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This Fourth of July, Celebrate "1776" -- The Movie
As we commemorate the Fourth of July, one of the joys -- and there are many -- of life in these United States is that you never know what the hell we, the people, will say next.
There's the delightful teenage girl in Montclair, New Jersey, who when informed this week that the nice married couple nearby had been arrested as Russian intelligence agents, joked to The New York Times, "They couldn't have been spies. Look what she did with the hydrangeas."
On the other end of the comedy spectrum there's House minority leader John Boehner, who scoffingly told the conservative Pittsburgh Tribune-Review that financial reform was akin to "killing an ant with a nuclear weapon." Yep, the bank-fueled economic meltdown that created those 8 million U.S. job losses and $17 trillion in lost retirement savings and net worth was one heck of an anthill. Good one, John.
But one remark that really floored me occurred last week when I was interviewing FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski before an audience at the Silverdocs documentary film festival just outside Washington, DC. At the end of the conversation, which covered everything from net neutrality and broadband access to the fate of investigative journalism in cyberspace, we took questions from the audience. One gentleman had several brief policy questions and then, of all things, asked Genachowski to name his favorite movie.
"'1776,'" the chairman instantly replied, with "Fiddler on the Roof" a close second.
Yes, "1776," the film version of the Broadway musical comedy by Sherman Edwards and Peter Stone that turned the signing of the Declaration of Independence into a song-filled romp through eighteenth century Philadelphia. Ben Franklin, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson even dance down a staircase in Independence Hall.
You could have knocked me over with a quill when Genachowski said it. But truth be told, "1776" is a favorite of mine as well. I wouldn't rank it anywhere near such greats as "Casablanca" or "Chinatown" or "The Godfather" or "Some Like It Hot" and "The Thin Man" (to name but a few), but I saw the movie when it first came out in 1972, still tune it in when it pops up on cable and have even seen a couple of staged revivals of the original play, one at a dinner theater in Maryland where between scenes the actors playing delegates of the Continental Congress served up prime rib and strawberry shortcake.
Yes, it's corny; many of the jokes are groaners and some of the lyrics edge toward crossing that "Spinal Tap" fine line between stupid and clever. But there's something deeply stirring about seeing the Founding Fathers as human beings, their foibles broadly drawn, their desire for freedom duking it out against prejudice, self-interest and resistance to change.
"What's so terrible about being called an Englishman?" Continental Congress delegate John Dickinson asks Benjamin Franklin. "The English don't seem to mind."
"Nor would I," Franklin replies, "were I given the full rights of an Englishman. But to call me one without those rights is like calling an ox a bull. He's thankful for the honor, but he'd much rather have restored what's rightfully his."
In some ways, this sparkly paean to patriotism is a subversive little hand grenade, its liberal politics woven into the plot at a time when Richard Nixon was still in the White House. In an exchange that stings now even more than it did then, John Hancock tells John Dickinson, "Fortunately there are not enough men of property in America to dictate policy," and Dickinson replies, "Perhaps not. But don't forget that most men without property would rather protect the possibility of becoming rich, than face the reality of being poor."
When the movie version was released its producer, Jack Warner -- allegedly at the behest of Nixon -- removed a song, "Cool, Cool Considerate Men," sung by loyalist, conservative delegates who smugly shout, "We have land, cash in hand, self-command, future planned!" According to "1776" writer Peter Stone, "The opponents of independence were very much involved in commerce and profits, so they were very much allied to modern conservatives. Nixon didn't want Americans to be reminded of this as he faced re-election in 1972, and the country was preparing to celebrate it's bicentennial. I think that's why he hated the song, and why Jack Warner took it out."
Luckily, the missing footage was found and has been restored to the version we see today on TV and DVD.
"1776" is a reminder that the embrace of the status quo in the face of revolutionary ideas is nothing new. Nor is bloody legislative compromise or our ongoing frustration over a Congress mired in petty squabbling, unable to take action.
At the beginning of the story, John Adams sings, "A second flood, a simple famine, plagues of locusts everywhere, or a cataclysmic earthquake, I'd accept with some despair. But no, You sent us Congress! Good God, Sir, was that fair?" Later he laments, "I have come to the conclusion that one useless man is called a disgrace; that two are called a law firm, and that three or more become a Congress!"
But the Tea Partiers and Glenn Becks of America who scorn government and who have tried turning the Founding Fathers into libertarian deities will find little comfort in "1776." As Franklin says in the film, "We're men, no more no less, trying to get a nation started against greater odds than a more generous God would have allowed." Rather than fall hopelessly into endless name-calling and mudslinging like today, ultimately these men engaged in forthright debate and overcame ideological differences that threatened to stop their revolution before it began. They managed to produce a nation, an experiment outlined in a Declaration of Independence that is, as the movie version's John Adams says, "a masterful expression of the American mind."
And they did so realizing, as a character in the film says -- quoting the words of conservative icon Edmund Burke, member of the British Parliament -- that a representative owes the people not only his industry, but his judgment, and he betrays them if he sacrifices it to their opinion.
So watch the movie and see what you think (Turner Classic Movies is playing it on the Fourth of July). I'd match "1776" against "The Last Airbender" or that "Karate Kid" remake any day.
15 Comments so far
Show AllActually, Adams first says "I have to the conclusion that one useless man" etc., and after he leaves the building, sings.
But it's a longtime favorite of mine & I was delighted when the DVD version restored the cut footage, including a longer debate between Adams & Dickinson.
I was lucky to see the original Broadway production as a child, owned the cast album, and watched the movie every year on the 4th (I think it was on channel 9) and eventually bought the video when it came out. For those who can't access it immediately, many of the scenes are available on YouTube. Aside from the matters the writer of this article addressed, there are no punches pulled on the drinking, whoring, and slavedriving on the part of many of our history's most accomplished and revered leaders (which serves as yet another painful reminder of why today's Congress is the way it is -- all that religious hypocrisy that the Constitution tried to keep out of government in Article 6 and Amendment 1), yet you'll note the conspicuous absence of a single Michelle Bachmann type. You'll also find three songs that could move you to tears -- "Mama, Look Sharp" sung by Washington's messenger to Congress, "Is Anybody There?" sung by John Adams, and "Molasses, to Rum, to Slaves" sung by Rutledge of South Carolina, exposing the hypocrisy of New England shipping profiteers blaming southern gentry for the horrors of slavery. And for Northern Exposure fans, that's Broadway baritone John Cullum under that wig as Rutledge.
This may be nitpicking, but I've always wondered why Caesar Rodney is portrayed as old and sickly, and is brought back from his deathbed to save the Delaware vote. In truth, he was young and dashing, and had left Congress to fight the revolution, which was a very rare thing, and he made a mad dash on horseback to Philly to save the Delaware vote. The real story is much more exciting than the way the musical rewrote it. If anyone has a Delaware quarter, that's Rodney on the back, during his famous ride, which to Delaware is bigger than Paul Revere's ride is to Massachusetts.
Oh Yeah Steve,
What a powerful solo it was. "Let us talk of Molasses, to Rum, to Slaves" he says. And historically, that's what made the whole South walk out: Jefferson's indictment against the "Christian King of Great Britain" for forcing a slave trade down the throats of the continent.
But truthfully, many of the ship owners from the North were neck deep in kidnapping and trafficking slaves and secretly did not want it to end. The South would scarcely talk to Jefferson after his attempt at indicting the institution of Slavery.
I really liked Adam's "I'm not a likable man". Funny, and true. He was a fussy, bald, short Puritan lawyer, a Christian; whereas many of the ranking founding fathers were deitists. He went into shock when Jefferson was shagging a young girl in his upstairs hotel room in the middle of the day instead of writing the Declaration of Independence. "Has he no decency?" Adams quips to Ben Franklin, "It's the middle of the day for God's sakes!" (or something like that.)
You really got the sense of how Early America was a collection of disparate beliefs and viewpoints; and how they overcame their differences to over-ride the Empires': Men of Land, cash in hand, self-command, future planned!......
It's one of the best Movies I've ever seen. Guys, if you can get it from Netflicks or buy it somewhere, you won't regret it.
TJ
I have seen the movie a number of times, and the song "Mama, Look Sharp" hits me emotionally as few songs do.
It would be good for every member of Congress, the Administration, and policy maker to listen to it while making decisions regarding our men and women in uniform.
Happy 4th!
I was visiting a friend from Long Island many years ago, and we went to see the film "1776" at NYC's Radio CIty Music Hall. The movie "1776" was so boring that my friend and I walked out in the middle of it.
I never saw the original Broadway or stage play of "1776", but I'm sure it was infinitely better than the movie version.
What to the Slave on the Fourth of July? by Frederick Douglass
The Hypocrisy of American Slavery
July 4, 1852
Rochester, New York
Fellow citizens, pardon me, and allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here today? What have I or those I represent to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? And am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar, and to confess the benefits, and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us?
Would to God, both for your sakes and ours, that an affirmative answer could be truthfully returned to these questions. Then would my task be light, and my burden easy and delightful. For who is there so cold that a nation's sympathy could not warm him? Who so obdurate and dead to the claims of gratitude, that would not thankfully acknowledge such priceless benefits? Who so stolid and selfish that would not give his voice to swell the hallelujahs of a nation's jubilee, when the chains of servitude had been torn from his limbs? I am not that man. In a case like that, the dumb might eloquently speak, and the "lame man leap as an hart."
But such is not the state of the case. I say it with a sad sense of disparity between us. I am not included within the pale of this glorious anniversary! Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. The blessings in which you this day rejoice are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity, and independence bequeathed by your fathers is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought life and healing to you has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth of July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn. To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated temple of liberty, and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems, were inhuman mockery and sacrilegious irony. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me, by asking me to speak today? If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. And let me warn you, that it is dangerous to copy the example of a nation (Babylon) whose crimes, towering up to heaven, were thrown down by the breath of the Almighty, burying that nation in irrecoverable ruin.
Fellow citizens, above your national, tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions, whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are today rendered more intolerable by the jubilant shouts that reach them. If I do forget, if I do not remember those bleeding children of sorrow this day, "may my right hand forget her cunning, and may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth!"
To forget them, to pass lightly over their wrongs and to chime in with the popular theme would be treason most scandalous and shocking, and would make me a reproach before God and the world.
My subject, then, fellow citizens, is "American Slavery." I shall see this day and its popular characteristics from the slave's point of view. Standing here, identified with the American bondman, making his wrongs mine, I do not hesitate to declare, with all my soul, that the character and conduct of this nation never looked blacker to me than on this Fourth of July.
Whether we turn to the declarations of the past, or to the professions of the present, the conduct of the nation seems equally hideous and revolting. America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. Standing with God and the crushed and bleeding slave on this occasion, I will, in the name of humanity, which is outraged, in the name of liberty, which is fettered, in the name of the Constitution and the Bible, which are disregarded and trampled upon, dare to call in question and to denounce, with all the emphasis I can command, everything that serves to perpetuate slavery — the great sin and shame of America! "I will not equivocate — I will not excuse." I will use the severest language I can command, and yet not one word shall escape me that any man, whose judgment is not blinded by prejudice, or who is not at heart a slave-holder, shall not confess to be right and just.
But I fancy I hear some of my audience say it is just in this circumstance that you and your brother Abolitionists fail to make a favorable impression on the public mind. Would you argue more and denounce less, would you persuade more and rebuke less, your cause would be much more likely to succeed. But, I submit, where all is plain there is nothing to be argued. What point in the anti-slavery creed would you have me argue? On what branch of the subject do the people of this country need light? Must I undertake to prove that the slave is a man? That point is conceded already. Nobody doubts it. The slave-holders themselves acknowledge it in the enactment of laws for their government. They acknowledge it when they punish disobedience on the part of the slave. There are seventy-two crimes in the State of Virginia, which, if committed by a black man (no matter how ignorant he be), subject him to the punishment of death; while only two of these same crimes will subject a white man to like punishment.
...
Thank you for that.
Trylon
What to the Slave on the Fourth of July? by Frederick Douglass
The Hypocrisy of American Slavery
July 4, 1852
Rochester, New York
(cotn.)
What is this but the acknowledgment that the slave is a moral, intellectual, and responsible being? The manhood of the slave is conceded. It is admitted in the fact that Southern statute books are covered with enactments, forbidding, under severe fines and penalties, the teaching of the slave to read and write. When you can point to any such laws in reference to the beasts of the field, then I may consent to argue the manhood of the slave. When the dogs in your streets, when the fowls of the air, when the cattle on your hills, when the fish of the sea, and the reptiles that crawl, shall be unable to distinguish the slave from a brute, then I will argue with you that the slave is a man!
For the present it is enough to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race. Is it not astonishing that, while we are plowing, planting, and reaping, using all kinds of mechanical tools, erecting houses, constructing bridges, building ships, working in metals of brass, iron, copper, silver, and gold; that while we are reading, writing, and ciphering, acting as clerks, merchants, and secretaries, having among us lawyers, doctors, ministers, poets, authors, editors, orators, and teachers; that we are engaged in all the enterprises common to other men — digging gold in California, capturing the whale in the Pacific, feeding sheep and cattle on the hillside, living, moving, acting, thinking, planning, living in families as husbands, wives, and children, and above all, confessing and worshipping the Christian God, and looking hopefully for life and immortality beyond the grave — we are called upon to prove that we are men?
Would you have me argue that man is entitled to liberty? That he is the rightful owner of his own body? You have already declared it. Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? Is that a question for republicans? Is it to be settled by the rules of logic and argumentation, as a matter beset with great difficulty, involving a doubtful application of the principle of justice, hard to understand? How should I look today in the presence of Americans, dividing and subdividing a discourse, to show that men have a natural right to freedom, speaking of it relatively and positively, negatively and affirmatively? To do so would be to make myself ridiculous, and to offer an insult to your understanding. There is not a man beneath the canopy of heaven who does not know that slavery is wrong for him.
What! Am I to argue that it is wrong to make men brutes, to rob them of their liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters? Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood and stained with pollution is wrong? No — I will not. I have better employment for my time and strength than such arguments would imply.
What, then, remains to be argued? Is it that slavery is not divine; that God did not establish it; that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? There is blasphemy in the thought. That which is inhuman cannot be divine. Who can reason on such a proposition? They that can, may — I cannot. The time for such argument is past.
At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed. Oh! had I the ability, and could I reach the nation's ear, I would today pour out a fiery stream of biting ridicule, blasting reproach, withering sarcasm, and stern rebuke. For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake. The feeling of the nation must be quickened; the conscience of the nation must be roused; the propriety of the nation must be startled; the hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed; and its crimes against God and man must be denounced.
What to the American slave is your Fourth of July? I answer, a day that reveals to him more than all other days of the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mock; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are to him mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation of the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of these United States at this very hour.
Go search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the Old World, travel through South America, search out every abuse and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.
Judging from this movie review and Winship's previous piece-- a bit of hand-wringing fluff deploring the mutated menarche of Miley Cyrus-- he's trying to rediscover himself as a media critic in the post-Moyers era. And in the process, splashing about in shallows normally inhabited by the likes of, say, Peggy Noonan.
I honestly didn't want to spoil the holiday cheer here, such as it is, attending this serving of puff pastry sprinkled with red, white and blue jimmies.
But now that other "Independence Day" grinches have dispelled the mood, I might as well offer the snarky observation that "1776" would make a great double feature with "Born on the Fourth of July"-- except that regardless of what order they were shown in, half the audience would walk out during the first feature.
It's hard to get people to join the revolution if we're going to be cranky and self-righteous all the time. Most of the time, sure, but not all the time. The movie is fun. It's pretty good, tells the old story in a new way, and has some memorable songs and indelible images.
The American revolution didn't create the society most of us would have liked by modern standards, but 1776 was not today. While the world has seen many occupied nations eventually become free from imperial rule, the United States was the first colony of a mother country's own settlers that decided to not only start anew, but to try to create, based on reason and eschewing superstition, a new form of government that would attempt to be a popularly selected revolving meritocracy rather than divine right and inheritance. And they had to do this while compromising with each other, or it couldn't happen, so on top of their 1776 sensibilities, that was one more pressure mitigating against perfection. They quite sensibly built a mechanism for improvement into the basic plan that has allowed considerable progress, while making one huge mistake that could only be settled by war 90 years later. All this and history's first legal case for pulling the plug on the social contract on the basis of the ruler's failure to meet his part of the deal, at risk of death. Not a bad package of historic accomplishments in their time, regardless of how and where they fell short.
I don't really think Canada can be compared to the American experiment, so it remains quite possible that not only were the American founders the first to attempt something of this unfathomable (by today's standards) magnitude, but they may remain the only people who have ever tried it -- and they succeeded, which wasn't even settled until 1814, meaning they and their citizenry stayed in it for the long haul. So don't act so freakin' superior. None of you who type here would have been fit to shine their shoes, let alone design and implement a better system with the knowledge and social norms available at that time.
Look at the clowns who occupy the seats of government now, at every level, and how much influence organized religion and corporations, which our founders attempted to exclude from influence, wield. Despite slavery and property, they got things a thousand times more right than we could today, even with our enlightenment on issues to which they were blind or barred by contemporaneous circumstances from action. If they were here today, they'd all pack up for Costa Rica as soon as they'd finished puking. And they'd be rightfully disappointed by the level of discourse by today's "progressive" rabble, too. Beam me up, Mr. Adams, no sign of intelligent life here.
Dafoe
Seems that most of this country gets its history from the movies or other fiction. How many years was this nation espoused as a "light on the hill" while that was true if you were white/european for other colors forget it and good luck trying to vote? If you can't assimilate into the european/briddish model then its your tough luck, there is no accommodation for any other culture.
The original inhabitants are not in and never were in the picture.
You watch "1776" and then watch John Wayne and his like mowing down those savages who don't want to do what they are told and you will have the full popular measure of amercan 'istery.
The difference between history and myth would be that history is written down, except that myth is also written down.
I take it you desire accuracy, and with this I have to agree. But the lies are as often bound and sold as textbooks as in song, and the guitar as often an instrument of change.
Let's strum for a bit here, Dafoe, and someone may lay down a different track.
(in the spirit of '76)
Down With Empire USA
Afghanistan?
for the Afghans
Iraq?
for the Iraqis
America?
up for grabs
Judging from the celebrations yesterday a foreigner watching the nonsense must have concluded that a military coup happened in 1776 instead of a significant political and economic rebellion.
Nope. Not this year. No one home.
Porch.
Tequila.
A couple oranges and a couple lemons.
Glad the explosions sound so far away
this year.
To Howard Zinn, to Frederick Douglass,
to you-all, friends: cheers.