Fourth of July: on liberty
[NOTE: This is a repeat of a previous post from many many years ago. It was written in the springtime during a visit to New York City. Reading it now, it seems almost archaic in certain ways.]
I’ve been visiting New York City, the place where I grew up. I decide to take a walk to the Promenade in Brooklyn Heights, never having been there before.
When you approach the Promenade you can’t really see what’s in store. You walk down a normal-looking street, spot a bit of blue at the end of the block, make a right turn–and, then, suddenly, there is the city.
And so it is for me. I take a turn, and catch my breath: downtown Manhattan rises to my left, seemingly close enough to touch, across the narrow East River. I see skyscrapers, piers, the orange-gold Staten Island ferry. In front of me, there are the graceful gothic arches of the Brooklyn Bridge. To my right, the back of some brownstones, and a well-tended and charming garden that goes on for a third of a mile.
I walk down the promenade looking first left and then right, not knowing which vista I prefer, but liking them both, especially in combination, because they complement each other so well.
All around me are people, relaxing. Lovers walking hand in hand, mothers pushing babies in strollers, fathers pushing babies in strollers, nannies pushing babies in strollers. People walking their dogs (a preponderance of pugs, for some reason), pigeons strutting and courting, tourists taking photos of themselves with the skyline as background, every other person speaking a foreign language.
The garden is more advanced in time than gardens where I live, reminding me that New York is really a southern city compared to New England. Daffodils, the startling blue of grape hyacinths, tulips in a rainbow of soft colors, those light-purple azaleas that are always the first of their kind, flowering pink magnolia and airy white dogwood and other blooming trees whose names I don’t know.
In the view to my left, of course, there’s something missing. Something very large. Two things, actually: the World Trade Center towers. Just the day before, we had driven past that sprawling wound, with its mostly-unfilled acreage where the WTC had once stood, now surrounded by fencing. Driving by it is like passing a war memorial and graveyard combined; the urge is to bow one’s head.
As I look at the skyline from the Promenade, I know that those towers are missing, but I don’t really register the loss visually. I left New York in the Sixties, never to live there again, returning thereafter only as occasional visitor. The World Trade Center was built in the early Seventies, so I never managed to incorporate it into that personal New York skyline of memory that I hold in my mind’s eye, even though I saw the towers on subsequent visits. So what I now see resembles nothing more than the skyline of my youth restored, a fact which seems paradoxical to me. But I feel the loss, even though I don’t see it. Viewing the skyline always has a tinge of sadness now, which it never had before 9/11.
I come to the end of the walkway and turn myself around to set off on the return trip. And, suddenly, the view changes. Now, of course, the garden is to my left and the city to my right; and the Brooklyn Bridge, which was ahead of me, is now behind me and out of sight. But now I can see for the first time, ahead of me and to the right, something that was behind me before. In the middle of the harbor, the pale-green Statue of Liberty stands firmly on its concrete foundation, arm raised high, torch in hand.
The sight is intensely familiar to me – I used to see it frequently when I was growing up. But I’ve never seen it from this angle before. She seems both small and gigantic at the same time: dwarfed by the skyscrapers near me that threaten to overwhelm her, but towering over the water that surrounds her on all sides. The eye is drawn to her distant, heroic figure. She’s been holding that torch up for so long, she must be tired. But still she stands, resolute, her arm extended.
NOTE: I was going to add a photo of the Statue of Liberty here. But instead I was very taken with a video about how the statue was constructed. I’d never previously thought about the challenges involved and how they were surmounted, but I learned about them here. And the video also caused me to reflect, and not for the first time, on how the forces arrayed against the US right now are good at destroying but not at building. Destroying is so much easier:
Thank you Neo… A wonderful post on Independence Day!
God bless America.
Thank you for your post! My wife and I, both retired, are totally saddened by the cherished tapestry of America that has been demolished. My youngest son, born in 1988, has no idea what a grand place we called home prior to the onslaught of the America….I dare say, “decency”….. hating progressives and their mindless cadre of destroyers rather than builders.
We were blessed to have “lived it”, and KNOW that there’s a better way than what we’re seeing these days.
Fox Nation has a series of videos on the Revolutionary War. I watched the one about the Battle of Yorktown yesterday. What a debt we owe to those incredible men and women who won our independence. They were stouthearted people with a vision of liberty – something uncommon in those days. That vision, and a willingness to risk it all, carried them to victory over the world’s predominate army of the time.
Happy Independence Day to all.
Neo doesn’t mischaracterize the famous statue here, but this is a good opportunity to emphasize that the statue’s actual name is “Liberty Enlightening the World” and that it has nothing to do with immigration. Instead, it was intended to call the world’s attention to what ordered liberty had produced in the young American republic and offer it as an example for others in their own lands.
This important truth was part of what Roberto Suro wrote in a Washington Post op-ed that appeared on July 5, 2009, “She Was Never About Those Huddled Masses”: https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/02/AR2009070201737_pf.html
So who’s Roberto Suro? A professor in the Annenberg School for Communications at the University of Southern California and founding director (2001 – 2007) of the Pew Hispanic Center.
Regarding the usual misinterpretation and misuse of the iconic statue, an astute friend wrote, “We used to have sensible immigration policy, but then someone built this damn statue.”
Happy Independence day everyone
Who knows how longer we will have it
Did ya’ll remember on the 3rd to get a 5th for the 4th ??
Happy Birthday America !
neo:
Lovely writing!
Reminds me a bit of a guy — Gerard van … something?
Praise.
I”m an American. I love America, and I look for signs that America, though now bitterly divided, is healing. Here’s my contribution on this Fourth of July.
Judging by black reaction YouTubes, there’s a weird love affair happening with blacks and Larry Bird. There’s now a cottage industry of such videos on Bird. They too find Larry Legend legendary.
Which is a bit surprising, because there has long been racial animosity in Bird’s career as the white star of the Boston Celtics at the time of racial tension in Boston due to busing. Later the Celtics vs Lakers rivalry became a racial flashpoint as well.
Bird was initially billed as the Great White Hope of basketball, though he washed his hands of that title immediately.
Which wasn’t just good optics. Bird was small-town white trash. After he imploded in his first college year and returned home in ignominious defeat, he worked, literally, on a garbage truck. But in the evening he still played hard-core b-ball mostly with blacks on the local courts. They accepted Bird and he learned much from them.
The funny thing some blacks now say about Bird — he was a black man in a white man’s body. They’ve got a point. Sure, Bird excelled at “white basketball” — fundamentals, passing, free throws, teamwork — but he could also pull off outrageous OG street moves like no one’s business.
Oh, and then there’s the trash talk. I loved Bird in the 1980s but no ordinary fan then knew how outrageous Bird was. Bird learned that from blacks and perfected it. No one, then or since, black or white, has come close.
Of course a player had to back that talk up with deeds. But Bird is still the ultimate clutch player in NBA history. He would tell the opposing team exactly the upcoming play to win the game and Larry Legend would come through.
Some of the Bird love comes out of today’s fans discovering how awesome 80s/90s b-ball was. As well they should.
They also now know Bird is one of the ultimate players of the game. As well they should.
Nice post. Usually this is the day I retreat to the air conditioning and watch 1776. But I went to a Yankees game instead. Glorious.
Larry Bird’s greatest hits: he gets into it with a player on the court, not a star player just someone put in to guard him aggressively. It nearly comes to a fight. After the game, the player, whose name I can’t remember, says to a reporter, “If Larry Bird’s looking for me, he knows where to find me.” This gets relayed back to Bird. He says, “Yea, I know where to find him. On the bench.”
A post about visiting nyc in 2024 would go a lot different. I don’t think it will ever recover in my lifetime or ever for that matter. The criminals and “migrants” have the run of the city, and that isn’t changing in our lifetimes
Mike Plaiss:
Yep. Here’s the cite:
https://www.yardbarker.com/nba/articles/larry_bird_destroyed_craig_hodges_for_saying_he_knows_where_to_find_me_for_a_three_point_contest_yeah_at_the_end_of_the_bulls_bench/s1_16751_36491807
Since retiring as a player, Bird has gone into management, with great success. He pretends he was never that player with the mouthiest mouth. When he’s wearing a suit and acting corporate, you believe it.
His teammates and opponents laugh. They love it.
Could a strawberry-blond Indiana white boy be the all-time NBA trash talker?
Turns out, yeah, hell yeah:
___________________________________
Oh my god, Bird talked trash to everybody.
–Charles Barkley, “Larry Bird STORIES that prove he’s the BEST TRASH TALKER”
https://youtu.be/v7Id88T5DPs?t=113
___________________________________
One of his funniest riffs was to complain to the opposing team that they were putting a “white guy” on him for defense. “It’s diserespectful, when you all put a whiite guy on me,” BIrd said.
The black players had no response, but couldn’t help laughing.
Blacks love these stories. Me too.
J.J. on July 4, 2024 at 12:56 pm said:
Fox Nation has a series of videos on the Revolutionary War. I watched the one about the Battle of Yorktown yesterday. What a debt we owe to those incredible men and women who won our independence
——
Yes, at one point. But they ultimately fought to create a place for Guatemalan “newcomers” to get free everything in exchange for college kids to fill out ballots in their names
Happy Independence Day, everyone!
I’m making a slightly quieter day of it than I had expected to. Just now, continuing the reading of the Franklin biography, I’m reaching the part about the early 1770s. I wonder what he would make of the goings-on these days.
Philip Sells, WHICH Franklin bio are you reading? There are several. Inquiring minds want to know.
“New York is really a southern city compared to New England”, says Neo. Which I as a Southerner dispute with vigor.
NYC is as much Yankeetown as is Boston, though the former is apparently fuller of black and brown “migrants”.
Powerlineblog as is their custom, reprised Calvin Coolidge’s 150th Independence Day anniversary speech.
I really love reading it.
We could use a Calvin Coolidge type; but, of course, he would never be elected now. Too bland. Too Constitutional.
A point abut him that I had missed. After finishing Warren Harding’s term and one of his own, he was urged to run again because of his popularity. (That would surprise a lot of people who ignorantly disparage him). He declined, saying: “Ten years is too long for anyone to be President”. If only others knew when to quit.
The comment about the Guatemalans looking for free stuff reminds me. Fox News Digital’s political cartoon of the day is by Ramirez, set in Revolutionary times, but so prescient. Ramirez, on target as all ways.
mongo, this is H. W. Brands, The First American.
I started out to comment on Neo’s comment on the Stature of Liberty and the marvel of its existence and lost my train.
It is mind boggling in a two fold way to contemplate some of the amazing projects that were fairly quickly brought to fruition in earlier days without modern technology.
A few that come to mind; the Pentagon, the Hoover Dam, the Golden Gate Bridge, Mt Rushmore. The list could go on for some time. Never mind the astounding production feats of WWII.
Today, it is painfully obvious that we are no longer capable of performing as former generations did routinely.
Good Lord. My city is resurfacing virtually every thoroughfare, whether it needs it or not. In each case, the fairly simple process of repaving and repainting the markings is excruciatingly slow. I consider some busy streets rather dangerous due to lack of markings for days upon days. We have somehow lost so much of what was common knowledge and practice just a few generations ago.
Off topic. Listening to LA TV News gushing over the 4th of July. I guess they have an emotional block against calling it “Independence Day” or “America’s birthday”. Not a soul used such terminology.
My wife says I should not let it bother me. I am sure that she is right–as usual. But, I do believe that language matters.
Happy Birthday America.
Laid up from surgery on Tuesday, so I watched 1776 and Yankee Doodle Dandy on TCM and Mariners on Root Sports. My dog is in fireworks terror mode now. My late Weimaraner would go to the sound of the guns. If my neighbors were shooting, he would head on over. This one recoils from the sound of the kibble hitting the metal bowl.
Cicero:
Maybe you missed the”compared with New England” part.
I could visualize every turn and your memory of the The Statue of Liberty and the view that you never saw until that moment … captivating.
We spend Independence Day with our son and his family in Huntington Beach. If you have seen the movie Sandlot, the scene on the 4th is this city. Fireworks and flags everywhere in every neighborhood. Truly delightful. God please continue to bless America.
Not the Bee had a great post today. There is a beautiful picture of Lady Liberty among the other photos of America.
https://notthebee.com/article/take-a-moment-today-to-appreciate-the-beauty-of-america-with-this-compilation-of-pictures
“We used to have sensible immigration policy, but then someone built this damn statue.”
The problem is not the statue, but the poem attached to the pedestal.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_Colossus
Even so, the people lauded by Lazarus are not exactly the same as the ones now being “sent” to us by some not-so-ancient lands.
Oldflyer
That’s the problem. Things that should bother people don’t.
There are places I never want to visit again. NYC is one.
I have walked along the Promenade many times and it is very uplifting.
I found the narrator’s voice to be reasonably intelligible until I tried speeding it up. It’s probably just me, but that didn’t work well at all. Odd.
I knew most of the story about the statue. My first thought watching the video was: Yes, funding was a problem before the federal income tax. That was when the federal government was fiscally a very small portion of a giant private and series of state’s economies. Now the feds eat a large piece of everything they have access to, which is almost everything. What a mistake.
Remember Sen. Dircksen’s quote? “A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon it begins to add up to real money.” Obama got nearly a trillion allocated for “shovel ready jobs,” and although they “only” spent a little over $0.5T, IIRC; in the wake of its fiasco, he used it as a laugh line. Imagine that. Complacency.
The color of clean copper is a lovely reddish yellow or gold. So different than the oxidized color. It must have looked really cool in those first several years.
When I was a pre-teen or teen, I walked up inside the statue, though the arm was closed off. And along the Promenade probably around 1980, give or take a couple years.
It is easy to break things. But one should always remember Chesterson’s Fence.
@Cicero
Sorry Cicero, but Neo is absolutely correct here. You don’t see many votes to secede and join the Confederacy (or symbolic wearing of the Confed Flag) in New England, While it has become a lot more “Yankee” and tied to “New England” in recent decades, it definitely was not always like that. It was formed at about the middle point between the South and New England by the Dutch and so absorbed a bunch of different influences from them, which is one reason why it’s generally been the midpoint between them in our politics, from being “Officially Patriot aligned but with heavy Royalist Sentiment” in 1775-6 (to being the inverse during the British occupation), to having avowedly pro-slavery and pro-Southern political dominance in Tammany Hall (with a particular note being to Fernando Wood’s abortive attempt to secede from the US in 20 or so years prior to the outbreak of the Civil War, and to Tammany’s heavy ties to the “Solid South”.
Things really changed from what I can tell in the 1960s and especially 1970s with Tammany’s downfall, the South shifting Republican, and so forth. And even then it’s worth noting that NYC still has heavy ties to a lot of the major Leftist strongholds in the South like Atlanta.
The idea that it was as Yankee as Boston has more to do with Boston becoming a lot more like the NYC under the reign of Curley and his successors, as well as the political sea changes severing the South from the Dems and breaking Tammany’s domestic stranglehold (albeit it looks like they were largely replaced by a different Dem political machine).
The odd thing is those who sacrifice the most for liberty rarely enjoy it’s benefits.
I am not familiar with Brooklyn and could not find the Promenade on the map from your description. Could you provide more detail, please?