Of history and holidays; of sizzle and steak

July 4 and July 14 are celebrated as national holidays in the US and France respectively. These are celebrated as the acts of American independence and the revolution that saw off the ancien regime in France.

In the case of July 4, the actual declaration took place two days earlier, with the Continental Congress's passage of the resolution (one of the myths about July 4 debunked in the HNN site's page on the topic)

`Resolved, That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and inde­pendent states, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.''

In fact, John Adams had thought that

"The Second Day of July 1776 will be the most memorable Epocha, in the History of America. . . . It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires, and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more."

However, even that may not have been the true revolutionary act. On May 17, 1775, the Continental Congress advised states to set up their own constitutions and it declared the forces assembled outside Boston to be a Continental Army. Arguably assuming the functions of a sovereign government was pretty damn close to a de facto declaration of independence.

Likewise, the celebration of Bastille Day in France overshadows the Tennis Court Oath. This had its origins on a royal lockout of the Estates-General when it looked like the Third Estate was going to win on a procedural vote that would've given them the dominant position in the ensuing deliberations. On June 20, 1789, over three weeks before the storming of the Bastille, the delegates of the Third Estate assembled at a tennis court and declared themselves a national assembly that wouldn't disperse until the constitution of the kingdom had been rewritten. Again, the true revolutionary act inhered in the assumption of sovereign power.

It is, perhaps, natural for the actual celebrations to center around an easily understood symbolic act than to delve into the more subtle questions of sovereignty. This isn't necessarily a bad thing as long as it inspires a deeper look into the latter kind of events rather than to limit such contemplations to the flashier parts of history.