution, they are often not included in such figures.
There was disagreement culminating in the Civil War.
Slavery was a contentious issue in the United States from the very beginning. At the Constitutional Convention, the George Mason and Governeur Morris argued against slavery while Charles Pickney and John Rutledge were in favor of the practice.
As the economy shifted toward industrialism in the North and towards agriculture in the South, the invention of the cotton gin in the late 1700s increased the importance of slavery in the South. In the wake of the Mexican-American War, the United States annexed a lot of new land in the West leading to questions about whether slavery would be allowed in these new territories. With increased northern opposition to slavery and increased southern dependence on slavery, it was becoming impossible to reach a political compromise on the issue.
When Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas debated leading up to the U.S. Senate election for Illinois in 1858, Lincoln was clear that he considered slavery to be morally wrong and must ultimately disappear in the United States. Honest Abe lost the election in 1858.
When he won the presidency just two years later, he won without winning a single Southern State. With his victory and stance on slavery, Southern states believed they would have no say in how they were governed and opted to secede. While this is partially based on the idea that the state would not have its own rights, reading the secession documents for South Carolina and Mississippi make clear that the key issue was the state not having the right to allow slavery.
There was disagreement during:
- The Jim Crow Era
- The Civil Rights Movement
- The Vietnam War
- The War on Terror
There remains disagreement today, and there always will be. That doesn’t mean we have to hate one another for it.
I invite civil, bipartisan discussion on this post.
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Continental_Congress
Boston Tea Party – Definition, Dates & Facts | HISTORY
Declaration of Independence: A Transcription | National Archives
April 19, 1775 – Minute Man National Historical Park (U.S. National Park Service)
How Thomas Paine’s ‘Common Sense’ Helped Inspire the American Revolution | HISTORY
Plain Truth (pamphlet) – Wikipedia
Loyalist (American Revolution) – Wikipedia
How Enslaved Men Who Fought for the British Were Promised Freedom | HISTORY
George Mason | Founding Father, Virginia Statesman | Britannica
Forgotten Founders: Gouverneur Morris | Constitution Center
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Pinckney_(governor)
https://www.americanhistorycentral.com/entries/john-rutledge/
Cotton gin | Definition, Inventor, Eli Whitney, Impact, & Facts | Britannica
Mexican–American War – Wikipedia
Lincoln-Douglas Debates – Background, Summary & Significance
