The Day After July 4th, 1776

So it’s the day after July 4th. The Declaration of Independence is all signed, the revolution is won, and it’s now “Sam Adams Time.” They can take a pause and relax because the job is done. Popular imagination, fueled by John Trumbull’s apocrvaphyl painting, often envisions an empty assembly hall on July 5th, assuming the delegates had disbanded and gone home:

However, nothing could be further from the truth. The Declaration was not signed that day; that would happen on August 2nd. Furthermore, not all the signers were present that day, with others straggling in to sign later in 1776 and 1777. What was done on July 4th was simply the approval of the final text. It wasn’t even unanimously approved because New York State was late to the party and didn’t authorize it until July 9th. So they finished the text… then sent it to the printer. Not exactly a fireworks moment.

So what was happening after July 5th with this almost unanimously approved declaration? As mentioned above, it was being printed. It was sent to John Dunlap, the official printer, to set the type and print 200 broadside copies. Since the signing was still a month in the future, it only had two printed names: John Hancock, President of the Congress, and Charles Thomson, the Secretary, in an attestation. So I imagine Mr. Dunlap, short of typeface, calling out to his assistant, “Do you have an extra capital ‘P’ and small ‘p’ for ‘the Pursuit of Happiness’?”

On July 5th, Congress was in session. But it was not a time of celebration for the birth of a great nation. A war had been declared, and preparations had to be made. The Northern Frontier had to be secured. Washington was authorized three Massachusetts regiments to be stationed in Ticonderoga. Governor Cooke of Rhode Island was commissioned, at the continent's expense, to build ships to defend the Great Lakes. The Postmaster General increased the number of daily express riders between Philadelphia, New York, and Boston, a much-needed communications upgrade. And to illustrate the fact that all the colonists were not on board with the revolution, a committee consisting of John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and others was appointed to establish legal protocols for prosecuting colonists who supplied provisions or intelligence to the British.

All this was done with the knowledge that they were committing high treason, a crime punished by hanging. They would not be seen as mere combatants, but as the worst of the worst: rebels and traitors. They knew that since June 29th, General Howe had begun the process of arming Staten Island with ships. They also knew that General Washington’s army in New York was vastly outnumbered. A rout was very possible with the British marching right to Philadelphia with roped nooses in hand. Personal property was at great risk, with the homes and estates of some of the delegates later seized by the British. Nor were families immune from the ire of the British. Francis Lewis’s wife was captured and put in prison for months, where she suffered under brutal conditions. Her health ruined, she later died in 1779.

This fear was represented by gallows humor. At the signing on August 2nd, Benjamin Harrison of Virginia had this to say to Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts:

I shall have a great advantage over you, Mr. Gerry, when we are all hung for what we are now doing. From the size and weight of my body I shall die in a few minutes, but from the lightness of your body you will dance in the air an hour or two before you are dead.

Clearly, from our point of view, this was one of the greatest watershed moments in world history. But how did the people feel at the time? John Adams clearly was into it:

I will inclose to you a Declaration, in which all America is remarkably united... It compleats a Revolution, which will make as good a Figure in the History of Mankind, as any that has preceded it.
— letter to Mary Palmer, July 5, 1776

But overall, there was deep pessimism (including from John Adams, as he noted in later letters). They knew they were going up against one of the most powerful nations on earth. The war would cost them dearly in blood and treasure. There were Loyalists within the colonies who would impede the revolution. In addition, while much of the population was indifferent, they would be less than cooperative because, in their minds, the revolution would inflict upon them pointless chaos and inflation.

So often in the course of human events, things are messy and spontaneous. What seems to us to be a single event was a mishmash of many events—some of great drama, others more quotidian, like getting the darn thing to the printers. Now that the U.S. is officially 250 years old, we are most fortunate, and grateful, to have had many more of those “days after.”