Fun Fourth of July Facts

Though the Fourth is generally regarded as the day the Declaration of Independence was ratified and signed, this is not the case. The motion for independence was ratified on July 2nd, whereas the final document was ratified on July 4th. All the necessary signatories didn't add their names to it until weeks after. John Adams, more responsible than any other colonial delegate for the ultimate vote to break away from Great Britain, wrote this in one of his letters 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 shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations from one end of this continent to the other from this time forward forever more."

Thomas Jefferson's original draft was cut down and/or changed significantly by approximately 25%, according to author David McCullough. Sitting next to Benjamin Franklin on July 3 and 4 as Franklin removed or changed significant pieces of the document, Jefferson "is not known to have uttered a word in protest, or in defense of what he had written. Later he would decribe the opposition to his draft as being like 'the ceaseless action of gravity weighing upon us night and day'."

Jefferson's original draft actually blamed George III for the slave trade, which was promptly extricated for any number of reasons, among them that a.) Jefferson himself owned a plethora of slaves, b.) a large amount of the Continental Congress owned slaves, and c.) George IIII didn't start slavery, and it was silly to say that he did, particularly in so important a document. That said, the slavery issue hung over the revolutionary delegates' heads. In the end, they punted on the issue. The roots of the abolition movement can be traced to before the Declaration of Independence, but the time for abolition had not come. Eighty years later, it would.

John Adams was also intimately involved in the editorial process of the Declaration. Gone from the document, vis-a-vis Adams, were Jeffersonian flights of bathos, such as: "These facts have given the last stab to agonizing affection, and manly spirit bids us to renounce forever these unfeeling brethren...we must endeavor to forget our former love for them. We might've been a free and great people together". But the one phrase, mostly Jeffersonian, but with small touches from Adams, was this:

"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 them 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."

Happy Independence Day.