V O L . X L V June, 1967 No . 6

4 JULY 1776

PART I

PUBLISHED MONTHLY IN TWO PARTS BY

THE MASONIC SERVICE ASSOCIATION OF THE UNITED STATES

WASHINGTON, D. C. - 20001

4 JULY 1776

Presumably, every American knows that the Fourth of July is the birth date of our nation. Our children are taught that on that memorable day in 1776 the Declaration of Independence was promulgated by the Continental Congress meeting in Philadelphia.

I t was an unusual event in history. A new nation was born, not by treaty or the hidden forces of historical evolution, but by a declara­tion of separation by the chosen representa­tives of a part of a mighty empire. Even the name of this new nation was created by decla­ration. It did not evolve from the geographical and racial backgrounds of its people, like Eng­land or Erance. The very title of that famous document gave our country its name: "The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen United States of America".

One may wonder, however, whether the average American remembers much more about the Declaration of Independence and its significance than those few identifying facts. Even Masons, who revere the famous Brethren who signed their names to that re­markable Declaration, could improve their knowledge of what that document contains and their understanding of what it means.

A Lodge of Speculative Masons, fulfilling its commitment to "good and wholesome in­struction," should pursue such an educational objective by means of an annual "Fourth of July Program." Merely having the Declara­tion read aloud in its entirety, including the names of al l the Signers, would be a most instructive patriotic program to commemorate the birth of our nation. (Of course, it should be done by a practiced reader.)

More than half the Declaration of Inde­pendence is a recital of grievances and com­plaints of "usurpations" against "the K i n g of

3

Great Bri ta in . " The members of the Conti­nental Congress, however, accused the mon­arch symbolically. They realized that they were actually calling to account the Parlia­ment and ministers of the mother country. Even though the intolerable conditions which the colonists were protesting are now "ancient history," they must be known and remembered if we are to understand the forces that im­pelled our Founding Fathers "to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another people." T o serious students of history those grievances also foreshadow some of the problems which were to beset the new nation for decades after it was launched under a new constitution.

What makes the Declaration of Independ­ence so sacred a document for Americans is the breath-taking courage and daring which it exemplified. It was an act of colossal defi­ance, of irrevocable separation. War had al­ready begun. Every man who signed that Declaration knew he was risking a barbarous death reserved for traitors. What the British failed to realize was the confidence and spirit of independence which Americans had devel­oped in a century and a half of conquering a wilderness and learning to manage for them­selves. They dared to challenge the greatest military power of their day and calmly com­mitted themselves to the outcome: "And for the support of this declaration, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor." What a commitment!

What makes their act so astonishing is the realization that the delegates to the Conti­nental Congress expressed the convictions of only a minority of the inhabitants of the thir­teen colonies. Even the Declaration admits that "mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right them­selves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed." Less than two years earlier many of the delegates still believed that har­mony between the mother country and the

4

colonies could be restored. They joined in "a loyal address to the K i n g " in a resolution of the First Continental Congress. On July 4, 1776, however, the representatives were posi­tive that their decision to separate was abso­lutely necessary, and confident that their con­viction would prevail. What fervency and zeal!

But much more significant than the protests and the decision to separate, to declare their independence, was the Founding Fathers' statement of the principles by which they were governed in their action. The funda­mental ideas underlying their decision became the foundation stone of the new nation they were determined to create. They became the moral and ethical concepts which have been dominant in so much of our history. They were an expression of some of the liberal ideas of the 18th century Age of Enlighten­ment, the same forces which made possible and encouraged Speculative Ereemasonry. Masons, therefore, should know the Declara­tion of Independence as thoroughly as they know their lectures.

God — the Signers of the Declaration be­lieved in God. Deity is mentioned four times in that "charter of liberties": "Nature's God" (the source of l a w ) , "Creator" (the giver of l i f e ) , "Supreme Judge of the World" (the dispenser of justice), and "Divine Providence" (the protector). He is no sectarian God; He is the Father of all men; He is the energizing and controlling Force of al l the universe. I t was that concept of Deity which Masonry adopted as early as 172.̂ in Anderson's Con­stitutions.

The expanding knowledge of the laws which govern the physical and biological worlds had led the scientific thinkers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to mar­vel at the Divine Intelligence which planned and governed them all . I t led others to a re­examination of human relationships and hu-

5

man institutions which helped to set off the political revolutions in America and France. Freedom, the condition of life most prized in every century, was not within the power of kings or tyrants to confer or to deny. I t was the heritage of every individual, from God. As the Signers of the Declaration expressed i t : "to assume among the powers of the earth that separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and Nature's God entitle them."

It was these concepts of God and of the orderly universe He governs which enabled Thomas Jefferson to pen the most famous sen­tence in the Declaration: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that al l men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Men are inherently equal be­cause they have the same Creator. They are al l sons of God, and therefore brothers. Free­masonry has been teaching this doctrine for centuries: " B y the exercise of brotherly love, we are taught to regard the whole human species as one family, who, as created by one Almighty Parent are to aid, support, and pro­tect one another."

One of the most interesting but least under­stood phrases in the Declaration of Independ­ence is "the pursuit of happiness." The pursuit is the right, not happiness itself. That cannot be guaranteed. The triple expression, "l i fe, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," is not a new statement in the Declaration. I n varying forms, but practically always beginning with " l i fe" and "liberty," it had been used fre­quently in speeches and documents for at least a decade before 1776.

As early as 1763 James Otis was defining the colonists' rights to life, liberty, property, and trade. John Dickinson, in The Farmer's Letters, 1767-68, wrote that "we cannot be happy without being free — we cannot be

6

free without being secure in our property." I n 1774, the Continental Congress declared that the inhabitants of the colonies "are en­titled to life, liberty, and property." I n June 1776, a General Convention in Virginia wrote a B i l l of Rights, whose first article declared "that all men are by nature free and inde­pendent, and have certain inherent rights; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happi­ness and safety."

As these quotations suggest, the developing concept of men's "unalienable rights" before July 4, 1776, always included the idea of prop­erty and the enjoyment thereof. Why, then, is it conspicuously absent in the Declaration of Independence? I t may be that the committee which framed the immortal document con­sidered it self-evident, obvious, understood. Thomas Jefferson, however, authored most of the Declaration. He was an extremely careful writer. He was not inclined to take things for granted. He may have felt that an emphasis on property would alienate the many prop­erty-less "little people" whom he trusted and believed in.

I t may be that he was conscious of the im­mortal quality of the document he was writ ­ing, that it might become a beacon light for all men in all ages. I n such a frame of refer­ence, only universal hopes and aspirations should find expression. The enjoyment of property is a limited source of happiness. Not all men desire or succeed in finding it that way, yet all men pursue happiness. Masons who truly understand the Speculative Art w i l l give Thomas Jefferson credit for such a spir­itual conception.

I n the Space Age of the 1960's, however, "the pursuit of happiness" has a fearful, frenzied quality which the Signers of the Dec­laration wouldn't understand. The modern world is filled with a sense of danger; it is

7

even more bewildered by a sense of spiritual confusion.

The savagery of civilized men in two World Wars and their satellite conflicts has given mankind no great confidence in the nature of man himself. The fear of atomic annihilation has permeated all the thinking of our era. The growing demand of people in every quarter of the world to enjoy "l i fe, liberty, and the pur­suit of happiness" has led to seething restless­ness and upheavals which destroy the peace and tranquillity of every society. Exploding populations intensify the dissatisfactions.

Underlying all the confusion and uncer­tainty is the greatest fear of a l l : the fear of the tremendous power which knowledge has put into the hands of man. So rapid is the increase of that knowledge in our time that no individual can understand all the poten­tialities of the power within reach of our col­lective hands. Instead of recognizing this development as a triumph of the intelligence and imagination of man, as a manifestation of the nature and quality of God, men despair and cry that God is dead. The individual feels insignificant; he relies on materialistic satis­factions to give meaning to his life.

Is this our heritage from those practical idealists who framed the Declaration of Inde­pendence? Hardly. I t is a new situation in which we must redefine our independence. The enemy we fight is not a king or Parlia­ment. It is a more complex and sophisticated foe — the fantastic increase in mechanistic power. How shall we preserve the individual­ity of human beings in the face of new con­cepts of the human mind and body? In the face of organized propaganda, "depth psychol­ogy," and the techniques of sublimal invasion of the mind? In the possibilities of drugs and chemicals which directly affect and alter indi­vidual personality?

Perhaps it is time for an enlarged declara­tion of the rights of the individual which our

8

forefathers described as "unalienable." They named only three: life, liberty, and the pur­suit of happiness, but acknowledged there were more.

I f Masonry is "a way of l i fe" to make men wiser and consequently happier. Freemasonry must teach mankind that al l men "are en­dowed by their Creator with certain unalien­able rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness by means of brotherly love, relief, and truth."

Speculative Masons know the absolute ne­cessity for such moral and spiritual qualities in the pursuit of happiness. Let that concept of freedom ring!