Americanism Redux
May 29, your today, on the journey to the American Founding, 250 years ago, in 1775
(good ol’ Aesop)
The appearance of things.
Tricky, that.
Something can look one way on the surface or at a glance, but can then turn out to be quite different when you lift the lid or take the time…to listen, to observe, to dive deeper.
It’s today, May 29, 250 years ago and the wiser among us stop for a moment and look longer at appearances.
* * * * * * *
(on the same team in Philadelphia)
It’s been quite a week at the Second Continental Congress.
Don’t give it another thought, some of the delegates insist, we’re amazingly united. Harsh words in disagreements? (Well, no big deal.) One of the delegates who had been dearly esteemed and respected is now ripped to pieces in open debate?; and God only knows what’s said of him off-the-record and at nighttime. (Uh, I’m sure he’s over it.) And then there was this: half of the more than sixty delegates were so offended in debate a few days ago that they walk out of the session? (They came back the next day, didn’t they?)
Any more such “unanimity” and we’ll be throat-cutting each other after roll call.
* * * * * * *
(also on the same team in Philadelphia)
A topic of hot-blooded debate in the Second Continental Congress is whether to write and send another petition of negotiation to the British imperial government. Still another is the final details of how New York City should be militarily defended. Maybe most divisive of all is the fundamental basis for any sort of reconciliation. The view of allowing for some imperial control and authority feels rather old and aging; it’s less suited to temperaments of many delegates sitting in the Pennsylvania State House this week.
So yes, okay, there’s a surface of unity over the unacceptability of raw British power and the impermissibility of unchecked imperial rule. But lower down, like a half-inch, and you get delegates mocking each other, blasting each other, walking out on each other.
* * * * * * *
(the new leader in the chair)
Perhaps a change of Preside-ent will help solidify the appearance of unity. One can hope.
Peyton Randolph, a Virginia delegate and the incumbent Preside-ent from last year’s Continental Congress (we call it “First” now that there’s a “Second”) in Philadelphia, has resigned his seat and returned to Virginia. Randolph judged that his most important role in the current moment is as Speaker of the Assembly in his home colony, a kind of colony-specific Preside-ent of the legislature.
Which means a new Preside-ent of the Second Continental Congress is needed, and now elected. Unanimously, of course! He’s John Hancock, well-known and well-regarded from Massachusetts. Hancock is not the same sort of leader as Randolph.
Like Randolph, Hancock is mega-wealthy. The similarities end there. He is from Boston, operating a vast mercantile business inherited from an uncle. He has no interest in enslavement. He’s much more inclined to be hard-edged and radical in his views of British authority. Hancock has been extensively involved in the design of a new provincial army while also serving as one of the primary leaders of the protests and pressures used by the colonial-rights movement. His prominence and aggressiveness as a colonial-rights protestor has earned him widespread notoriety and infamy in British imperial circles. He’s been wanted for treason and arrest.
Where Randolph moderates and soothes, Hancock pushes and pokes. Where Randolph seeks to siphon off emotional outbursts and impulses, Hancock waits to see where they go, where they lead, where they offer advantage. No wild-eyed, pitchfork-the-rich-dude rioter is Hancock, to be sure. Still, he favors the forceful and as Preside-ent, he’ll bring that outlook to his chair at the front of the room, facing out on the delegates.
* * * * * * *
(staring at the uniform)
Looking out across these so-called united delegates, perhaps Hancock will notice the eyes of John Adams. Adams can’t stop staring at George Washington, sitting with the other Virginia delegates, wearing a striking military uniform, the only one wearing the clothing of a colonial warrior. He looks magnificent, thinks Adams, a testament to the Virginian’s eagerness to accept war in defense of colonial rights. “Oh that I was a soldier!!,” Adams sighs to himself. “I will be,” vows the Massachusetts lawyer, inwardly.
Unity on the surface, and a thousand thoughts beneath.
* * * * * * *
(John Jay, primary author of the Canadian paper)
If handled properly, paper can unify.
It needs the right words. Who will do the writing? Will they write to unify to the point of unanimity?
Part of today, 250 years ago, is a pair of attempts at using paper to unify.
One paper is in the Pennsylvania State House, within full view of the Preside-ent’s Chair where John Hancock now sits. A trio of northerners—John Jay of New York, Samuel Adams of Massachusetts, and Silas Deane of Connecticut—have drafted a document being read aloud to the delegates. It’s title is “To The Oppressed Inhabitants Of Canada”. The aim of the trio is to forge an alliance with the British colony of Canada, making it the fourteenth colony in resistance to British imperial policy. The three writers try to reassure the Canadian audience of American support, a respectful and collaborative embrace, and a strong alignment of shared interests and values in opposing mistreatment from England.
The delegates change one phrase—”province of Quebec” becomes “inhabitants of Canada”—and afterward adopt the document as an official statement. After translation into French, a thousand copies will be hauled northward for distribution.
The other paper is thirty-two miles away from Preside-ent Hancock’s chair.
In Trenton, New Jersey, eighty-five people have been elected from communities across the colony. They sit together today as the first-ever “Provincial Congress” of New Jersey. They’re taking governmental control from the British sympathizing royal governor. Among the delegates is Reverend Jacob Green. Green is one of the founding trustees of the College of New Jersey (Princeton), a diehard colonial-rights supporter, and consistently at odds with his Presbyterian parishioners over his insistence of working secular jobs to earn more money.
Only hours before, Green and his eighty-four comrades in Trenton approved of policies to boost New Jersey’s military readiness. More than that, though, he and they are working on writing a document called “The Association.”
It’s a kind of affidavit or official form that they want people in the colony to sign—fill in your name and write your signature—attesting to full and complete loyalty to “whatever measures may be recommended by the Continental and our Provincial Congress, for defending our Constitution and preserving the same inviolate.” Sign it and you’re one of us. Refuse to sign it and you’re one of them. It’s that simple.
Unity declared, or disunity revealed. The tough choices of Trenton.
* * * * * * *
(John Stark)
A semi-secret military operation has been approved by the Massachusetts Provincial Congress and executed by colonial soldiers surrounding the British in Boston.
Colonel John Stark of New Hampshire has led 300 soldiers organized from his home colony onto Hog and Noodle Islands in Boston harbor. Their objective was the destruction of resources that might be seized and used by the Redcoats penned up in Boston. This means the rounding up of cattle, the slaughter of many of the animals, and the burning of stacks of hay. Stark’s force succeeds in the destruction and then is forced to wage a fire-fight against a unit of British marines sent in response to the colonial mission. Connecticut’s Israel Putnam and roughly 500 soldiers are also dispatched to assist Stark and to clash with several British naval vessels moving toward Stark’s position.
Putnam displays the type of raw courage that many New Englanders have known about him since the French and Indian War. In confronting the British naval vessels that looked to threaten Stark, Putnam waded waist-deep into the saltwater to offer clemency to British soldiers on a stranded boat. Exposed to the possibility of musket and artillery fire for several minutes, the soaked Putnam made his way back to shore and directed his men to shoot at the boat.
The action ends with Stark’s mission executed and a safe return ensured with Putnam’s support. Casualties on either side are minimal.
Official reports by the Redcoats tend to be dismissive of the event, while the 20,000 armed colonists surrounding Boston get a major boost in morale from the mission. In particular, Putnam’s name circulates quickly in the tents and taverns.
The appearance of military skill and prowess is a key resource in the cause of American rights.
* * * * * * *
(one of the trio, William Howe)
Three new arrivals in Boston are witness to Stark and Putnam’s experience. They wear the uniforms of general officers in the British Army: Major-General William Howe, Brigadier-General Henry Clinton, and Brigadier-General John Burgoyne. With them are 4500 more Redcoats, adding to the force currently led in Boston by General Thomas Gage, overall commander of the British military in America.
The quartet of Gage, Howe, Clinton, and Burgoyne set to planning a significant operation that will punish the colonists who killed the cattle and burned the hay. They want to inflict severe damage on the colonial cause.
Also
(the newspaper of today)
At nearly the same day the trio of British officers land in Boston, a newspaper in London informs its readers of shocking news.
The London Evening Post provides the English media’s first published account of the battles and clashes of April 19 at Concord, Lexington, and Old Bay Road.
Violence has slipped its leash. Blood is flowing. War-waging soldiers are marching, firing, and charging.
Cry havoc, wrote Shakespeare. The tracks of a Mars hound lead into the woods.
* * * * * * *
(a modern San Diego descendant)
On the Pacific coast of North America flows the San Diego River. A community of Kumeyaay Natives live in the Capitan Grande valley. They hunt, farm, and pay close attention to managing the land to allow for both activities.
Seven years ago a force comprised of Spanish military and religious ministers arrived in the valley. They established a presidio, a type of Spanish fort where faith, politics, and imperial authority intermingled. They introduced animals and labor familiar to Spanish culture. Steadily, they expanded Spanish imperial power across the valley at the expense of Kumeyaay life.
Today, 250 years ago, tensions are reaching the boiling point. Spanish soldiers regularly rape Kumeyaay women. Native men, women, and children alike are subject to whippings with metal-tipped chords and lashes as determined by either Spanish military officers or Catholic priests. Life along the San Diego River has darkened.
People can only stand for so much. Beneath the surface, the fires burn hot.
For You Now
Appearances—how do you know the word?
Appearances…count for a lot. Keeping up…appearances. Let’s put in an…appearance. Appearances…only take you so far. Make an…appearance. Judging by…appearances. Concerned with…appearances.
The word needs a hook, it has to connect to something else. It’s transitory and drifting, and the longer the time or distance in making the connection, the weaker and wispier the word becomes.
Appearances as a word is everywhere in today’s Redux.
Putnam’s presence in the water in defiance of the British boat has the appearance of amazing nerve and courage. Delegates at the Second Continental Congress assure others of the appearance of unity and unanimity. The official communication to Canadians appears to testify to mutual interests and beliefs (can you believe 250 years later we’re seeing official American communications to Canada in a similar vein?). John Adams draws conclusions from the appearance of delegate George Washington in uniform. The appearances of three British generals in Boston suggest a clear direction in British imperial policy toward colonial protestors. The appearance of an English newspaper account shocks a reading public.
Appearances.
They last if one of two things are true—either they’re tied to something real and thus act as a consistent extension, or if they reveal something real that is in sharp contrast to their original assumption. Proving either real or unreal, one way or the other, appearances can point to the next coming stage or phase in choices and decisions and to the foreseen and unforeseen.
Suggestion
Take a moment to consider: as a leader, how are you in handling appearances?
(Your River)
