Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 November 1883 — THE FOURTH OF JULY. [ARTICLE]

THE FOURTH OF JULY.

A Protest Against tl>e Curtailment of the . . , Privileges of the Small Boy. ■ ' I hold these truths to be self-evident: That all boys are created young; that they are endowed with certain inalienable rights; that among these is the right to go to the circus and the right to shoot fire-crackers on the'Fourth of July; that to secure these rights governments are instituted among men, and, to a limited extent, among women, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, and if there is any nation of people more governed by everybody than boys nobody ever heard of it; that, whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is,the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and of the boys *to ignore it, and to institute a new government, with a Mayor 14 years old or under, who shall wear no shoes, and only one suspender or none, laying the foundations of the goverment on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. And by this declaration I will eyer stand. A Fourth of July without firecrackers ! Oh, worshipful masters, as well might the Fourth of July fall always upon the Sabbath day. What was the Fourth of July made for, if not to fill all the day with smoke and smell, the joyous bray of the brass band and the flam of the drum V Did our fathers die for Mayor King, of Philadelphia? Not one solitary father. The father who was detailed to die for Mayor King heard that he wasn’t going to allow any fire-crackers on the Fourth of July, and the noble man girded up his loins and lived until he was 104 years old, and died under protest even then, drawing his revolutionary pension with one hand and his last breath with the other. The rest of the fathers died for boys and the Fourth of July. Where was the avor- —Many Mayor—when the boys of Boston boldly demanded their rights of a hostile General ? And did they do this; did these patriots scarce yet in their teens maintain their right to coast on the Common, a right that is still accorded the boys of Boston; did great Warren bleed at Bunker hill, and Washington pray at Valley Forge and swear at Monmouth; did sleepless Marion ride and Lafayette unsheathe his sword that the boy of to-day might enjoy the inestimable privilege of going to a picnic on the Fourth of July, carrying a big basket loaded with cooked rations for eight people through a July sun down a dusty lane two miles from the station, and then enjoying himself by alternately going to the spring a mile and a quarter for water for the crowd, taking care of the baby and swinging the neighbors’ children until his arms ached and it was time to carry the basket and rattling dishes back to the train? Is this the kind of a Fourth of July our fathers died to perpetuate? Must our boys go up to shiver every year over the prospect of this sort of thing because we have outgrown our taste for noise and smoko ? Forbid it, Heaven!— R. J. Burdette.