DECEMBER 1, 2025 – Outside the Chester, Connecticut public library is a sign marking America’s upcoming Semiquincentennial. I doubt the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence will be called by its Latin derivative, which is half a dozen letters longer than “Bicentennial” (and two letters longer than my good friend Dr. Ravi(shankar)’s last name, “Balasubrahmanyan”.)
In any event, at this point there’s far less hoopla about the approach of our 250th anniversary than there was when we were gearing up for our 200th anniversary celebration. Back then, Gerald Ford was president. Say what you will about his politics, but as a human being, he was of good character and a genuinely decent soul. Now . . .
Arguably, today’s troubles are more acute, more worrisome than what we faced on the cusp of 1976. We’d survived the national nightmare of Watergate, thanks to our Constitution and an essential element of integrity in both major political parties. The fall of South Vietnam, into which we’d poured so much blood and treasure, was behind us, as well. Furthermore, by year’s end 1975, the annual rate of inflation was down to 9.13% from 11.4% and would drop to 5.76% during our Bicentennial year. Today? Our plight has become a veritable bed of nails. Perhaps the longest spike of the bunch, however, is open worry that next year’s midterm House and Senate elections will be suspended. If they are, it would be a first in American history.
Speaking of American history, thus far I’ve watched four of the six two-hour episodes of Ken Burns’ PBS documentary on the American Revolution. If you haven’t yet viewed the series, I urge you to do so. Although it leaves much for deeper examination (12 hours are hardly enough to do more than scratch the surface of a very complicated subject), the documentary covers lots of figurative and geographic territory—the immediate causes of conflict between the British and their American colonies; the progression of hostilities that devolved into what was both a civil war and a world war; the military stratagems, blunders, triumphs, and miseries of each side; the Colonists’ campaign to draw France into support of the “Patriots’” cause.
What I find most interesting about studying any epoch is how we tend to judge the players by outcomes. For example, it’s easy for us to pass judgment on Loyalists when we’re standing two and a half centuries away from events in the 1770s. Yet, when Washington’s troops had their backs to the wall, who could’ve blamed Loyalists who saw the rebellion as a direct threat to Loyalists’ property and way of life? And how could we blame people who were less than free—Black slaves, laborers without property, indentured servants, native peoples deprived of their lands—for having little to no enthusiasm for a “Revolution” fueled by Southern gentry and northern merchants and property owners to protect and advance their economic interests? Only with the promise of broader rights and “free land” to be granted after it was seized from native control, was broader recruitment to the cause rendered viable. The documentary’s broad coverage make it easier for us to appreciate the uncertainties, despite our well established acquaintance with the ultimate outcomes.
The documentary also deflates some of the mythology that grew out of the Revolution. One part of the myth was that the “Patriots” (as rebels came to be called) won the War for Independence by divine destiny. This was hardly the case: during the first two years of the war, at least, it seemed that the Colonies were destined to fail miserably. The fundamental reason the Patriots won in the end was Washington’s strategy to live to fight another day—a classic approach adopted by subsequent generations of “freedom fighters”—or “terrorists,” as characterized by their nemeses. Another busted myth concerned the whole notion of unity among the American Colonists. The reality was quite the opposite: the Colonists had differences—economic, political, religious, social—every bit as profound as their similarities. The Articles of Confederation—the first attempt to unite the 13 Colonies—was a flop, as people were too keen on blazing their own trails.
If the American Revolution was fueled by ideas and ideals informed by the Enlightenment, it was driven harder by economic interests. The proof of this reality, as it would turn out, arrived 80 years later.
Through a better understanding of our origins, we can gain insight into our current position in the arc of history. The Ken Burns documentary, Revolution, is an excellent gateway into that understanding. Start watching now.
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© 2025 by Eric Nilsson
