Feature of the Month: July 2007
Americans celebrate July 4, 1776, adoption of Declaration of Independence
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The Empire State building is dwarfed by a burst of fireworks during Independence Day along New York's East River. (© AP Images) |
"That document continues to represent the standard to which we hold others, and the standard by which we measure ourselves. Our greatest achievements have come when we have lived up to these ideals. Our greatest tragedies have come when we have failed to uphold them."
President George W. Bush, outside Independence Hall, Philadelphia, birthplace of the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 2001
Presidential Proclamation on Independence Day 2007
U.S. Independence Day a Civic and Social Event
The United States celebrates its Independence Day on July 4, a day of patriotic celebration and family events throughout the country. In the words of Founding Father John Adams, the holiday would be “the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, … . 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.”
The holiday is a major civic occasion, with roots deep in the Anglo-American tradition of political freedom.
Community fireworks displays are common. In New York City, Macy's department store for 30 years has sponsored a July 4 fireworks display. In 2005, the 30-minute show featured 35,000 shells launched from seven barges afloat in the East River and in New York Harbor. The Associated Press estimated that more than 3 million watched in person. The event also has been televised nationally in recent years.
"The Fourth" is a family celebration. Picnics and barbeques are common. July is summer in the United States, and millions of Americans escape the heat at beaches and other vacation spots. Independence Day is not among the legal holidays fixed on a Monday or Friday, but many employees use vacation time to create an extended weekend, as in 2006, when the holiday occurs on a Tuesday.
Construction of important public works sometimes begins on July 4. The Erie Canal, Washington Monument and Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (the nation's first) all broke ground on Independence Day. The date reflects a desire symbolically to stamp these projects as true civic improvements.
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Leah Meixner and her father
watch an Indedpendence Day
parade in Anchorage
(© AP Images) |
The Fourth of July is a time when elected officials and other public figures often give speeches extolling American traditions and values.
BACKGROUND
 Independence Day has provided some of this nation's most stirring words of freedom. In 1788, Founding Father James Wilson addressed a Philadelphia gathering that was possibly the largest July 4 celebration in the young nation's history. He exhorted his fellow citizens to ratify the proposed Constitution. "What is the object exhibited to our contemplation?" he asked. "A WHOLE PEOPLE exercising its first and greatest power -- performing an act of SOVEREIGNTY, ORIGINAL and UNLIMITED….”
On July 4, 1852, the black journalist and abolitionist Frederick Douglass decried the evils of slavery, still prevalent in the American South at that time, but identified forces "drawing encouragement from the Declaration of Independence, the great principles it contains, and the genius of American Institutions in operation" that "must inevitably work The downfall of slavery."
Ninety years later, near the darkest moments of World War II, President Franklin D. Roosevelt reminded the nation that July 4 symbolized "the democratic freedom which our citizens claim as their precious birthright:" For the "weary, hungry, unequipped Army of the American Revolution," he continued:
the Fourth of July was a tonic of hope and inspiration. So is it now…. The tough, grim men who fight for freedom in this dark hour take heart in its message -- the assurance of the right to liberty under God -- for all peoples and races and groups and nations, everywhere in the world.
Fireworks Companies Working Around the Clock for July Fourth
Towns across the United States celebrate America’s Independence Day on July 4 with fireworks – shimmering bursts of light that mesmerize and explosions so loud they rattle the chests of onlookers. Since April, the fireworks display companies that put on the shows have been working at full tilt, according to Julie Heckman of the American Pyrotechnics Association. In many cases, the companies increase their number of employees tenfold in the weeks leading up to the holiday. On the Fourth of July, the hard work pays off. “You get dirty, sweaty, bloody, hot,” says Lansden Hill, president of Pyro Shows USA, in LaFollette, Tennessee. “But at the end of the day, you flip a switch, and hundreds of thousands of people cheer and laugh and scream and honk horns. At that moment, there is not a job in the world like this. (complete text)
Fourth of July Music Reflects U.S. History, Diversity
The patriotic songs that have become staples of the U.S. Independence Day celebrations reflect the nation’s history and the contributions of immigrants to the country’s diverse culture. For Americans, strains of John Philip Sousa’s “The Stars and Stripes Forever” or George M. Cohan’s “Yankee Doodle Dandy” evoke July 4 memories. Russian composer Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture is a traditional July 4th feature, although the piece commemorates Russia’s victory over Napoleon’s army and has no connection to U.S. events. (complete text)
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