Today we are celebrating our country's independence from the colonial empire which spawned it; and from the taxation without representation that personified that rule. That, and the goodness of an excellent barbecue with family and friends.
If, between bites of that barbecue, some of us reflect a moment on recent independence movements and their less-than-stellar outcomes, we might wonder why ours caught on.
Were we just lucky? After all, we had the same elements back then that we suspect are causing problems today: religious extremism, big money politics, foreign intervention. One thing we didn't have were the communications that could allow disparate factions to unite in protest almost instantly. Horseback messengers and signal lanterns don't quite equate with cell phones, the internet, and Twitter. But great communication might have helped as well as hurt.
We did have some things going for us, and those were ironically the British system of laws, courts, and the colonial governments that had all been in operation for a century before Independence was declared. So we had a framework backed by expectations based on long experience to help order our post-revolution society.
But those institutions could also have been used against us by unscrupulous power seekers. We had a few of those, but they always seemed to be defeated at just the right moments.
And some of those parts of the world now experiencing a revolutionary desire for independence also have long civil traditions. Why aren't they working for them?
My best guess is that we were indeed lucky. So much could have gone wrong that would have derailed our revolution and independence, that we have to consider ourselves the recipients of a Miracle of sorts.
We need to hope that a similar miracle happens in Egypt before civil war begins, and that something miraculous happens in Syria, Afghanistan, and Iraq as well. Money isn't the miracle; and neither is foreign military intervention. What miracle or miracles happen must come from within the people, and we must all hope they find some.
If, between bites of that barbecue, some of us reflect a moment on recent independence movements and their less-than-stellar outcomes, we might wonder why ours caught on.
Were we just lucky? After all, we had the same elements back then that we suspect are causing problems today: religious extremism, big money politics, foreign intervention. One thing we didn't have were the communications that could allow disparate factions to unite in protest almost instantly. Horseback messengers and signal lanterns don't quite equate with cell phones, the internet, and Twitter. But great communication might have helped as well as hurt.
We did have some things going for us, and those were ironically the British system of laws, courts, and the colonial governments that had all been in operation for a century before Independence was declared. So we had a framework backed by expectations based on long experience to help order our post-revolution society.
But those institutions could also have been used against us by unscrupulous power seekers. We had a few of those, but they always seemed to be defeated at just the right moments.
And some of those parts of the world now experiencing a revolutionary desire for independence also have long civil traditions. Why aren't they working for them?
My best guess is that we were indeed lucky. So much could have gone wrong that would have derailed our revolution and independence, that we have to consider ourselves the recipients of a Miracle of sorts.
We need to hope that a similar miracle happens in Egypt before civil war begins, and that something miraculous happens in Syria, Afghanistan, and Iraq as well. Money isn't the miracle; and neither is foreign military intervention. What miracle or miracles happen must come from within the people, and we must all hope they find some.
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