Fifty years ago, I was just finishing the 8th grade and all of the talk was about the Bicentennial. There were Bicentennial moments on TV like the ones narrated by Hal Linden. There was Schoolhouse Rock that focused on America both in its birth and government. There were the special trips into the city of Philadelphia that toured the historic places like Independence Hall and the new home of the Liberty Bell.
It was all a little much but since we focused on the Revolutionary War during our Social Studies classes, it became a very special topic to me. Since I went into teaching music, I was particularly affected by our trip to Philadelphia to see the movie 1776, a musical based on the story of the revolution. I watched and rewatched this musical over the years and it wasn’t until I had performed in it in 2003, the same year that the National Constitution Center opened in Philadelphia, I really began to understand it. While performing, I was able to research some of the accuracies and discrepancies with the performance and real life.
It turns out that the changes made to “history” had more to do with the audience ability to keep track of the action. For example, there was no scoreboard in Independence Hall. It was added for the audience. Some of the quotes used by characters in the show were accurate but made by other people. One in particular involves Sam Adams who was not in the show.
Still more similarities existed over the years. There was a song called Cool Considerate Men that was in the Broadway version but didn’t survive the original screening to Richard Nixon. It appears he thought it reflected poorly on the Republican Party of the day so he wouldn’t allow it to be included. If you see it on TV even today, it is not there. It is in the restored director’s cut.
Crap like this has been going on in American History for a long time. When I graduated in 1976 from 8th grade, I was given a diploma that included famous American Documents. I still have it and look at it from time to time. If you read through it and read through the Bill of Rights for example, the second amendment is entitled “the militia”. It turns out that the title was not militia and it is not right to bear arms…the statements are there to stand on their own.
When you are living during the time something is written you seldom think about its meaning over time because what was “self evident” if I may borrow a phrase from the Declaration…it is not so clear to a population a hundred or so years removed. The true purpose of this Amendment was not to have it written for the people so much as it was written for the world to know that the entire country was deputized for the purpose of defending its long and vulnerable coastline and if you dare cross that beach, the government of the United States was there in the homes and the hearts of its inhabitants.
The one exception that I noticed in the 1776 musical was when slavery was being debated and the southern colonies succeeded in removing an offending clause calling for its ending. When faced with this decision John Adams line of “posterity would never forgive us” was uttered to which Benjamin Franklin said well we’ll be long gone by then. It turns out that the actual quote was from Sam Adams and its line was so prophetic that they chose to reduce it to make the movie more believable. He actually predicted the civil war.
Another movie that I watch this time every year is one called Dazed and Confused. It is a story of the last day of school in 1976 and it follows middle and high school students through the crazy traditions of teen life in the 1970s and deals with issues such as bullying, drugs, sex, rebellion, drinking and one thought provoking line from a teacher who said “just remember as you are celebrating the bicentennial that the real reason behind the revolution is that a bunch or rich white men didn’t want to pay their taxes.”
This movie also didn’t survive the censors as one scene dealing with prevalent racism against Asians was cut and you can find it in the DVD extras. It was a casual remark inside of the truck and one that the star football player wasn’t happy with from his teammates. It turns out that the feeling toward Asians were too hot of a topic on the heels of the Vietnam War.
So we have been dealing with censorship and brainwashing all along. We just don’t call it that…it’s just commerce. Sell more guns, more drugs, more movies, more poverty and blame those caught up in the loop of it all when running for office so that the freedom that we think we have is still on all of our lips and comes nowhere close to the ideals that made me love the Bicentennial America of the day.
Oh well. I will still watch baseball…have a hot dog…some apple pie…and wonder why I ever bought that Chevrolet S-10 pickup truck. All the commercial American Values. Then, with luck and energy, go back to fighting for the ideals that were put in writing 250 years ago that require all of us to defend.
Happy 4th.