4th of July Post on The Athenaeum

"The Spirits of the people are very good.  The loss of Charlstown affects them no more than a Drop in the Bucket..."

http://turcopolier.typepad.com/the_athenaeum/2013/07/the-spirits-of-the-people-are-very-good-the-loss-of-charlstown-affects-them-no-more-than-a-drop-in-t.html

Comments

[The Twisted Genius]

The New Englander in me can become immersed in these accounts our desperate early days. Those spirits haunt the towns and woods of my childhood. Thanks for reposting this.

I'd like to share this from our local newspaper. Those same spirits haunt my new home in Virginia.

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The birth of the United States of America 237 years ago today was a happy occasion, but it was no fairy tale - and many of the 56 who signed the Declaration of Independence did not live happily ever after. Some lost everything they owned and died bankrupt. Some emerged from prison broken men. Others saw war’s tribulations claim wives and children. Nine forfeited their own lives for liberty.

Reflect on the last sentence of the Declaration, reprinted below—the words about pledging lives and fortunes. As often as not, the pledges were called in. But no one lost the third treasure laid at freedom’s altar. Whether well-to-do or impoverished, surrounded by family or cruelly shorn of loved ones, each signer passed on with his sacred honor intact and shining.

Today, amid the entirely appropriate hoopla, consider that in a republic, now as then, there is no living happily ever after. Preserving and perfecting our freedom is a job from which no generation can retire, lest it give up the third, and best, treasure.

"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."

Paul Akers
Opinion Page Editor, Free Lance-Star
Fredericksburg, Virginia

[Maureen Lang]

Thanks for sharing this Free Lance-Star op-ed, TTG. Grew up partly in New England myself- the very ground, rocks, trees felt saturated with memories of that time. As Akers noted, very few of them seemed fairy tale-like.

FYI to all: HBO, as is their custom, is showing their John Adams series today (7/4/13). Always worth a re-watch alone, or with guests, kids, & grandkids.

[505thPIR]

Amen

Character must undergrid talent or talent will cave in.

[Charles I]

Happy 4th of July, though I saw another commenter claim it is now Independence Day.

I took an oath as a lawyer, and I didn't breach it, though I don't believe in a Divine per se.

I must say now though that I never gave honour or liberty much more than passing thought except in terms of honesty and incarceration. 8 or nine years of the privilege of reading all your thoughts, and experiences with them have really opened my mind if not moved it.

I thank you all heartily for for making these concepts, so dear to you much more clear to me, who after all still sees bleeding heart liberalism as the Christian, the honourable thing domestically, however misguided on a global scale.

Your passion for duty, honour and liberty, for the South, particularly when the state and governments you served have run amok has been as inspiring as corrective.

I'd salute if I was worthy, thanks.

[Medicine Man]

A handful of daguerreotypes published on Time with short descriptions of who the men in the pictures are: http://lightbox.time.com/2013/07/03/faces-of-the-american-revolution/#1

Fascinating stuff, so I thought I'd share it. Happy Birthday, USA.