Meanwhile

I know I've been quiet.

Today is July 5, 2025. It has been years since I read the Declaration of Independence. I firmly believe that we should each read cultural documents on a regular basis. More often than not, a piece of work such as that declaration becomes a mere whisper of its original intent.

I’m sure that those people who met in 1776 knew full well that the words penned and released on July 4th suggested an automatic death sentence for the authors. Regardless, they had suffered the whims of clowns and kings long enough. They were willing to embark on a new form of government. The systems the colonist suffered under was a theocratically inspired monarchy. God anointed the rulers.

I think now about those people who stood against tyrants. Releasing the document was indeed a great celebration. They did it. They dreamt of a new order. A secular government that was not beholding to a god or king but was instead responsible to its constituents. A government of, for and by the people.

What happened on July 5, 1776? Did some of the signers wake with buyers’ remorse? After they left the meeting and headed back to their homes did they travel looking over their collective shoulder?

Then, as now, they lived in a divided time. The fight for independence began first as a rebellion. We must remember that the colonists served divided loyalties. Many were very comfortable with the status quo. Years ago I realized while spending some time in Charleston, South Carolina that some of the old families were disgruntled about losing the “war.” I assumed it was the Civil War that left them defeated. Upon closer inspection I found that the war to which they were referring was the Revolution. They were loyalists.

Reality tells us that each citizen responds to a laundry list of self-interests. The purpose of government is to sort that laundry. Through compromise each person of interest group may not get exactly what it wants but there would be a general average that pushes forward the concept of a “greater good.” Hopefully the end result is a land in which each and every inhabitant is able to pursue a certain path toward a prosperous life.

I can’t help thinking that on their way home 249 years ago there were dreams going through the authors’ heads. Dreams of a land full of possibilities. No doubt the path that lay ahead was full of trips and traps. July 5, 1776 was the day to look at the future. A day after the break with the past.

Thomas Paine was the best selling writer of the revolutionary period. No doubt he was a student of The Enlightenment. We know that the founding fathers were impressed by enlightenment ideals. Those ideals are what made this grand experiment the most successful country in recorded history of the world.

The Enlightenment is also known as the Age of Reason. It is based on a philosophy that emphasizes reason over superstition and science over blind faith. Both reason and science begin with questions. We analyze and question each and every system in a reasonable fashion. We look to the scientific method to arrive at workable theories. For the most part this country has done just that.

Lately, the daily news has pushed me into a creative funk. I want to write, make art, do something that speaks to my questions about the times. My superstitious mind tells me that I’m tilting at windmills. My fingers freeze over the keys. Paint dries hard in my brush. But, my enlightened mind tells me to plow forward. Keep my eyes on a new world where myths and superstitions of the past slough like the serpent’s skin.

I remember back during Civil Rights days of the 1960’s. The common phrase that became the excuse for systemic racism was. “That’s not the way I was raised.” I think about those who met to draft the letter to the king that was released on July 4, 1776. They were raised as loyal British subjects who bent the knee to both the Crown and the Church of England. We thank our lucky stars that they broke with the way they were raised.

July 5 is the day the hard work begins. We rake the cast off shells and skins of last night’s fireworks and start building a new future. One not rooted in the failures of the past but is bent towards a time rooted in reason and science.