Ever since two of our greatest Founding Fathers, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson both passed away on our nation’s 50th birthday, July 4, 1826, Americans have seen great significance in our milestone anniversaries. The event calls, at a minimum, for a great celebration, a chance to tell the story of America’s founding, progress, and triumph. But real life – and politics – often find a way to intrude.
Even in 1826, while the country celebrated progress, the “progress” was mixed. The movement to expand voting rights for all white men was expanding, but slavery was more entrenched and brutal than at the founding. The mechanical loom and the cotton gin exploded growth of cotton and slavery, which many thought was a dying institution at the end of the 18th Century, was more profitable than ever 30 years later. The 1808 ban on the transatlantic slave trade1808 did not weaken slavery, but intensified it. A vast internal slave trade tore families apart as enslaved people were sold further South to fuel cotton’s explosive growth.
1876 Centennial. The Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia was America’s first world’s fair and the biggest show ever seen yet in this country. Emerging from Civil War, completing its conquest of the continent, and unleashing industrial power and technological progress never seen before, the United States took the opportunity to flex its muscles to the world. Spread out over 400+ acres of Fairmount Park, the fair showed our industrial might as well as agricultural, mineral, and scenic wonders. The telephone and the typewriter made their débuts at this world’s fair as did another world-conquering American institution: Heinz ketchup.
Yet in 1876, the United States was poised to take some gigantic steps backward. News of the massacre of George Armstrong Custer’s cavalry force reminded people that the west wasn’t as civilized as we might have thought – and ignited the final drive to extinguish the remaining life of the Plains Indians and corral them onto reservations. America was in the grip of a racist counter-revolution. The brief outburst of civil rights for freedmen – enforced by the U.S. Army – was coming to an end as Redemption forces in the South violently resisted federal authority. Later that year, the most corrupt presidential election in our history sealed the end of Reconstruction and paved the way for Jim Crow. The “anthropology” exhibits, while nowhere near as overtly racist and eugenic as later ones at the 1893 and 1904 world’s fairs, nevertheless portrayed native tribes and other cultures as exotic and inferior.
1926 Sesquicentennial. Like the 1926 Sesquicentennial International Exposition held in Philadelphia, the overall sesquicentennial event was a smaller imitation of its 1876 counterpart. In 1926, the nation was in an ugly place. The postwar “Red Scares” were a recent memory and there was a massive xenophobic, antisemitic, and racist backlash to immigration, labor organizing, and agitation for expanded rights. White supremacist organizations wielded real political power. Racial violence and intimidation was widespread. Antisemitic conspiracy theories flourished. Anti-Catholic campaigns targeted Irish, Italian and eastern European immigrants. The most restrictive immigration legislation in our history had recently been enacted.
The Klan was newly ascendant, its strength built on anti-Catholic, anti-Jewish, and anti-immigrant hate. On September 13, 1926, the Klan held a massive, unmasked march in Washington, DC. Tens of thousands of robed Klansmen processed down Pennsylvania Avenue, demonstrating the group’s political influence.
1976 Bicentennial. In 1976, the Bicentennial arrived in the midst of desegregation. The country’s mood was reflective. We were struggling with the after-effects of Vietnam and Watergate. Trust in government was at an all-time low. But, somehow, the Bicentennial Commission put together a celebration that seemed inclusive. Patriotic without jingoism. The country heaved a sigh of relief – and enjoyed the celebration.
2026. Whose Semiquincentennial? With this mixed record, the nation approaches its 250th. For the first time, there are two distinct celebrations. Congress created a bipartisan “America250” initiative to coordinate a national celebration. But President Trump has created his own “Freedom 250” that seems to be a vehicle for more grift, Trump self-glorification, and gawdy events like a UFC fight and an auto race in the streets of Washington, DC.
These mainly seem to be opportunities for corporate solicitations that promise access to the President. Plans for a 250 foot triumphal arch that will tower over the Lincoln Memorial, the Trump coins, and the pervasive Trump imagery also seem questionable.
Other privately-funded, oversight-proof “Freedom250” events include traveling “Freedom trucks” that “tell America’s story” as interpreted by ultra-conservative Prager University and Hillsdale College and a 1st amendment busting “National Jubilee of Prayer, Praise, and Thanksgiving” that gave participants a chance to give “thanks and praise to God for 250 years of His Providence for the United States … and in solemnly rededicating our country as One Nation under God.”
Public Citizen’s Lisa Gilbert said, “Donald Trump and his henchmen have sabotaged what should be a unifying moment and appear intent on instead creating a highly divisive, corporate-funded, ideologically extremist exercise. Once again, nothing is sacred in the Trump administration, not even the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Everything is for sale to corporate and potentially foreign interests.”
