Dave Witzig Normal Community High School

Ken Burns was recently interviewed at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. He was asked who were some of the memorable historical figures he had the opportunity to get to know as he worked on his documentaries. Burns named three: Louis Armstrong, Jackie Robinson, and Abraham Lincoln. After speaking about the first two he said of Lincoln "he breathed new life into the Declaration of Independence." I wonder if he read American Scripture. There were so many lessons and ideas that Maier brought out in her book about the Declaration of Independence and Revolutionary America. I learned much from Maier's book but there were three ideas I will focus on: loyalty to the British, the lack of precedence of a republic form of government, and the 1820 revival of patriotism.

Do most Americans remember that the colonists respected the British and believed that the problem with the British would be resolved. Maier writes, "Over and over the Congress had insisted the imperial conflict could be settled at any time" (3). Many members of the Continental Congress were instructed by their constituents to reconcile with the British. Maier writes, "Americans took particular pride in being governed under Britain's unwritten constitution, which they considered the most perfect form of government ever invented (29). One wonders how history would be different if the British Parliament and the King were able to better handle the situation across the ocean. Maier writes, "The King was stubborn, not especially imaginative, and temperamentally disinclined to think through the careful arguments colonists posed" (23). The most famous snub to the colonists was the Olive Branch Petition -- the King refused to "formally receive the petition on the throne" (25). Then the King followed up with harsh measures which infuriated the colonists. In fact many communities wrote "declarations of independence" from the King (a fact that is hard to find in textbooks it seems that Jefferson wrote the first one). The penalty for these "declarations" were the charge of treason.

At the time of the Declaration of Independence "there were no regular, 'republican' governments of the sort Paine advocated, in which all authority rested on popular choice and none on hereditary title" (35). What made the colonists think they could be the ones to figure out this form of government? To me this is one of the most amazing feats of our early nation -- the ability to start a republic. We learn from world history that Ancient Athens and Rome accomplished (on a limited scale) but in modem history republics "were said to be so short lived that the wisdom of founding another was questionable" (35). Students in classrooms just assume (or don't question) that we and others have always had this kind of government! The Americans of the 1770s were attempting something radical.

I found it fascinating how Americans of the 1820s had a desire to remember and celebrate the veterans of the Revolution. It reminds me of what we are finding today with World War II veterans. Maier writes, " the country watched as their (revolutionary veterans) numbers shrank, year by year, decade by decade (79). Reverend Elias Brewer Hillard "hurried to interview and photograph those 'last survivors of our great national conflict' for the benefit of posterity" (179). I hear of that today, many families are videotaping their World War II father's recollections before they are gone. Maier writes, "Our own are the last eyes that look on men who looked on Washington" (179). We could write "Our own are the last eyes that look on men who looked on FDR and Eisenhower."

In her book American Scripture Pauline Maier describes how the Declaration of Independence was thought of, written, edited, displayed, and viewed by others in history. In doing so she describes revolutionary America and its impact on the rest of our history. By reading this book I will be better able to engage my students on the importance of this document and why the American colonists chose to revolt against the King.

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