Independence Day

by Unknown

THE ORIGIN OF THE DECLARATION[6]

BY SYDNEY GEORGE FISHER

Besides the semi-independent character of their political governments, there were other circumstances which tended to inspire a large part of the colonists with a strong passion for independence, and led them to resist with unusual energy the remodeling plans which England began in 1764.

The sturdy influences of Protestantism and American life had, however, not so great an effect on that large body of people called loyalists, whose numbers have been variously estimated at from one-third to over half the population. They remained loyal to England, and were so far from being inspired with a love of independence that they utterly detested the whole patriot cause and sacrificed their property and lives in the effort to stamp out its principles and put in their place the British empire method of alien control as the best form of government for America.

Patriot parties have existed in other countries without the aid of the particular influences which Burke described. The love of national independence is, in fact, the most difficult passion to eradicate, as the Irish, the Poles, and other broken nationalities bear witness. The desire for independence is natural to all vigorous communities, is generally regarded as more manlike and honorable than dependence, and usually springs up spontaneously whether in Holland, Switzerland or America, in spite of the commercial and conservative influences of loyalism. But, nevertheless, the influences mentioned by Burke, and several that he did not mention, had no doubt considerable effect in creating the patriot party in America and inspiring it with enthusiasm and energy.

The self-confidence aroused in the colonists by their success in subduing the wilderness, felling the vast forests, hunting the wild game and still wilder red men, has often been given as a cause of the Revolution and the American love of independence. Eloquence is easily tempted to enlarge upon such causes, and to describe in romantic language the hunter and the woodsman, the farmer in the fresh soil of primeval forests, the fishermen of the Grand Banks, the merchants and sailors who traded with the whole world in defiance of the British navigation laws, and the crews of the whaling ships that pursued their dangerous game from the equator to the poles.

The American lawyers, according to Burke, were an important cause of the Revolution. They were very numerous in the colonies; law and theories of government were much read and studied, and the people were trained to discussion of political rights as well as of religious doctrine. Burke described in picturesque detail how, in the South, the ruling class lived scattered and remote from one another, maintaining themselves in self-reliant authority on plantations with hundreds of slaves; and slavery, he said, inspired in the white master a fierce love of independence for himself and an undying dread of any form of the bondage which his love of gain had inflicted on a weaker race.

The geographical position of the thirteen contiguous colonies, so situated that they could easily unite and act together, and having a population that was increasing so rapidly that it seemed likely in a few years to exceed the population of England, was possibly a more effective cause of the Revolution than any of those that have been named. The consciousness of possessing such a vast fertile continent, which within a few generations would support more than double the population of little England, furnished a profound encouragement for theories of independence. People in England were well aware of this feeling in the colonies, and Joshua Gee, a popular writer on political economy in 1738, tried to quiet their fears. Some, he said, were objecting that “if we encourage the Plantations they will grow rich and set up for themselves and cast off the English government”; and he went on to show that this fear was groundless because the colonists nearly all lived on the navigable rivers and bays of America, where the British navy could easily reach and subdue them. He also attempted to argue away the advantage of the contiguous situation of the colonies and described them as split up into a dozen or more separate provinces, each with its own governor; and it was inconceivable, he said, that such diverse communities would be able to unite against England.

English statesmen, however, saw the danger of union among the colonies long before the outbreak of the Revolution; and they shrewdly rejected the plan of union of the Albany conference of 1754; and in the Revolution itself a large part of England’s diplomatic and military efforts were directed towards breaking up the easy communication among the colonies.

In modern times England’s colonies have been widely separated from one another. There has been no large and rapidly increasing white population on contiguous territory with ability for union. The dark-skinned population of India is enormous in numbers, but incapable of the united action of the Americans of 1776, and India is not considered a colony but a territory continuously held by overwhelming military force. Instead of a colonial population which threatened in a short time to outnumber her own people, England’s power and population have, in modern times, grown far beyond any power or population in her well-scattered white colonies.