Thanksgiving
An appropriate place to start would be some reasons for Thanksgiving. Many contemporary Americans seem to have lost touch with the concept of Thanksgiving as a day of giving thanks to God, filling the day instead with food and football. Food and football are both wonderful, but not as the primary motive for the day. In 1832, The Reverend William T. Harrison, minister of the First Presbyterian Church of Newark, NJ, published a sermon he gave on the reasons American citizens should be thankful on Thanksgiving. I liked the perspective he gave on how Americans saw themselves and their country.
1. The land itself that belongs to the United States. At the time, America comprised 2,400,000 square miles. This territory lies in temperate climate and is blessed with many important resources, among them deep bays and large rivers, useful for navigation. Natural resources such as coal and lead were also blessings to a growing country.
2. The location of America. Being located across an ocean isolated America from the old world of Europe. Political freedom was protected by isolation; in Europe, political movements toward liberty were squelched by other nations. Americans were able to develop themselves and use all their energies without exciting the alarm or jealousy of other European countries.
3. The population growth. Cheap land, natural resources, a democratic government, and religious freedom encouraged the oppressed of all lands to make a new start in America, where they could develop as far as their talents took them. The fact that people of every country poured into America affirmed the new style of government as a blessing to mankind.
4. Internal and external peace. Unlike many of the European nations of that day, the United States maintained peace, and its citizens had not experienced the terrors of war. Political differences could be worked out through the system, bitterness and anger simply being safety valves to release tension.
5. The stability of America's free institutions. Democratic freedom and liberty was won with blood and effort, both on our continent and in Europe. Yet European examples showed how rapidly liberty could be torn away from people. The United States still maintained its freedom and needed to be eternally vigilant that liberty would not be eroded or overthrown.
6. Unequaled prosperity. Fertile soil, temperate climate, and democratic institutions lead to rapid growth. The continent was being developed and improved - land was farmed, canals were being dug, rivers improved for navigation - improvements that encouraged and rewarded the industry of the citizens.
7. Freedom from wasting disease. Despite the climatic range and the rigors to which the American citizen was exposed, sweeping pestilence did not rage across the nation. At the time, Europe was experiencing cholera epidemics and the United States was free from those terrors.
8. The United States' growing influence among the nations of the world. The American experiment of democracy had survived its birth pangs and had reached the point where other countries were recognizing its institutions as more than an oddity. The peace and prosperity of the United States was beginning to excite interest and jealousy in other nations. The older political systems were beginning to revise themselves after the United States, and so America was bringing the blessings of liberty to others beyond its shores.
9. The increase of literature and the general increase of intelligence. More public journals were published in America than in any other country in the world. Public education and Sunday schools were on the rise and increasing in number rapidly. The means of education was more generally accessible in the United States than in any other country and the habit of reading was more universal.
10. The continuance and extension of religion. Churches were growing and being planted, missionary boards and tract societies were expanding. The American Temperance Society was expanding in numbers and influence and revivals were starting to sweep the nation.
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