Hot week in Philadelphia

When my high school history teacher taught us about our early origins, she begged us to attempt our own adoption of the Founding Fathers' mind set in trying to understand why they acted as they did. Why did they select young Jefferson to write the incriminating document, with the ageing mentors Adams and Franklin to guide him? The Continental Congress, which had adopted the resolution to secede from the mother country, knew they would all hang from the same gibbet if they failed in the grand enterprise. They had backed the stirring words with their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor, no light collateral indeed! Was this expression, which had arisen only after years of trying to close the breach with George III, of such sudden urgency they might have thought they would back down unless they seized the moment right then? History records the telling blow from London was the concept of taxation without representation. This constituted tyranny to the colonists, who had been willing to accept their role as loyal subjects otherwise. How many wavering congressmen would have failed to pass the fact of separation unless that mind set brought about an unusual status of unanimity? They took Dr. Franklin's advice to heart when he reminded them "it is well that we all hang together, else, we would assuredly all hang separately!"

What was going on in the mind of young General George Washington, when he assumed command of the Continental Army? Under his stern visage, did there hang doubt and dread when he realized these raw and undisciplined troops were no match at all to go up against British regular solders? What was troubling the minds of the one-third of a population who were still loyal to the Crown? Where was the money coming from to maintain an army? What a burden for any time in our history -- much less the tenuous time of revolution. Who could have looked ahead to such names and places as Valley Forge, Cowpens, Saratoga, Trenton, Yorktown? Who could have guessed what heroes and what greater villains would come through this struggle with their records of heroism or infamy? For every Ethan Allen we suffered a Charles Lee or a Benedict Arnold. Marion, the "Swamp Fox" needed none of von Steuben's drill master discipline -- his men were born to the saddle in the storied depths of the South. Those were the times and they were the men who lived for good or ill until we triumphed in God's own time -- and received His inestimable gift of freedom. Coupling that with His other gift of free will, we changed our world.

Have a joyous Fourth!