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Show iiif Ihe Vdwxi; GOOD old freedom and equality equal-ity have been with us so long in these United States and who shall deny that we have them? that It has become a "property of easiness" and we are prone to forget, with all the Independence days we have observed since that far day of the first one born of the spirit of '76, just how It all came about It has been some time since we have heard a "Fourth of July Oration" or heard the "Declaration of Independence" read at the fair grounds. So let's take a moment's pause and do a little looking backward back-ward and recover, perhaps, a few forgotten thrills, advises a writer in the Kansas City Star.1- The hall in which our freedom was born Is still standing there in Independence Square, Philadelphia, little changed with time. Some of the chairs the delegates sat in and the desk upon which the president of the congress wrote his "John Hancock" are there. Portraits of the signers look down from the walls. But who today can recall the actual happenings of those fateful years of June and July, 159 years ago, when our independence was In travail? What actually happened on July 4, the subsequently dedicated dedi-cated days? When was the immortal immor-tal document proclaimed to the nation? na-tion? Was the great step taken amid a tumult of shouting and bell-ringing bell-ringing and firing of cannon, as It came to be celebrated in after years? Glorious in legend as was that first Fourth 169 years ago, it was a day of deep and cautious solemnity. solem-nity. They were not noise-makers who assembled to launch a new nation na-tion "dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal." The day fell upon a rainy Thursday. In Philadelphia's old state house there was no stately ceremony. No crowds were waiting outside as yet to hear "the Joyful news." In fact, there was an atmosphere of grave uncertainty in the hall as to the fate of the great charter of American Ameri-can liberty. To state the historical truth, by the record. Independence had already al-ready been declared July 2, two days before. It was on that day that Richard Henry Lee's resolution. Introduced In-troduced In the congress some weeks before, was passed by a bare majority, ma-jority, declaring "that the United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be. Free and Independent States, and that they are Absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection hetween them, and the State of Great Britain Is, and ought to he. totally dissolved." In effect that action was a severing of the political politi-cal tie between the colonies and Great Britain. Why, then. Is not July 2 the "day we celebrate?" Because those fathers of the Republic Re-public recognized the gravity of the step they were about to take and that It meant war' and bloodshed. They were practical, methodical nnd Just men, and men bred In the parliamentary par-liamentary usages and constitutional law. They recognized that more than a mere resolution was necessary neces-sary to justify their action to the world, and that "a decent respect for the opinions of mankind required re-quired that they should declare the causes which Impel them to the reparation." They were determined not to go before the world as mere 'revolutionists and rebels," but statesmen representing a just cause and a new idea of government "with the consent of the governed." So, July 4 became the day we celebrate because it was not until then that the congress was ready to go before the Judgment of the people and of other nations with a candid statement of the causes that Impelled them to the severance sev-erance of the ties that had long bound them to the mother country. coun-try. The act was not consummated without long and careful deliberation. delibera-tion. The idea of Independence had been long a-borning. The fashioning fash-ioning of the great document that bade defiance to the king and proclaimed pro-claimed a new nation was not as smooth and easy a task as. it may appear from a reading of the beautifully beau-tifully engrossed transcript In the archives at Washington now accepted ac-cepted as "the original Declaration of Independence." The idea of a declaration of independence inde-pendence had its birth 15 years prior to July 4, 1770. James Otis, the "fiery-tongued orator," sounded sound-ed the first note in the statehouse at Boston, in 1761. Nearly a month before the writing of the formal declaration, "Richard Henry Lee, na spokesman for the Virginia delegation delega-tion in congress, Introduced his resolution res-olution which, so far as the record was concerned, finally became the formal declaration. It precipitated a serious debate, for there were Reading Declaration of Independence Independ-ence From Balcony of State House. many who "were not ready for the question." On June 11 a committee commit-tee was appointed to prepare a suitable suit-able declaration of causes, in support sup-port of Lee's resolution, composed of Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, John Sherman and Robert Livingston. The task of formulating the causes and writing the document fell to the facile pen of Thomns Jefferson. But it was not finally accepted wholly as Jefferson wrote It. Many passages were stricken out and several amendments attached to it But on July 4 Jefferson's final draft of the "form of announcing the fact of separation" was fo mally adopted and ordered prliited and distributed to the assemblies conventions and councils of safety throughout the colonies. This print Ing had only two slgnatures-those "f John Hancock, president, and Charles Thomson, secretary of the congress. On July 19, congress or-dered or-dered the declaration to be "fairly engrossed on parchment," and It was not until August 2, 1770 that the great sheepskin was unrolled In the presence of the Continental Con-cress. Con-cress. Fifly of the falhers S,gne"l the document on that day Six dl, not ffix thpIr 'I d ?ter date. And one, Thomas Me Koan of Delaware, did no si-' It until five years later H"t with the signatures of Han cook and Thomson, ,e Z became official, so far s ,p world was concerned, on .lulv 4 On Jul, 8. Washing,,,,, ,, .Jj |