So today’s the day — Happy 240th Birthday to the United States of America. When I last updated this blog, I noted that the annual Porta Potty had been delivered and the neighborhood was ready for the 4th. Well, the Porta Potty is still here, and will be for the better part of the coming week — but — today’s the real birthday bash….
Most every year I talk a little about the 4th of July and its meaning. As I’ve mentioned in the past and most everyone knows, July 4th isn’t the day the Continental Congress declared independence.
Lots of things happened around the time the country was preparing to start out on their own.
April, 1775 — the start of the American Revolution
June, 1776 — the first draft of the Declaration of Independence written by Thomas Jefferson
July 2, 1776 — the Continental Congress declared independence
July 4, 1776 — Continental Congress approved the final wording of the Declaration of Independence
August 2, 1776 — The date the Declaration of Independence was signed
November, 1776 — the Declaration was delivered to Great Britain
So July 4th, 1776 is the date the Continental Congress approved the final wording of the document. They’d been working on the wording for a couple of days after the draft was submitted on July 2, and on the 4th, they finally agreed on all of the edits and changes. (Imagine Congress being able to do that today??) The document was dated July 4th, after all had agreed to the changes.
Even though independence was actually declared a couple of days earlier, we celebrate on July 4th. I think that’s much better — who wants to go to a 2nd of July picnic?
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