By Dr. C.D. Sreenivasa Murthy

Fourth of July is celebrated with great pomp, gaiety and fanfare with bands, picnics, meetings, concerts and fireworks throughout the United States of America. It was on this day in 1767 the Founding-Fathers at the meeting of the continental Congress in Philadelphia proclaimed the “Declaration of Independence”. But it took nearly eight more years of fighting till General George Washington defeated the British. American Constitution would only be adopted after eleven years in 1788 and a stable Central Government established in the United States. 

At the time of independence there were thirteen colonies of Britain in America. All of these were situated on the eastern part and their total area was probably about a fourth of the present day United States. Each of the thirteen colonies had a charter, or written agreement between the colony and the King of England. Charters of royal colonies provided for direct rule by the King. A colonial Legislature was elected in each State by property holding men. Every one of the States had their own Constitution, Legislature and a Governor appointed by the King in England. Some States maintained even small armies. These were all independent States and ruled directly by the English King. 

People of all the States were of English and Scottish origin and were all proud of their English language, English heritage and English culture. The colonies did not have any major industry of their own and exported raw materials like tobacco and cotton to England and would import all their needs from that country. 

In 1755 the English Parliament levied a number of taxes on these colonies to make up for the increased expenditure on the military to maintain the colonies. These taxes were levied without approval of the colonial Legislatures. The people of the American colonies, particularly the educated and propertied class, felt that the British King and Parliament were treating them as second class citizens of subject colonies. They felt these colonies should be represented in the British Parliament and they should be treated as equal citizens of England. They sent many petitions to the King and the Parliament to give them representation. The King and the Parliament were not prepared for it and instead sent an army to quell the dissent.

The delegates from all the States met in Philadelphia with the object of getting independence from Britain. They also realised that the English King would not give independence to them without a proper fight. They appointed General George Washington as the Commander-in-Chief of the army to fight the British. Britain was a great military power and had the most powerful army in the world. The people of the colonies knew it was not an easy task to defeat the British. General Washington had too many setbacks. His army was ill-equipped and ill-trained. But he received the help of the French military towards the end. Washington finally defeated the British in 1785 and the British General Lord Charles Cornwallis and his army surrendered to General George Washington’s American forces on October 19, 1781. But the war finally ended only in 1783, after nearly six years of declaration of independence.

The Constitution could not be framed for eleven years after the declaration of independence. The thirteen States were squabbling and very reluctant to give up their independence and powers. There had to be trade-offs to produce a consensus among the States. One of the main issues was the practice of slavery. Slavery was implicitly recognised in the original Constitution in provisions commonly known as the Three-Fifths Compromise, which provided that Three-Fifths of each State’s enslaved population (“other persons”) was to be added to its free population for the purposes of census.

The other issue was the proportional representation in the Legislature. This was hotly debated and the final result was another major concession by the bigger States. The smaller States were afraid of proportional representation since they thought they would lose their equality, importance and power in the decisions of the Central Government. The final compromise was that the House of Representatives will have a proportional representation and the Senate will have two Senators from every State irrespective of its size. With continuous debate and compromises, a Constitution was signed on 17th September 1787.

The Constitution was not a perfect document but was the result of various concessions and compromises among the States. Women were not mentioned since they were the property of their husbands as per the prevailing norms of the times. The original tribes who inhabited the land do not find a place, indirectly denying them any rights and making them aliens in their own land. The word Democracy does not appear anywhere in the document. But still the new Constitution was an epoch-making vision for a new country and was an idealistic concept of a nation. There was no King as head of the country and there was no ruling aristocracy. It was a Union of States with a  Federal structure and lots of powers to the States and an elected Chief — the President. There were three independent branches of the Government — the Executive, the Judiciary and the Legislature — with various checks and balances to control the power of each wing. For the first time in the history of mankind the country’s head — the President — was chosen directly by all the people. The Founding-Fathers with their idealism and vision had created a nation which drew its      power from their people.

The initial years were not easy for the new Republic. Britain attacked it again and burnt the White House in 1814. There was a Civil War after nearly 74 years, from 1861 to 1865 and the country almost broke into two. Abraham Lincoln won the war for the Union and emancipated the slaves. From the time of end of the Civil War in 1865, the United States has grown from strength to strength. The original Constitution has undergone many amendments in the last 233 years and has become an inspiration for democracies all over the world. Indian Constitution draws heavily from the American Constitution and both of them begin with the same three words — “WE THE PEOPLE”.

The visionary Constitution given by the Founding-Fathers has created the richest and the most powerful Democratic Nation in human history. Let us greet and salute this Great Nation, “The United States of America” on the day of its independence. 

A declaration of real Human Freedom

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.  

– From the American Declaration of Independence

At present America has 50 States.