The life of a paper skiff

In 1823, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were sniping at each other. Adams believed Jefferson took too much credit for the Declaration of Independence, insisting that its ideas were not original to Jefferson. Defensive, Jefferson complained in a letter to James Madison, “I did not consider it part of my charge to invent new ideas.” Both men knew full well that the ideas undergirding the document went much further back. The Declaration sprang from an alchemical distillation of the Christian religion and the British constitutional tradition dating back to the Magna Carta of 1215.

King Charles III reminded his listeners of our common, political heritage in his recent address to Congress. Even though “ours is a partnership born out of dispute,” Charles explained, “we can discern that our nations are in fact instinctively like-minded—a product of the common democratic, legal, and social traditions in which our governance is rooted to this day.”

Unlike the French Revolution, American independence was grounded in its political and cultural traditions, and the ideas enlivening the Declaration had deep roots in those traditions. Two recent books highlight how the Declaration’s deep-rooted ideas were received by people at the time and how the Declaration has influenced American culture since its signing.

Emily Sneff offers a compelling narrative of how the Declaration’s ideas went viral in the weeks and months following July 4, 1776. When the Declaration of Independence Was News (Oxford University Press, 272 pp.) approaches the Declaration from a relatively untrodden direction, exploring how the Declaration, as a “communication tool,” reached worldwide audiences and how they reacted to it.

Sneff sheds light on many characters in the Declaration’s history who are easily overlooked. People like Mary (Polly) Palmer received her copy from her friend and pen pal, John Adams. On July 18, the Wolastoqey tribe’s Chief Ambrose Bear listened to a translation of the Declaration into French during the Watertown Treaty talks, and Bear became the first foreign power to recognize the independent states.

Most people were not so well connected. They read the Declaration in cheap broadsides or newspapers, or they heard it read in churches and town halls. One of the first of these groups was the Continental Army in New York City. On July 9, the troops heard the Declaration, and soon afterward, they proceeded to rip down the large statue of King George on the Bowling Green.

However, not everyone shared the army’s excitement. John Dickinson, who opposed independence but fought for the states during the war, described the Declaration as “a skiff made of paper” sailing into a storm. Likewise, the Declaration put 300 North American Anglican ministers in a difficult situation, since the king was the Supreme Governor of the Church of England. Overnight, the head of the church became a treasonous, foreign power. Many ministers felt isolated, some were threatened, and not a few decided to close up their churches as war with Britain unfolded.

Sneff’s account also documents the global spread of the Declaration. While most European powers received the news by late August, it landed in England first, appearing on the front page of the London Gazette. Other papers quickly followed, including passages from the Declaration. Most papers were careful about what portions of the document they published, and many removed direct references to the monarchy or words like tyrant. Not unlike our own news culture, what Londoners knew about the Declaration very much depended upon what news outlets they relied upon.

As much as the Declaration went viral in the weeks following July 4, in National Treasure: How the Declaration of Independence Made America (Avid Reader Press, 368 pp.), Michael Auslin demonstrates that its popularity dwindled within a decade.

Auslin begins with the traditional history leading to independence, from the Intolerable Acts through the Olive Branch Petition to the Declaration’s signing. For Auslin, the Declaration is first and foremost a “powerful statement of unity … in common hopes and shared beliefs of what life is meant to be in America.” Despite the chasmic divisions running through American history, the Declaration is a touchstone for everyone. National Treasure calls up a variety of characters to demonstrate the Declaration’s universal appeal, from the socialist reformer Robert Owen and the domestic terrorist Timothy McVeigh to Ralph Waldo Emerson, Susan B. Anthony, and Martin Luther King.

However, the significance of the Declaration was not a foregone conclusion. After the Constitution was ratified, the Declaration all but vanished from the public consciousness, set out to pasture after a job well done.

The pivotal moment came during the War of 1812, when British troops set fire to the Capitol. If it were not for the quick actions of a Treasury auditor, the original manuscripts of the Declaration, the Constitution, the Articles of Confederation, and George Washington’s correspondence would have burned.

After it was rescued from the flames, the original manuscript became sacrosanct to the Republic. Preserving it became a cherished responsibility. Auslin celebrates people like the Librarians of Congress Herbert Putnam and Archibald MacLeish as well as archivists and conservationists like Mary Lynn Ritzenthaler and Catherine Nicholson whose work kept the document safe. These individuals make it possible for over 1 million visitors to pay homage to the Declaration at the National Archives every year.

On July 4, 1821, Secretary of State John Quincy Adams read from the original in the House of Representatives, marking the first recorded public display of the Declaration after 1776. Since then, the Declaration is recited on radio and television on July 4th and at many naturalization ceremonies. It is memorialized in the Jefferson Memorial, Mount Rushmore, and the Capitol rotunda.

Of course, like most things American, “selling the Declaration” played a vital role in the revival of its popularity. Auslin takes note of various items that have hit American shelves over the years; everything from engravings and high-quality reproductions to coins and handkerchiefs were produced to market this icon of liberty.

Taken together, Sneff and Auslin provide a captivating journey of the life and legacy of the Declaration in America, and both authors continually return to those ideas that Jefferson and Adams were sniping about. The Declaration provides a model for citizenship in peace and in crisis. In peace, to live in “Safety and Happiness.” In crisis, to humbly insist, and keep insisting, before “the Supreme Judge of the world” that justice be done. And, while King Charles is not threatening American shores, issues like fair taxation, an independent judiciary, executive overreach, and the suspension of due process remain all too relevant today.