THE ENGLISH VIEW OF THE FOURTH OF JULY.
LONDON, _July 4, 1902_.
It is the custom of the American Ambassador to England to give a
reception every year, on the Fourth of July, to any of his countrymen
who may be sojourning in the British metropolis. Being in London
on the recurrence of that memorable date in 1902, we made it our
special business to attend this reception. It did not differ from
the conventional affair of this kind. Mr. and Mrs. Choate and their
daughter received their guests with gracious cordiality. The house
is a large one, well furnished, and worthy to be the home of the
representative of the greatest nation in the world. All the great
halls, wide stairways, and spacious parlors were thrown open as well
as the large dining-room, on the first floor, where refreshments were
served, and a wide spreading marquee on the terrace in the rear, where
lively music was discoursed and these were all filled with people, well
dressed, and, for the most part, well-bred ladies and gentlemen, the
ladies predominating a company so numerous as to give one a very strong
impression of the number of Americans visiting London in the summer.
This season may, indeed, have been exceptional, as the coronation of
the King had been expected to take place in the latter part of June.
But apart altogether from that, it would have been a large crowd, and
it is certain that, under ordinary conditions, the number of our people
visiting London steadily increases year by year, and that they feel at
home there, as among their own kith and kin, to a degree unknown in any
other of the European capitals.
[Sidenote: Increasing Friendliness between America and England.]
Speaking by and large, I believe that we like and trust the British
people, and that they like and trust us. A marked change has come over
the feelings of both peoples within the last quarter of a century. I
remember well that when I was a boy, the school histories of the United
States had the effect of making all the American boys hate the English.
They were not informed that many of the English people, including some
of their greatest statesmen, deprecated earnestly the oppressive acts
of the British government which led to the American Revolution, and
that now the people of Great Britain are practically unanimous in the
opinion that their government was wrong, and the Americans right in
that great conflict. If any reader doubts this, I beg leave to call his
attention to some statements found in a pamphlet called "Pictures from
England's Story," which I bought at a London news stand. It belongs to
a series of such works called "Books for the Bairns," which are written
by English authors for the instruction of English children, and which,
though well printed, in clear, bold type, and copiously illustrated,
are sold at the almost incredibly small price of one penny apiece.
[Sidenote: How the English now View the American Revolution.]
"Most of the pictures which you will find in this book are pictures of
English victories, but there is one picture, and that one of the most
significant of all, of an English defeat. This is the picture of the
battle of Bunker's Hill, that was fought in America. I want you to take
particular notice of that picture, because, although the English were
defeated, it was much better for them to be defeated than it would have
been for them to have been victorious. You will often be told that
you must always be glad when your country is victorious, but that is
not true, for justice and right are greater than your country. When
your country fights against justice, and against right, and against
liberty, it is fighting against God, and even if it succeeds for the
time being, it will always suffer in the long run. In the war which
began with the battle of Bunker's Hill, England was in the wrong. Every
one admits that now, but at the time when it was fought, the King and
his ministers, and most of the people of England, believed that they
were in the right, because it was the cause of England, and England was
the home of liberty, and it seemed to them quite absurd to think that
the American farmers could have right on their side. But the American
farmers were in the right. They were few, they were poor, they had
no army, they had no king, and they had no parliament, and it seemed
quite impossible to our forefathers of those days to think that such a
small people could possibly stand up against the armies and the navies
of Great Britain. But Great Britain was in the wrong. The Americans
were the English people who had gone across the sea to make new homes
for themselves in another country, where they could be free to govern
themselves in their own way, without interference from the British
government. They were good people, honest, hard-working, pious folk,
who had carried with them across the sea the English love of liberty
and self-government.
[Sidenote: A Fair Statement of the Question and the Conflict.]
"The English in England had been victorious in their war against
France. They were governed by a German king, who was much less in
sympathy with English ideas than were the Americans, and he believed,
and the majority of the English in England agreed with him at the time
that the Americans ought to be content to be governed by governors
sent out from England, and should be willing to pay the taxes, which
the English Parliament ordered them to pay. Now the English have
always maintained that no king or government has a right to compel the
people to pay any money for the support of the government unless the
people consent to pay it. Taxation without representation is tyranny,
and the Americans said, that as they had no voice in the election of
the English Parliament, which made the taxes, they were not bound
to pay them. The English said, that whether they liked it or not,
the Americans must pay them. The Americans said they would not. The
English said they would make them, and they sent an army to America
to compel the Americans to pay the taxes, and to obey the King and
Parliament. In doing this they were sinning against the first principle
of English liberty, and the Americans took up arms to defend their
liberty against the English soldiers. They met at Bunker's Hill, and,
to the astonishment of every one, the undrilled farmers, who knew how
to shoot, met and defeated the disciplined troops of England. England
sent thousands upon thousands of men across the Atlantic; they defeated
the Americans again and again; they burned their houses; they ravaged
their country; they captured all their cities; but still the Americans
went on fighting, because they were of the true English breed, and
they would rather lose their lives than give up the independence of
their country. They were not independent at first, they were British
colonists; but when they found themselves attacked by the British, they
declared their independence, and formed themselves into a republic,
without a king, or a House of Lords, or an Established Church.
[Sidenote: What England Learned from Fighting against her own
Principles.]
"The war went on for long years; it cost England a hundred millions of
money, and thousands upon thousands of brave soldiers; but the English
were fighting against their own English principles, which were defended
by George Washington and the Americans with such bravery and heroism
that at last the English, notwithstanding all their pride, and their
wealth, and their power, had to give in, and own themselves beaten....
Fortunately, we were defeated, and from our defeat we learned a great
lesson, which we did not forget for nearly a hundred years. That lesson
is that it is impossible to govern a white, freedom-loving people
except by their own consent. We took that lesson to heart so much that
for nearly a hundred years we never again attempted to compel our
colonists to do anything they did not want to do. We gave them freedom,
and let them govern themselves upon the true English principles which
George Washington fought for, and which George III. fought against.
The British Empire, of which we are so proud to-day, exists because
the principles of George III. were knocked on the head at the battle
of Bunker's Hill, and in the long war which followed it.... The United
States of America are now a great nation, which is more numerous and
more powerful than Great Britain."
This candid and manly statement, made by an English author and
published broadcast for the instruction of English children, is one of
the most interesting things I have encountered in England, and I have
thought it worth while to quote it here in the interests of a still
better understanding between the two great nations of the same stock,
and the same speech, and the same political ideals.
A slighter indication of the same English breadth of view in regard
to this question was given by the good ladies who have charge of the
pleasant boarding house, on Torrington Square, which we have made
our home on all our visits to London, and who, on the morning of the
Fourth of July, thought of it themselves, and had a tiny firecracker
lying by the plate of each young American in our party when we
came down to breakfast, besides other indications later in the day
of their readiness, though themselves staunchly British, to enter
sympathetically into the enthusiasm with which Americans celebrate the
natal day of our nation.
A movement has been started in London to erect a statue of George
Washington. It was decided that the subscriptions should be confined to
British subjects. Archdeacon Sinclair, in submitting the plan to the
(Puritan) Society, said:
"Englishmen have at last fully recognized the great qualities of
Washington. I feel assured that nothing will be more popular in this
country than such a tribute to that great man of English birth, who has
done so much for the world's history, not only for the young nation
across the sea, but for Great Britain as well."
Archdeacon Sinclair announced that he was authorized to offer a place
for the statue in St. Paul's Cathedral.
But now I find that I have become so much interested in the statement
of this reversal of British sentiment concerning the American struggle
for independence, that I have left myself no space to speak of the
burning question in England just now, in regard to which the government
has taken a position, extraordinary as this may seem, which violates
the same principles of liberty for which the Americans fought, and so I
must reserve that for another letter.
_P. S._--Since my return to America I have seen an interesting
statement by the Rev. R. J. Campbell, of London, in regard to the
steady increase of the pro-British feeling in the United States. He
says that a book has just been published by an American barrister
named Dos Passos, called _The Anglo-Saxon Century and the Unification
of the English-Speaking People_. This gentleman, although of Spanish
origin, is of American birth, and his interest in the future of his
own country had led him to examine that of ours. He believes that the
twentieth century is to be the Anglo-Saxon century, even more than the
nineteenth, and the conditions of an alliance, as advocated by him, are
as follows:
1. The Dominion of Canada voluntarily to divide itself into such
different States, geographically arranged, as its citizens desire,
in proportion to population, and each State to be admitted as a full
member of the American Union, in accordance with the conditions of the
Constitution of the United States.
2. To establish common citizenship between all citizens of the United
States and the British Empire.
3. To establish absolute freedom of commercial intercourse and
relations between the countries involved, to the same extent as that
which exists between the different States constituting the United
States of America.
4. Great Britain and the United States to coin gold, silver, nickel,
and copper money, not necessarily displaying the same devices or
mottoes, but possessing the same money value, and interchangeable
everywhere within the limits covered by the treaty, and to establish a
uniform standard of weights and measures.
5. To provide for a proper and satisfactory arbitration tribunal to
decide all questions which may arise under the treaty.
Much of this may seem chimerical and unsound, but there is certainly a
feeling in this country which is influencing things in the direction of
a better understanding, and a consciousness of a common destiny between
the British Empire and the United States. In private one is constantly
meeting with expressions of it, and I may as well add that nothing
has caused me more surprise than this one fact. One frequently hears
the hope expressed that a common citizenship may one day be possible
without any interference with the constitution of either country. This
is a new idea to me, and may be a fruitful one some day.