We did not have such a government before the 4th of July, 1776. Our country was then governed by a king, and, what was worse, this king was on the other side of the ocean, and cared nothing for the people of America except as money bags to fill his purse. But after that 4th of July we governed ourselves, and had no king for lord and master; and we have got along very well without one.
Now you can see what the Declaration of Independence and the Revolution meant. With the Declaration we cut loose from England. Our ship of state set out on its long voyage to liberty. The Declaration cut the chain that fastened this great ship to England's shores. The Revolution was like the stormy passage across the ocean waves. At times it looked as if our ship of state would be torn to pieces by the storms, or driven back to the shores from which it set sail; but then the clouds would break and the sun shine, and onward our good ship would speed. At length it reached the port of liberty, and came to anchor far away from the land of kings.
This is a sort of parable. I think every one of you will know what it means. The people of this country had enough of kings and their ways, and of being taxed without their consent. They made up their minds to be free to tax and govern themselves. It was for this they fought in the Revolution, and they won liberty with their blood.
And now, before we go on with the history of our country, it will be wise to stop and ask what kind of government the Americans gave themselves. They had thrown overboard the old government of kings. They had to make a new government of the people. I hope you do not think this was an easy task. If an architect or builder is shown a house and told to build another like that, he finds it very easy to do. But if he is shown a heap of stone and bricks and wood and told to build out of them a good strong house unlike any he has ever seen, he will find his task a very hard one, and may spoil the house in his building.
That was what our people had to do. They could have built a king's government easily enough. They had plenty of patterns to follow for that. But they had no pattern for a people's government, and, like the architect and his house, they might spoil it in the making. The fact is, this is just what they did. Their first government was spoiled in the making, and they had to take it down and build it over again.
This was done by what we call a Convention, made up of men called "delegates" sent by the several states. The Convention met in Philadelphia in 1787 for the purpose of forming a Constitution; that is, a plan of government under which the people should live and which the states and their citizens should have to obey.
This Convention was a wonderful body of statesmen. Its like has not often been seen. The wisest and ablest men of all the states were sent to it. They included all the great men—some we know already, Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, and Adams and many others of fine ability. For four months these men worked in secret. It was a severe task they had to perform, for some wanted one thing and some another, and many times it looked as if they would never agree; but at length all disputes were settled and their long labors were at an end.
General Washington was president of the Convention, and back of the chair on which he sat the figure of the sun was painted on the wall. When it was all over, Benjamin Franklin pointed to this painting and said to those who stood near him:
"Often while we sat here, troubled by hopes and fears, I have looked towards that figure, and asked myself if it was a rising or a setting sun. Now I know that it is the rising sun."
The rising sun indeed it was, for when the Convention had finished its work it had formed the noble Constitution under which we now live, the greatest state paper which man has ever formed.