Independance Day - John Adams - Thomas Jefferson

by

       M. Richard Maxson

      When the initial battles in the Revolutionary War broke out in April 1775, few colonists desired complete independence from Great Britain, and those who did were considered radicals. However by the middle of the following year with more taxation and British tyranny many more colonists had come to favor independence. Their beliefs were expressed in the bestselling pamphlet “Common Sense,” published by Thomas Paine in early 1776.

      On June 7^th of that year the Continental Congress met at the Pennsylvania State House (later Independence Hall) in Philadelphia, the Virginia delegate Richard Henry Lee introduced a motion calling for the colonies’ independence. Amid heated debate, Congress postponed the vote on Lee’s resolution, but appointed a five-man committee—including Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, John Adams of Massachusetts, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania and Robert R. Livingston of New York—to draft a formal statement justifying the break with Great Britain.

      On July 2nd, the Continental Congress voted in favor of Lee’s resolution for independence in a near-unanimous vote (the New York delegation abstained, but

later voted affirmatively). On that day, John Adams wrote to his wife Abigail that July 2 “will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival” and that the celebration should include “Pomp and Parade…Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other.” It wasn’t until July 4th, the Continental Congress formally adopted the Declaration of Independence, which had been written largely by Jefferson. Though the vote for actual independence took place on July 2nd, from then on the 4th became the day that was celebrated as the birth of American independence. John Adams did not agree. Until his death he believed that July 2nd was the correct date on which to celebrate the birth of American independence, and would reportedly turn down invitations to appear at July 4th events in protest. 

 

Early Fourth of July Celebrations

      During the summer of 1776 some colonists celebrated the birth of independence by holding mock funerals for King George III as a way of symbolizing the end of the monarchy’s hold on America and the triumph of liberty.

      It was in Philadelphia the first annual commemoration of independence was held on July 4, 1777, while Congress was still occupied with the ongoing war. Festivities including concerts, bonfires, parades and the firing of cannons and muskets usually accompanied the public readings of the Declaration of Independence.

      George Washington issued double rations of rum to all his soldiers to mark the anniversary of independence in 1778, and in 1781, several months before the key American victory at the Battle of Yorktown, Massachusetts became the first state to make July 4th an official state holiday. 

Two Founding Fathers Reunite 

       Founding Fathers, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, worked together with the others to forge the successful American Revolution and, subsequently, as

political rivals, they had helped shape the nation’s early years. Adams went on to serve a term as the second U.S. president; Jefferson followed him into the Executive Mansion with two terms. These two Presidents of the United States, were two very different individuals. They disagreed on many things which led to their estrangement during the time they were in the White House. In 1812, Abagail Adams and mutual friends brought Adams and Jefferson together again, at least via mail, but it wasn’t until 1818 that these two old political rivals began to exchange hundreds of letters on every conceivable topic.

      Prior to their deaths fourteen years later and now, well into their retirement years, they resumed writing to each other. “You and I ought not to die,” Adams wrote Jefferson, “before we have explained ourselves to each other.” They became good friends, “I look back with rapture on those golden days when Virginia and Massachusetts lived and acted together like a band of brothers,” Adams had written Jefferson in 1825.

      The following year Jefferson had been asked to prepare a speech for July 4th, but ill health prevented him from delivering in person what became his valedictory. In the draft, he would observe: “May [the Declaration of Independence] be to the world, what I believe it to be, the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government.” Adams. too, was asked to celebrate the occasion in Washington, Philadelphia, and New York. Likewise, illness prevented him from traveling.

      Both Adams and Jefferson died on July 4, 1826, the fiftieth anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. It was an anniversary that both founders were determined to live long enough to see. Death took Jefferson at 12:50 in the afternoon. Near noon, close to the time of Jefferson's death, Adams awakened from a deep sleep and with great effort proclaimed, "Thomas Jefferson survives." These were his last words, after which he fell into a coma. At about six o'clock in the evening, as the warm day turned cool, John Adams died. He was ninety-one years old.