MISSOURI WATCH: 222 YEARS OLD AND COUNTING

For many years we who are fortunate enough to call ourselves Americans have celebrated our independence in a variety of ways, most of them devoted to our own personal choices and pleasures, as befits a free people living in a free country. On the Fourth of July we pack our families in cars and travel miles and miles to visit families and friends, attend outdoor picnics and barbecues, watch parades and fireworks displays, water ski and fish, do whatever pleases us at the moment.

Independence Day has become a national holiday in which we exercise our independence by doing what we please, when, where and how. There's nothing wrong with this, since we gained our independence more than two centuries ago and most of us feel we have a right to pursue personal moments rather than national concerns. It is an independence we seldom recognize, but it exists, nonetheless, and merits recall.

Can any American living today imagine the challenges and uncertainties that faced this land a mere two hundred and twenty-two years ago this month? Let's see if we can capture at least a brief essence of America in the month of July in the year of our Lord 1776.

The small group of men who had gathered earlier in Philadelphia to ponder and debate the advisability and possibility of treason against the English monarchy were united in a desire to be free but less certain of the wisdom of going to war against the then most powerful nation in the world.

The questions facing those who had dared to gather even to discuss revolution were monumental, making the challenges facing modern presidents and congresses seem, well, if not minor than somewhat less than consequential. For those gathered in Philadelphia, the course ahead seemed anything but certain -- but one certainly filled with both personal and national danger, perhaps death, perhaps penury, perhaps shame and banishment, not only for themselves but for their families and friends.

If independence seemed elusive, imagine how these men viewed the likely success of their actions. The colonial armies at their disposal were most often little more than ragtag outfits, poorly equipped and barely trained. There were no funds available for weapons, no plans laid to carry out an insurrection, no chain of command that was needed for military survival. Arrayed against them were armies that had fought and won wars against equally powerful forces, financed by the world's wealthiest monarchy, united in the cause of destroying revolutionaries who had once been banned or encouraged to depart the motherland.

As we now know, the founders eventually put aside their logic and voted with their emotions for independence, the emotion they shared with all living beings everywhere. If there is a human denominator, it is the desire to be free, free from rule, tyranny, restraint. Even as these men debated independence, there was no doubt of their decision: They would decide to be free from those who would deny them this goal.

The doubt facing American colonists was not the efficacy of their cause but how to achieve it. Considering the obstacles they faced, they were extraordinarily successful, despite the mishaps, twists and turns of fate and the might of King George's armies. While the liabilities of waging a war of independence against a common enemy were significant, they were not all on the side of the revolutionaries, as countless later examples, such as Vietnam, would prove. Those who fought for independence were willing to die for independence, a quality lacking among the British Red Coats who would land on unknown foreign soil to wage traditional warfare. The English would be fighting men who, while poorly equipped were not totally devoid of experience. Besides, there were others across the Atlantic who were willing to help humiliate the English.

The war that started 222 years ago, as all good Americans were taught in their earliest classrooms, ended with the Americans winning their elusive victory and bringing them face to face with the equally difficult task of governing themselves. We like to believe that the founding fathers succeeded effectively and admirably with this challenge, forging a government that was initially quite basic and fundamental, free of special exceptions found in nations less dedicated to the basic concept of the importance of the individual.

Skipping more than 200 years from the first independence day to the ones we observe today, Americans can find themselves challenged and burdened by some of the same issues existent in 1776. We are still debating and deciding the issues of freedom of the individual, and today's diverse world injects even more complexities to be resolved. It is worth remembering in 1998 that the presence of new issues and new uncertainties does not mitigate the validity of our nation's conceptual intent.

Independence is fundamental to the concept of the Revolution whether the question is integration or the Internet. The issue is not whether our political parties serve interests of the nation, for they have long since proved they do not always, but whether the vast majority of us are willing to sign onto granting the same freedoms to others that we reserve and defend for ourselves. Will we offer to those we disagree with, deplore and oppose the same rights that we inherited in 1776?

How we answer this fundamental question will determine the shape of a nation that is changing daily before our eyes. No one is wise enough to supply a demographic picture of the American future, but it will certainly be different than today's America, just as we are different from our ancestors 222 years ago. The answer will not immediately be forthcoming, as elusive as the uncertainties in Philadelphia in 1776. But our answer had better be right or the American Revolution is over.~~~~~~~~~

Jack Stapleton of Kennett is editor of Missouri News and Editorial Service.