LEBANON — In his now well known 1852 speech about Independence Day, prominent abolitionist Frederick Douglass pointed out what many Americans were unwilling to acknowledge about the accepted account of their nation’s founding. Those who sought freedom from the British crown went only so far.
“They preferred revolution to peaceful submission to bondage,” Douglass said on July 5, 1852 in Rochester, N.Y., to an abolitionist group. While admiring those ideals, he pointed to the “shameless hypocrisy” of the institution of American slavery.
In recent years, Douglass’ speech has gained wider notice, with regular readings around the country on July 4. On Monday, around 100 people gathered in Lebanon’s Colburn Park to recite Douglass’ speech, consider his wider view of what patriotism means, and to reflect on what it might mean today.
The event began with an acknowledgement that the land where the crowd sat had been inhabited by the Abenaki people before it was colonized by British and other settlers, and that colonization is an ongoing issue.
Doreen Schweizer, a member of the Upper Valley Insight Meditation group, which organized the reading, spoke to the crowd about the mixed legacy of Independence Day.
“Some people can get a little scornful about the 4th of July because of the people who didn’t, you know, the women and indigenous people and African American people, enslaved and nonenslaved people who didn’t benefit,” she said. “But there was something really important that happened in the history of the human heart and that is this movement away from feudalism. This movement, at least in our understanding, away from a small (group) ruling everybody.”
The concepts of patriotism and freedom, which are at the heart of the American experiment, need to be renewed, participants in the gathering said, particularly during tumultuous times for the nation.
“To me patriotism is not nationalism,” Lebanon Mayor Tim McNamara said. “Patriotism is the willingness to give everyone a voice, to respect everybody else’s opinions and then to make democratic decisions, as a society. So, ultimately, I think that patriotism is sort of the opposite of ultra-nationalism, it’s the opposite of authoritarianism, it’s the ability for everybody to have a voice.”
Themes of equality and inclusion ran through many attendees’ statements. Nicole Ford Burley, Lebanon historian and a reading participant, stated that, “to me personally, understanding what America means to various groups, different people, and understanding that it is not something everybody can take part in and take pride in … understanding the history of this country and what it has and has not done … coming to terms and reconciling our history with what we want.”
This was Douglass’ point. He spoke 170 years ago of the nation’s potential: “The 4th of July is the great fact in your nation’s history — the very ring-bolt in the chain of your yet undeveloped destiny.”
New Hampshire state Rep. Susan Almy, D-Lebanon, said she believes that at our core, American ideals still exist, but that they must still be defended.
“We are part of the country. Patriotism is trying to save the country. Sometimes from itself, without people believing like that, and working hard at that, we are just going to sink further into leaving our basic ideals. The ones we’ve developed over the centuries and our founders knew that things were going to evolve … unlike the current supreme court.”
In an interview after the event, Schweitzer referred to “The struggle of humankind moving toward goodness and freedom.”
There is work that remains to be done.
“Patriotism means to me to look at ourselves as a nation and our place in the whole collective and to move forward,” she said.