founding fathers

After Dallas: Searching for Peace in a Violent World

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In the wake of the Dallas shootings and others across the United States this week, I have felt at a loss for words. This is not a good feeling for a writer, but so much senseless violence, whether motivated by racism or fear or just hate has made me stuck.

I did find this quote from Shakespeare, however.

“How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds / Make deeds ill done!” –Shakespeare, King John.

We need to make it more difficult for people to do ill deeds. I believe that people have a right to own guns to protect themselves and their families from people who would harm them. However, I don’t think the Founding Fathers could have envisioned semi-automatic weapons or rogue police officers. The proliferation and misuse of weapons isn’t our only problem, though.

We also have racism.

The Founding Fathers didn’t envision a society where people who did not look exactly like them would rightfully demand equal rights under the law. All men are created equal? The fine words of the U.S. Constitution didn’t remotely ring true in the 18th century. This week’s events, among others, has made it clear that we still fall short of thinking that everyone is equal.

Many of the Founding Fathers committed “ill deeds” by owning slaves. Sometimes the slaves escaped or even managed to revolt and use weapons against their masters. In many ways, our country still suffers from the evils of slavery.

White and black people too often look at each other with distrust. And when a gun is handy for either side, the results are often disastrous.

Babies aren’t naturally born with a racist gene. They have to be taught to distrust someone who looks different from them. Laws that limit the sale of weapons that only need to be used in war and require background checks are all well and good. However, if children continue to be taught by their families or by their everyday experiences to hate people who are not just like them, ill deeds will be perpetuated.

Benjamin Franklin and Slavery

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Throughout his life, Benjamin Franklin had a tendency to change his mind on political issues. For example, he initially supported the Stamp Act and only later decided that the American colonies should separate from Britain. Yet often Franklin ended up on the winning side of an argument, even if the argument was not settled in his lifetime.

Like his opinion of the American Revolution, Franklin’s views on slavery changed, too. He owned a couple of slaves at various times of his life and published ads for slave auctions when he worked as a printer. Still, he and his wife Deborah made sure that their slaves received an education from a Philadelphia school for black students. Most slave owners didn’t think slaves could learn, but after Franklin visited the school he commented that he had “higher opinions of the natural capacities of the black race.” He also published a few articles arguing against slavery. Until 1787, however, Franklin never gave the abolition of slavery his complete support.

By 1787, the year of the Constitutional Convention, Franklin became president of the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery. During the convention, he sought to include a statement about the freeing of slaves in the U.S. Constitution. Like many of the Founding Fathers, however, Franklin feared that the union between northern and southern states would not be created if he argued too forcefully for the end of slavery.

Franklin’s silence on the abolition of slavery lasted only until the Constitution was ratified and the new federal government was in place. In 1790, he submitted a petition on the society’s behalf to the U.S. Congress. Franklin declared that slavery contradicted the principles of the American Revolution, particularly the ideas that all men were created equal and that they were entitled to liberty. The petition stated that Congress had an obligation to ensure “the blessings of liberty to the people of the United States without distinction of color.”

The anti-slavery petition set off a heated debate in Congress. It angered pro-slavery advocates like Congressman James Jackson of Georgia. He stated that the Bible supported slavery and that slaves were needed to do the work on the South’s plantations. Though in poor health, Franklin didn’t miss the opportunity to mock Jackson’s speech in print. He compared it to a speech supposedly given one hundred years earlier by an Algerian pirate who had Christian slaves. The pirate argued that it was “in the interest of the state to continue the practice; therefore let the petition be rejected.” He also said that his religion permitted the enslavement of Christians, and that they were better off living as slaves than as free men in Europe “where they would only cut each other’s throats in religious wars.”

Like Franklin’s fictional Algerian pirate, Congress rejected the petition to end slavery. After the debate ended, George Washington wrote to a friend, “the slave business has at last [been] put to rest and will scarce awake.” The contradiction of slavery and the promises of liberty for all Americans awoke again in the nineteenth century, resulting in the Civil War. Once again, Franklin had picked the point of view that eventually prevailed.

Independence Day and The History of Fireworks

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Ever since the first anniversary of Independence Day, Americans celebrated the holiday with fireworks. When the Founding Fathers signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776, John Adams predicted that “this day will be celebrated…with parade, guns, bonfires, and fireworks, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more.” The newly created United States was not the first country to use fireworks for special occasions, however.

Many historians believe that the Chinese invented fireworks by accident approximately 2,000 years ago. One legend claims that a cook mixed charcoal, sulfur, and saltpeter together (all common kitchen ingredients back then). The combination of these chemicals created gunpowder—the key ingredient in fireworks. Eventually someone stuffed gunpowder into bamboo shoots and threw them into the fire. The result was a large BOOM, and the first fireworks were invented. The Chinese used the loud noises to scare away evil spirits.

The explorer Marco Polo may have brought gunpowder back to Europe in the late 1200s after visiting China. In medieval England, using gunpowder to create fireworks became popular as a way to celebrate military victories. Later, they were used during various special events, such as King Henry VII’s wedding day.

By the 1500s, some Englishmen made a living by setting up fireworks displays to entertain audiences. These experts were called firemasters. Their assistants, known as Green Men for their green leaf caps and green costumes which helped them blend in with the displays, were responsible for setting off the fireworks. Green men also told jokes to crowds and tried to keep people from getting too close to the displays. Despite their humor, the Green Men were always in danger. They could be injured or killed if the fireworks failed to rise into the air or went off at the wrong time.

Fireworks experts from various European countries brought their knowledge to America. They quickly became part of Fourth of July celebrations, though some people complained about the noise. On July 4, 1866, a man living in Germantown Pennsylvania wrote, “July 4th is the most hateful day of the year, when the birth of democracy is celebrated by license and noise. All last night and all of today, the sound of guns and firecrackers around us never stopped.”

Throughout the early 1900s, many American adults and children suffered injuries or died from lighting fireworks. To prevent injuries to non-professionals, many states created laws that made setting off fireworks illegal. Professional displays like the one at the National Mall in Washington, D.C., however, are legal everywhere.