Independence Day 2012

On this day, in 1776, 236 years ago, British colonists who had settled here on Turtle Island along with subjects of several other Eastern Hemisphere nations, decided to revolt against their King and establish their own Nation on land belonging to other Nations.

The revolt, long in coming, was triggered by a royal decree issued on October 7, 1763. King George III had approved treaties with the Indigenous people that defined the Appalachian crest as the boundary between whites and Indians. However, many settlers, in violation of these treaties were continuing to move beyond the established settlement and onto Indian land. In his decree, the King ordered settlers beyond the crest to leave, and required royal permission to buy any more land from Indians.

The final spark came in 1773 when Boston merchants, who had been smuggling Dutch tea from Holland and making a fortune by selling it cheaply, were angered by a move by the British government to cut the price of legally imported British tea even lower, thus ending their illicit operation. This culminated in the Boston Tea Party, where colonists disguised as Mohawks, destroyed a shipment of British tea in an attempt to maximize their own profits. 230 years later, a group of their descendants, interested in elevating personal profit over the good of the nation, would adopt the name Tea Party.

Indian nations fought on both sides of the American Revolution, drawn in by promises from both sides that their sovereignty would be respected. Those who aligned with the British crown were told that they had sacrificed that sovereignty by picking the wrong side; and those who aligned with the colonists were similarly treated. Case in point, in 1779, American President George Washington sent 5000 troops under General John Sullivan into upstate New York with orders for “the total destruction and devastation of [the Indian] settlements and capture [of] as many prisoners as possible”. Washington, in an act of genocide, made no distinction between those who had been allies of the British and those who had been his allies and had helped him to win the war.

Despite the fact that we have a great love for this land, there is nothing on this day for Indigenous peoples of this land to celebrate. This is a celebration by a former British colony that they, unlike other former British colonies where the indigenous people eventually regained control of their land (Botswana, Ghana, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, India, Malta, Sri Lanka, Fiji, etc.), were able to maintain control and reduce the indigenous to a minority population. As a person of Indigenous descent, while I like fireworks as much as the next man, this is not a day that symbolizes freedom to me.

Also on this day, in 1826 - President Thomas Jefferson died at Monticello, near Charlottesville, Virginia after holding more than 700 people in slavery during his lifetime. Upon his death, his will specifically freed only five slaves. The rest, which he had used as collateral to support a lavish life style, were sold to pay for Jefferson’s debts. On that same day, President John Adams died in Braintree, Massachusetts. His dying words were “Thomas Jefferson survives”, not knowing Jefferson had died a few hours earlier.

Five years later, in 1831, President James Monroe died in New York City.

And in 1946, the United States granted independence to the Philippines, after having “bought” the nation from Spain in 1898 for $20 million and fighting a three year war against the Native Filipinos.
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