I have spent a long time pondering the proper way to publicly observe our national day of independence in a time when America is once again grappling with the enduring taint of its original sin. Should I celebrate it in the way I celebrate Christmas, recognizing the day for its social and traditional value despite any misgivings I might have concerning the subject matter? Should I ignore or denounce it entirely, as many activists have called for? Perhaps some middle ground is in order, where I sheepishly enjoy the displays of fireworks while also proclaiming to anyone who cares to listen that Thomas Jefferson owned over six hundred slaves. I suppose as I'm writing this at 3:18 in the morning (4:11 now that it’s done), my indecision technically made my choice for me. But I have some thoughts.
I'm still not entirely certain what the 'proper' way to observe this day is, but I've at least come to a conclusion that is true for me: I will not, I cannot, denounce outright the birth of this nation. The lofty ideals that so many of this nation's founders failed to meet are too important, this great experiment too crucial to humanity and what it has become, to spend the day in which we observe Columbia's birth simply and only condemning her uncountable failings. This nation was dragged into existence at a time when unspeakable acts of cruelty and inhumanity were the status quo, and our nation was no exception. With that said, her birth (grotesquely flawed as it might have been) became a guiding light, a torch which led the way to the cleansing of that blight from the world. Without the men who declared with one voice (hypocritical as that voice might have been) that men are endowed by their creator with an unalienable right to liberty, and without the men and women who fought and died in service to those few words, the French Revolution would never have occurred. Without the French Revolution, the West Indies slave rebellions would have likely never occurred. Without England’s slave-driven colonies becoming more trouble than they were worth (economically speaking), abolitionists likely would never have achieved the rapid successes they did. The United States of America might have been among the last nations worldwide to abolish the practice of slavery, but it is a reasonable argument that the seeds of the end of the practice were planted on American soil. I can condemn those who took part in and profited from the practice, and I do so with enthusiasm, but I cannot do so without also acknowledging this truth: America is greater than the sum of her faults, vast as that sum might be.
Perhaps more importantly, I refuse to surrender the day of this nation’s birth and the very idea of love of country itself to those who believe that patriotism is best captured by the act of wearing clothing striped in red, white, and blue, or those who believe that the most sacred right enshrined in the Constitution is the right to own an AK-47. I refuse to allow those whose heartlessness is ‘individuality’, whose racism is ‘tradition’, whose love of ignorance is ‘freedom’ to define what this nation is, and to lay exclusive claim to its most hallowed symbols.
I love this nation. I believe that you should, too. And I think that it’s important that men and women stand up with firm resolve providing an alternative meaning for what that love can mean. There are hordes of star-spangled citizens who believe that loving a nation means embracing all of its aspects, and there are countless more (whose beliefs look far closer to my own) that seem more than ready to accept this definition… but unwavering devotion in the face of evil is not patriotism. Not truly. Patriotism, true patriotism, is a love for a nation that causes one to work with all one has to improve her. Truly loving America means believing with all that one is that though the nation may be sick at its very roots, and that though it has been so since its inception, that doesn’t mean that the ideals which it has time and again failed to live up to are not still worthy of pursuing in her name. When those legendary men set their names upon the Declaration of Independence, they set themselves and all the rest of us on a grand quest (one which we still find ourselves upon) in pursuit of a more perfect union. We have made so much progress on the path, and there is still so much work to be done.
I love this nation. I refuse to allow the declaration of love for this nation to be a strictly partisan enterprise. I choose to take today to celebrate this nation not as she was in the year 1776 (though there are so many whose actions in that time are utterly deserving of celebration), but instead take the day to celebrate the ideal toward which this nation has spent the last 244 years pursuing: that all human beings are inherently equal, and that a nation and its citizens should reflect this single all-important value.
I end this rather lengthy affirmation with a passage written by Albert Camus (whose intellect and courage as a member of the French Resistance have long inspired me) which I think particularly relevant today:
“I belong to an admirable and persevering nation which, admitting her errors and weaknesses, has not lost the idea that constitutes her whole greatness. Her people are always trying and her leaders are sometimes trying to express that idea even more clearly. I belong to a nation which for the past four years has begun to relive the course of her entire history and which is calmly and surely preparing out of the ruins to make another history and to take her chance in a game where she holds no trumps. This country is worthy of the difficult and demanding love that is mine. And I believe she is decidedly worth fighting for since she is worthy of a higher love. And I say that your nation, on the other hand, has received from its sons only the love it deserved, which was blind. A nation is not justified by such love. That will be your undoing. And you who were already conquered in your greatest victories, what will you be in the approaching defeat?”
July, 1943