ADAMS FIGHTS CONGRESSIONAL "SLAVE POWER"

 

[Published in Essay 10-B: John Quincy Adams and the Fight Against The Gag Rule - Constituting America]

John Quincy Adams was America’s most impactful former President. His most important accomplishment was risking scorn and even death to defend free speech and constitutional liberties.

Adams was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1830, the only former President to serve in that chamber. He would win election to nine terms, serving from 1831 until his death in 1848.

After one reelection victory, Adams said that he must “bring about a day prophesied when slavery and war shall be banished from the face of the Earth”.

As the abolitionist movement grew, the American Anti-Slavery Society filed over 1,000 petitions, with 130,000 signatures, focused on abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia since it was under federal jurisdiction. In 1836, in response to Adams’s consistent presentation of these citizen petitions, Southern Democrats imposed a Gag Rule that immediately tabled any petitions about slavery.

The Gag Rule prohibited anti-slavery petitions from “being printed, read, discussed, or voted on, stating that the effect of these petitions was to create much irritation and ill feeling between different parts of the Union”.

Prior to the Rule’s vote, Adams rose from his seat to protest. When House Speaker, James Polk, refused to recognize him, Adams yelled, “Am I gagged?” He argued that the Gag Rule was a “direct violation of the Constitution of the United States, the rules of this House, and the rights of my constituents.” He declared it a threat to free, deliberative government: “The freedom of debate has been stifled in this House to a degree far beyond anything that ever has happened since the existence of the Constitution.”

This was the beginning of Adams’s relentless campaign to overturn the Gag Rule, waged in an increasingly dangerous political environment:

Joanne B. Freeman’s book, The Field of Blood; Violence in Congress and the Road to Civil War, documents the deterioration of representative government and civil discourse. As she writes, “Between 1830 and 1860, there were more than seventy violent incidents between Congressmen in the House and Senate Chambers or on nearby street…armed groups of Northern and Southern Congressmen engaged in hand-to-hand combat on the House Floor….fighting became endemic and Congressmen strapped on knives and guns before heading to the Capitol every morning.”

A core of members of Congress from slaveholding states countered Adams’s increasingly creative parliamentary maneuvers with physical threats. Rep. Thomas Arnold (Whig-Wisconsin) defense of Adams provoked Rep. John Dawson (D-Louisiana) to brandish a large knife and threaten to cut his throat. Once, when Adams’s remarks “put slaveholders in blaze”, scores of slaveholders “shouted points of order, every now and then screaming at the top of their voices”. This was followed by a gang of Southern members surrounding Adams, threatening physical violence. Adams rose to his feet and shouted, “I see where the shoe pinches, Mr. Speaker, it will pinch more yet!”

Adams led the ban of dueling to stop Southerner members using deadly force (the assassination of abolitionist Rep. Jonathan Cilley by Southern Rep. Willam Graves occurred on February 24, 1838 was orchestrated and covered-up as a duel).

Adams asserted the dueling ban “goes to the independence of this House; it goes to the independence of every individual Member of this House; it goes to the right of speech and the freedom of debate in this House.”

Adams continued to present hundreds of petitions with the signatures of citizens opposed to slavery, only to be shouted down. He then avoided the word “petition”, saying instead that he was introducing a “prayer” that all would enjoy their God-given rights. “Petition was prayer,” he argued. “It was the cry of the suffering for relief; of the oppressed for mercy.”

Adams received numerous death threats. “I promise to cut your throat from ear to ear,” read one. Another had a picture of a large Bowie knife and threatened “Vengeance is mine, say the South!” Adams confided to his diary, “I walk on the edge of a precipice in every step that I take.”

Adams introduced thousands of petitions, including 511 on March 30, 1840, alone. All were tabled without debate. Proslavery representatives then instituted a harsher gag rule to shut Adams up. The House agreed it would not receive any petitions. Adams saw a “conspiracy in and out of Congress to crush the liberties of a free people of the Union.”

In a bold act of defiance, Adams had the clerk of the House read the Declaration of Independence aloud to his fellow representatives, stating, “I rest that petition on the Declaration of Independence.”

Adams’s crusade drew increased media coverage of the Gag Rule and congressional violence, which “exposed the tyrannical force of the Slave Power for all to see”. In 1842, Southern members overplayed their hand by censuring Rep. Joshua Giddings over his resolution congratulating Adams winning the freedom of the Amistad ship slaves in a case before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Media coverage raised American awareness of, and opposition to, the Gag Rule. Northern voters increasingly supported candidates who demanded the right of representation, petition, and free speech. This new generation of Northern Democrats were unwilling to embrace Southern intimidation tactics.

After these election reversals, Rep. Henry Wise (D-Virginia), the leading Gag Rule supporter and Adams’s nemesis, announced to reporters that he “ceased to contend in the war which is being carried on in the House by certain men against the South”. Wise ceded that the Gag Rule “roused Northern fury over violated rights”.

The Gag Rule was finally rescinded on December 3, 1844, by a vote of 108–80, with all Northern and four Southern Whigs voting for repeal, along with 78% of Northern Democrats.

Congress never again attempted to silence dissent among its members.

AMERICA's WESTWARD EXPANSION

 

[Published in Essay 7-A: The Northwest Ordinance And Settlers in The West - Constituting America]

America’s westward expansion reshaped the way the world worked. Never before had a national government strategically outlined how settlement would evolve, how new lands would be governed, and how settler rights would be protected.

The movement of people into unsettled or unorganized land was historically shaped by conquest and occupation. Settler rights and representation were at best an afterthought. Rome and other empires granted land to soldiers and political favorites. England and the other European powers granted specific charters for colonies and trading zones. In all cases, these expansions were tied to existing centralized powers and their agendas.

Colonial America found ways to leverage the tangle of charters and geographic distance from England into local self-government. These early forms of representative government closely tied to communities created the foundation of America’s unique civic culture. This led to the Revolutionary War when Britain attempted to undermine this civic culture and constrain the consent of the governed.

America applied the lessons of the Revolution as it was inventing itself under the Articles of Confederation. The grand experiment was how a nation preserves self-governance and protects fundamental rights as it expands territorially. The laboratory for expanding democracy was the unmapped expanse of land beyond the Appalachian Mountains.

In 1670, John Lederer crossed over the Appalachian/Blue Ridge Mountains to explore the Shenandoah River valley and other western lands. In the 1730s, Jost Hite led the first organized group of settlers into this region.

Others soon followed. British King George II allowed westward expansion to counter France’s North American ambitions. King George III, on the other hand, wanted to consolidate American colonists into the narrow coastal region along the eastern seaboard. Preventing westward expansion avoided unnecessary conflicts with Native Americans, allowing England to focus on tightening its control over its colonies.

On October 7, 1763, King George III issued the Proclamation of 1763, forbidding colonists from settling west of the Appalachians. The King demanded that settlers already living west of this new “Proclamation Line” abandon their homesteads and return east. He further prohibited commerce with Native Americans except with traders licensed by the Crown.

Daniel Boone (1734-1820) was among many who ignored the Proclamation, leading legions of settlers into the west through the newly discovered Cumberland Gap (1769).
On January 14, 1784, the Continental Congress ratified the Treaty of Paris, which formally ended the American Revolution. The treaty granted the new nation all British lands from the Proclamation Line to the Mississippi River.

Southern states immediately claimed land to their west all the way to the Mississippi River. This left unclaimed land, known as the “Territory of the United States North West of the Ohio River” to administer. This vast unsettled area was both an unprecedented challenge and opportunity.

Thomas Jefferson proposed the Ordinance of 1784 as a framework for organizing this area. His approach was too complex to implement, but it framed future discussions.
On July 13, 1787, the Continental Congress adopted the Northwest Ordinance, crafted by Nathan Dane and Rufus King, both delegates from Massachusetts.

The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 is considered by historians and constitutional scholars as one of America’s most important founding documents, taking its place with the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

The Ordinance outlined how American settlers in this region would govern themselves, be incorporated into the United States as citizens of new states, and enjoy the basic protections of rights and freedoms. These provisions would guide America’s expansion into the 20th Century.

The Ordinance established a three-stage process for unsettled land to evolve from a federally governed area into a self-governing territory and eventually into a state admitted into the Union as its population grew. It provided for the settlers of these lands to adopt their own state constitution based on the rule of law and consent of the governed. It embraced local governance and federalism, anticipating the U.S. Constitution, which was under consideration at this time (May-September 1787).

The Ordinance’s other key component was Section 14. Its Articles anticipated the Bill of Rights (September 1789-December 1791). This included rights to habeas corpus, trial by jury, due process relating to property, preventing cruel or unusual punishments, and freedom of religion.

The Ordinance’s Section 14, Article 6, prohibited slavery: “There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory.” This incendiary issue was deferred in the U.S. Constitution and only resolved when the 13th Amendment was adopted on December 6, 1865.

The Article 6 prohibition of slavery set the line between free and slave regions. It established the precedent and future conflict over limiting the westward expansion of slavery. Prohibiting slavery in the Northwest shifted the region’s settlement demographics. Slaveholders avoided the Northwest territories while “free laborers” and immigrants flocked there. These ancestral demographics shape the culture and politics of this region to this day.

STAMP ACT IGNITES AMERICA's REVOLUTION

 

[Published in Essay 2-A: The Stamp Act and The People - Constituting America]

America has always been a nation of communities.  Its pattern of settlement, through Royal Charters, gave wide latitude for establishing local governance.  Because the colonies were over 3,500 miles from London, detailed oversight of the colonies was impossible.  By necessity, and by desire, colonists embraced local authority over distant rule from England. 

 This pattern of delegating powers to American-based local governments was promoted by King George II (reigned 1727-1760).  He supported a “hands-off” approach to Colonial Administration, allowing local governments to establish and enforce their own laws and establish and collect their own revenue, overseen by passive Royal Governors.

George II’s worldview was that his colonies’ expanding population and economy generated demand for British goods and thwarted French and Spanish ambitions in the Americas.  

 The King’s delegation created “fertile soil” for Colonial America to develop a thriving governance culture based on local sovereignty and the consent of the governed.

 As Alexis de Tocqueville would later explain:  “The revolution of the United States was the result of a mature and dignified taste for freedom, and not of a vague or ill-defined craving for independence.”

 The passing of George II changed things for the worse.

First, England triumphed over the French in the first true “world war”. The Seven Years War (1756-1763) obliterated French control in North America (except for the Port of New Orleans) and India.  Colonial America no longer played a role in countering French incursions.

Second, King George III (1760-1820) had a very different world view from his grandfather.  He saw everything in terms of loyalty to the Crown (him). As a result, he sought direct control of the American colonies. He distrusted America’s local governments bending to his will. 

 The King’s Prime Minister, Lord Grenville (1763-1765), devised a way to assert the Crown’s authority over the American Colonies.

 British victory in the Seven Years’ War left it with crippling debt.  Grenville chose to ignore the windfall profits gained from India’s cotton and opium trades. He also chose to ignore the fact that American colonists paid, fought, and died to defeat France in North America. 

 During the “French and Indian War,” approximately 3,000 British “Regular” troops were killed in action, but over 11,000 American “Provincial” troops died in action.

 Instead, Grenville promoted the concept that the beneficiaries of the war (American colonists) should pay for it: “and now will these Americans, children planted by our care, nourished up by our indulgence until they are grown to a degree of strength and opulence, and protected by our arms, will they grudge to contribute their mite to relieve us from heavy weight of the burden which we lie under?” Grenville’s first step was to enforce existing customs duties.  Many British Customs officials managed collections through intermediaries while remaining in England.  Grenville forced them to relocate to America as part of his general crack down on sporadic smuggling, lax enforcement, and spotty revenue collection. Expanded numbers of Customs Officers became more aggressive in using search warrants, called “writs of assistance,” to track down smuggled goods. Warehouses were seized and ships were captured to bolster Royal revenue collection.  Royal Customs officials became a permanent and pervasive presence in Colonial seaports along the Atlantic coast.

American colonists resisted this Royal intrusion by “going underground.”  Universal smuggling became the new colonial business practice. Customs revenue fell accordingly.

 This shortfall in Customs revenue led to the Stamp Act of 1765, the first internal tax levied directly on American colonists by the British Parliament. Prior to the Stamp Act, taxes were only levied by local government through their elected officials.  Now a government 3,500 miles away was asserting control, without the knowledge, approval, or oversight of the colonists.

 The Stamp Act imposed a tax on all paper documents in the colonies. This included legal documents, playing cards, newspapers, and land titles. Stamps had to be purchased with British sterling, rather than local paper currency, causing additional economic hardship. Proof of payment required affixing a Royal Stamp on documents, which is why it is called the “Stamp Act.”

 The February 1765 British Parliament debate on the Stamp Tax revealed the collision course set by King George III against the American Colonists.

 Colonel Isaac Barré [Member of Parliament and friend of Benjamin Franklin] spoke against Grenville’s Act and the King’s strategy: 

 “They [America Colonists] nourished by your indulgence? They grew by your neglect of ‘em. As soon as you began to care about ‘em, that care was exercised in sending persons to rule over ’em, in one department and another, who were perhaps the deputies of deputies to some Member of this House, sent to spy out their liberty, to misrepresent their actions and to prey upon ’em; men whose behavior on many occasions has caused the blood of those sons of liberty to recoil within them….

 “They [America’s Colonists] have nobly taken up arms in your defense, have exerted a valor amidst their constant and laborious industry for the defense of a country whose frontier while drenched in blood, its interior parts have yielded all its little savings to your emolument …. The people [America’s Colonists] are as truly loyal as any subjects the King has, but a people jealous of their liberties will vindicate them if ever they should be violated.”

 America’s journey to Revolution had begun.

 

[Constituting America: Why So Many Ambitious Men Exist in the US, but so few Lofty Ambitions (Vol 2 Pt. 3 Ch. 19)]

Alexis de Tocqueville was a keen observer of America’s emerging civic culture.  His insights on how democracy shapes individual and community existence resonant with us to this day.

In his chapter on ambition, de Tocqueville outlines the attributes of equality in its classic sense.

American democracy in the early 19^th Century provided a framework for liberty and equality in the law and the marketplace.  He celebrated how the framework gave everyone an equal mix of opportunity and challenge.  Such a mix ignited the passion in Americans to seek better lives. 

“The first thing that strikes one in the United States is the innumerable multitude of those who seek to get out of their original condition.”

Individual ambition in a free society was the engine for economic vitality.  Government provides a stable and honest environment for individuals to test themselves against their environment.

De Tocqueville contrasted American equality with the remnants of aristocracy and lust for power.

“So when once the ambitious have power in hand, they believe they can dare all: and when it escapes them, they immediately think of overturning the state to get it back.”

He knew firsthand the extremes that arise from a revolution that topples aristocracy.  His own family endured imprisonment and the guillotine in the wake of the French Revolution.  France’s cycle of chaos, violence, tyranny, and return to aristocracy served as cautionary lessons. 

“As the former barriers that separated the crowd from renown and power are suddenly lowered, an impetuous and universal movement of ascent is made toward this long-envied greatness.”

France never achieved the promise of its revolution.  The French suffered through monarchy, anarchy, revolutions in 1848 and 1870, an Emperor, military humiliation in 1870, and malaise leading to World War. De Tocqueville notes: “The passions that the revolution had prompted do not disappear with it…on all sides one sees disproportionate and unfortunate ambitions ignited that burn secretly and fruitlessly in the hearts that contain them.”

The French revolutionaries strived to change everything.  They even renamed the calendar months, established new weights and measures, and toppled every institution that was tainted by the old regime. Thousands were slaughtered.  Europe was ravaged.

Frenchmen’s lofty ambition to change the world led to their ruin.

Americans’ personal ambition was not to change the world, but to change their personal world. 

America’s cultural strength was unleashing individual creativity to strive for this end. 

De Tocqueville rejoiced in how America’s focus on personal ambition avoided France’s post-revolutionary vortex.

De Tocqueville toured America during an era of unbridled technical achievement.  The Erie Canal went into operation in 1825.  The first segment of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal opened in 1831.  America’s first railroad, the Baltimore Ohio Line, moved freight and passengers starting in 1827.

These were realistic and pragmatic ambitions.  They were human scale for the benefit of humans. 

De Tocqueville understood that what set Americans apart from all other nationalities was their focus on “a multitude of small, very sensible ambitions…they finish many undertakings rapidly rather than raise a few long-lasting monuments; they love success much more than glory.”

He concludes his review of ambition with a warning against complacency. The benefits of democracy and a free society can lead to stagnation and the waning of ambition. 

“I avow that for democratic societies I dread the audacity much less than the mediocrity of desires; what seems to me most to be feared is that in the midst of the small incessant occupations of private life, ambition will lose its spark and its greatness…so that each day the aspect of the social body becomes more tranquil and less lofty.”

For De Tocqueville, leaders “should want one to strive to give them a vaster idea of themselves.”

This is his challenge for America and the ages.

 

 

GOVERNMENT OF THE PEOPLE

 

[U.S. House Chamber 1820]

[Published as part of Constituting America's Ninety Day Study on America's Founding Principles: Principle of a Legislative Branch Within a System of Government Closest to the People – Constituting America]

In advocating for establishing the Legislative Branch in the U.S. Constitution, James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, writing under “PUBLIUS”, stated in Federalist No. 52:

“First. As it is essential to liberty that the government in general should have a common interest with the people, so it is particularly essential that the branch of it under consideration should have an immediate dependence on, and an intimate sympathy with, the people. Frequent elections are unquestionably the only policy by which this dependence and sympathy can be effectually secured…. It is a received and well-founded maxim, that where no other circumstances affect the case, the greater the power is, the shorter ought to be its duration.”

Madison and Hamilton explained how the Legislative Branch was fundamental to Americans remaining in control of their own government in FEDERALIST No. 57:

“The House of Representatives is so constituted as to support in the members an habitual recollection of their dependence on the people. Before the sentiments impressed on their minds by the mode of their elevation can be effaced by the exercise of power, they will be compelled to anticipate the moment when their power is to cease, when their exercise of it is to be reviewed, and when they must descend to the level from which they were raised; there forever to remain unless a faithful discharge of their trust shall have established their title to a renewal of it.”

Binding the Legislative Branch to the people built upon the precedents from America’s colonial period.

The Royal Charter that established Jamestown in Virginia evolved from governance by the Charter holders into governance by the King’s Representative (Royal Governor) and his Advisory Council. When the settlers demanded their own voice, the Virginia House of Burgesses, in 1619, became the first democratically elected legislative body in America. 

The House of Burgesses became a proving ground for what would become the U.S. House of Representatives. Drawing upon British tradition, revenue and spending bills originated in the House instead of the “upper chamber”. Drawing from British tradition, the members of the House held their positions for short periods of time, the better to be held closely accountable by those they represented.

Tying government closely to the people is foundational to America.  The reason America is a “federal” system, and not a “national system”, is to preserve state and local government.  This assures most public policy and public activity is closest to the people it serves and reflects their diversity.  Serving an urban New York City neighborhood is very different from serving a rural community in Montana.

America’s diversity is embodied in our nation’s motto: “E Pluribus Unum” – out of many, one.

Governing a diverse America is institutionalized in the Tenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Today, America is governed by 87,576 local units.  This includes 3,034 counties, 19,429 municipalities (cities, towns, villages), 16,504 townships, 13,506 school districts, and 35,052 special districts (such as water & sewer, fire, and conservation).

Except for Switzerland and Germany, European governments are national. Their policy and programs are based on “one size fits all”. National governments ultimately amplify regional and ethnic tensions.  England’s Acts of Union with Scotland (1707) and Ireland (1801) spawned countless conflicts.  Today, Scotland and Wales have separate Parliaments.  Ireland divided itself into a Free State and Northern Ireland in the wake of years of violence (1921).  England leaving the European Union in January 2020 reflected what happens when a weak parliament, which could have embraced diversity, was dominated by a powerful and unaccountable bureaucracy.

America’s federal structure, emphasizing government closest to the people, was chronicled by the Frenchman, Alexis Clerel, the Vicount de Tocqueville.

“Democracy in America” was published in two volumes (1835 and 1840).  It remains a foundational document describing how Americans benefit from local government.

“The village or township is the only association which is so perfectly natural that wherever a number of men are collected it seems to constitute itself. The town, or tithing, as the smallest division of a community, must necessarily exist in all nations….”

“….local assemblies of citizens constitute the strength of free nations. Town-meetings are to liberty what primary schools are to science; they bring it within the people’s reach, they teach men how to use and how to enjoy it. A nation may establish a system of free government, but without the spirit of municipal institutions it cannot have the spirit of liberty. 

de Tocqueville recognized how Americans preserving local governance serves as a model for a better world:

"I believe that provincial [local] institutions are useful to all nations, but nowhere do they appear to me to be more indispensable than amongst a democratic people.

The only nations which deny the utility of provincial [local] liberties are those which have fewest of them; in other words, those who are unacquainted with the institution are the only persons who pass a censure upon it.”

Thanks to the strength of local government, America remains an inspiration for all those who seek free and open societies. 

 

HOLDING GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABLE

 

[Published as part of Constituting America's Ninety Day Study on America's Founding Principles - Principle of Duty of the American People to Continually Maintain Checks on Government Power – Constituting America]

On November 19, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln spoke immortal words about the eternal mission for all Americans: “that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth”.

 

Citizens holding government accountable begins with knowing what their government, at all levels, is doing.

 

Two long standing legal concepts provide the framework for citizens being eternally vigilant and government officials being consistently accountable: government documents should be public and government meetings should be public.

 

During the Virginia Ratifying Convention for the U.S. Constitution, Patrick Henry asserted public knowledge was the bulwark of protecting freedom, “The liberties of a people never were, nor ever will be, secure, when the transactions of their rulers may be concealed from them.”

 

“Where are your checks in this government?…The most valuable end of government is the liberty of the inhabitants. No possible advantages can compensate for the loss of this privilege.”

 

Patrick Henry’s linkage of protecting liberty to citizen access echoed James Madison’s commentary in Federalist 49:

"As the people are the only legitimate fountain of power, and it is from them that the constitutional charter, under which the several branches of government hold their power, is derived, it seems strictly consonant to the republican theory, to recur to the same original authority, not only whenever it may be necessary to enlarge, diminish, or new-model the powers of the government, but also whenever any one of the departments may commit encroachments…it must be allowed to prove that a constitutional road to the decision of the people ought to be marked out and kept open.”

Madison raised concerns about those who aspire to unbridled power.

“The same influence which had gained them an election into the legislature, would gain them a seat in the convention. If this should not be the case with all, it would probably be the case with many, and pretty certainly with those leading characters, on whom every thing depends in such bodies…it is the reason, alone, of the public, that ought to control and regulate the government.”

Public access to view the proceedings of House and Senate began in December 1795. 

The rapid growth of the Federal Government during President Franklin Roosevelt’s “New Deal” raised concerns about public access to Executive Branch documents and proceedings. Many of Roosevelt’s new agencies had unprecedented powers to create laws and regulations outside the reach of Congress. On June 11, 1946, the Administrative Procedures Act (APA) was enacted to re-establish balance between the Legislative and Executive Branches.  The APA also outlined how the public would be informed and allowed to comment on Executive Branch actions:

1.    to require agencies to keep the public informed of their organization, procedures and rules

2.    to provide for public participation in the rulemaking process, for instance through public comment

3.    to establish uniform standards for the conduct of formal rulemaking and adjudication

4.    to define the scope of judicial review

The APA had its limitations as bureaucrats continually found ways to avoid compliance. A more explicit federal law mandating public access to unclassified government meetings, the Government in the Sunshine Act was enacted September 13, 1976.  Similar “Sunshine Laws” were enacted among state and local governments.  However, to this day, citizens still have to file lawsuits to enforce public access as elected and appointed officials fail to provide “adequate public notice” to hide questionable actions.

The practice of public accessing public documents began on December 2, 1766, ten years before the American Revolution. Sweden passed the “Freedom of the Press Act”. Among other things—it gave Swedish citizens access to uncensored government documents. This was the first “freedom of information” law in history.

The world's first law requiring "publicity for official documents" was initiated by the Finnish-Swedish enlightenment thinker Anders Chydenius, a member of the Swedish Diet (Parliament).

FOIA@250: World’s First Freedom of Information Act Dates to 1766 | National Security Archive (gwu.edu)

“No evidence should be needed that a certain freedom of writing and printing is one of the strongest bulwarks of a free organization of the state, as, without it, the estates would not have sufficient information for the drafting of good laws, and those dispensing justice would not be monitored, nor would the subjects know the requirements of the law, the limits of the rights of government, and their responsibilities. Education and ethical conduct would be crushed; coarseness in thought, speech, and manners would prevail, and dimness would darken the entire sky of our freedom in a few years.”

Chydenius’ Freedom of Print Act was intended to vitalize political discussions. To achieve this objective, Chydenius asserted it was essential that the citizens had access to official documents in order to see how the state was run. Seven of the ordinance’s fifteen paragraphs were dedicated to detailing this public access.

While the Administrative Procedures Act mandated information access, it rarely happened. Formalizing “Freedom of Information Access” for American citizens took longer. The American Society of Newspaper Editors commissioned Harold L. Cross, legal counsel for the New York Herald Tribune, to investigate the issue of excessive government secrecy. Cross’s 1953 report was published as a book titled The People’s Right to Know.

 

Cross wrote that virtually every part of American government operated under what amounted to an “official cult of secrecy”; that this secrecy had become “a breeding ground for corruption; that it was leading to a rise in public mistrust in government; and that all of these things combined were doing serious damage to American democracy itself.” Cross 400-page report made the case that Congress must craft new legislation that gave American citizens greater access to the inner workings of their government. In the early 1950s, The People’s Right to Know became a manual for the blossoming “freedom of information” movement.

 

In 1955, former businessman John Moss (D-CA) began a 12-year effort to codify Cross’s recommendation by passing the Federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

 

On June 20, 1966, it passed the House of Representatives (306 to 0). It was then sent on to President Lyndon Johnson.

 

Johnson opposed the legislation but allowed it to become law on July 4, 1966.

 

On this 4^th of July we should celebrate this milestone in the public’s power to observe government decisions and maintain checks on government power. 

 

It reminds us that citizens must remain constantly vigilant to protect our god given rights.