Tommy's Farewell

Ever think about how extraordinary it was that Tommy and JA both managed to die on the 50th Anniversary of July 4? Americans at the time viewed the wacky coincidence as a sign from Providence and while they initially could not decide if the twin deaths were a sign that God loved them or hated them--was it glorious or an omen??--the Americans of 1826 decided that they wanted to believe that it was definitely a sign that the G-O-D loves America.

For, as newspapers like the July 8, 1826 New York American observed there was

“nothing in the annals of man so striking, so beautiful, as the death of these two time honored patriots on the jubilee of that freedom, which they devoted themselves and all that was dear to them, to proclaim and establish.”

Really? Really New York American there was nothing more striking or beautiful in the history of the world than the deaths of JA and Tommy? Huh, that seems a little, well, hyperbolic to us, but if that is the way that you feel, I suppose that you are entitled to that opinion. Funny though.

We admit that we sometimes wonder at the sheer will power that it took for both of them to conspire to die on that day. Tommy had been near-death for days and days. He would wake up from a laudanum-induced coma every now and then and ask if it was yet the Fourth of July. When he finally heard that it was he barked some orders at a slave and then died several hours later. JA was in slightly better health and had even received visitors and given them a toast for the local Fourth of July celebration ("Independence forever and not a syllable more," he reportedly said), but yet he still managed to die that day.

There is something very drama and a little spooky about that, for sure.

But, you know what interests us about it even more than the mere fact that it happened? We think that it is fascinating just how much Americans lost their minds about it and how they decided that because of it America was truly exceptional. The belief in American exceptionalism allowed them to do some not so nice things: Trail of Tears anyone? Slavery as a positive good for the nation? Westward expansion? All v. bad, all justified by our belief that we were a chosen people on a chosen land. Of course, we had believed that for a long time, but the deaths of JA and Tommy proved it. Like the New York American said, there was nothing more beautiful in the history of the world and that belief justified everything else.

The logic is something like:

JA and Tommy died in the craziest way possible; clearly, God has spoken; the deaths prove that God loves America; America can do nothing wrong because God loves us.

Americans then and now were not meant to question this logic. For example, would God really love a broke slaveholder? How about a grumpy and vain curmudgeon? Was God a republican? See, if you ask questions about the logic, then none of it makes any sense. But, for Americans at the time the whole thing didn't make any sense, so this gave them a story, a frame for understanding.

Tommy's last words to the people had asked them to view the then-upcoming Fourth of July celebration as:

"The signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government. The form which we have substituted restores the free right to the unbounded exercise of reason, and freedom of opinion. All eyes are opened or opening, to the rights of man. The general spread of the lights of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God. These are grounds of hope for others--for ourselves let the annual return of this day forever refresh our recollections of these rights, and an undiminished devotion to them."

Tommy had 'borrowed' the "booted and spurred" line from the 1685 gallows speech of Richard Rumbold, but Americans didn't know that at the time, nor would it have mattered much if they did. While we certainly like Tommy's letter and agree with its sentiment, we wonder at the contradictions between what Tommy wrote here and how Americans reacted to the deaths. I mean, can we really say that Americans did not act with "monkish ignorance" or "superstition" when they resoundingly pronounced the deaths as "glorious" and the most "striking" and "beautiful" event in the history of the world? Were they really using the "lights of science" when they interpreted the whole thing as a sign from God?

We're not sayin', we're just sayin...

You can read the full text of Tommy's Last Letter here at the Library of Congress (we heart the LOC!)