Cradle of Liberty

Philadelphians snort at the idea that a building in Boston—Faneuil Hall, a marketplace and meeting place–should presume to be called “the cradle of liberty” just because James Otis gave a fiery anti-British speech there in 1761. How can that compare to a city where the Declaration of Independence and Constitution of the United States were drafted, debated, revised, and signed—both in a brief period of eleven years?

Pride of place, if we can be generous for a moment, can be shared. Mark Twain once called Switzerland the Cradle of Liberty because alpine-born democracy had roots there too. Indeed the world is full of cradles of liberty, and some are now being violently rocked by young people hooked into social media as the Arab Spring turns the Middle East upside down.

Yet, Philadelphia is a special cradle of liberty.

It not only was where the Continental Congress and Constitutional Convention did their epic work. Indeed, a century and more before, it was the city imagined by the visionary William Penn as a place where people of all classes, cultures, and ancestral backgrounds would learn to live together. Penn and his Quaker followers were determined to establish a unique colony free of the violence, intolerance, and corruption that were widespread on both sides of the Atlantic. Just a generation before, Puritans in Massachusetts were hanging Quakers on the Boston Common, and only a few years before Penn arrived they were bent on eradicating Wampanoag people from the Bay Colony

Religious and Ethnic Tolerance

Philadelphia—to be called the “city of brotherly love”—never entirely lived up to its visionary founding principles; but nowhere else in the hemisphere did colonizing Europeans display such substantial toleration for religious and ethnic differences and such peaceful relations with Native Americans. “I deplore two principles in religion,” Penn wrote memorably; “obedience upon authority without conviction and destroying them that differ with me for Christ’s sake.” Most European visitors were astounded at such words and at how they took hold.

For a while, Penn’s vision of “putting the power in the people” was realized in good measure. And then, nearly a century after Penn’s arrival, Philadelphia was the place where those stirring words that ricocheted around the world—“inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” and “we the people”—were written and enshrined. For generations to come, a storm of strangers would cherish Philadelphia as the place where these founding documents were written and ratified.

But many of the strangers came unfree and involuntarily. From Africa, they would wait a long time before they saw Philadelphia as a cradle of liberty. But they insisted that liberty should be theirs as well and were not shy about invoking the principles espoused in the nation’s founding documents. “Search the legends of tyranny and find no precedent.” thundered James Forten, accomplished sailmaker, businessman, church leader, and philanthropist, in 1813. “It has been left for Pennsylvania to raise her ponderous arm against the liberties of the black, whose greatest boast has been that he resided in a state where civil liberty and sacred justice were administered alike to all.” Shaking the cradle of liberty, he warned, in his effort to ward off vicious laws restricting free black men and women, that “the story will fly from the north to the south, and the advocates of slavery, the traders in human blood, will smile contemptuously at the once boasted moderation and humanity of Pennsylvania.”

Two decades later, when “the cradle of liberty” motto was gaining currency, abolitionists in Boston and New York, seizing on the words from Leviticus inscribed on the brim of Philadelphia’s old State House bell, “Proclaim liberty throughout the land to all the inhabitants thereof.” Rechristening the bell as “the Liberty Bell,” they shamed Philadelphia for lagging behind in the crusade to cleanse the nation of its deep-dyed sin of chattel bondage.

Clash of Liberty and Slavery

This put Philadelphia on the defensive, its cradle of liberty motto under attack. “Shame on you,” shouted one abolitionist pamphlet with the Liberty Bell on its cover. “Is it to be tyrants amid slaves that Americans, with liberty glowing on every page of their history, and the glorious Declaration of Independence upon their lips, have been found willing to degrade themselves?” Another charged: “Hitherto, the bell has not obeyed he inscription: and its peals have been a mockery, while one sixth of all inhabitants are in abject slavery.”

And with that, the bell tarnished, the cradle of liberty needed repairs. That came as Philadelphians of different political persuasions paraded their own brand of liberty—Protestant nativists who put the Liberty Bell on a pedestal, literally, in Independence Hall in 1855 while attacking Catholics; pro-labor advocates such as the wildly popular journalist George Lippard, who fought to protect blue collar liberty from exploitative capitalists; and black Philadelphians struggling for social justice and the right to vote. In a fast-growing, immigrant-filled city many wanted to claim part of the cradle.

In time, the city cemented its claim as the cradle of liberty. The millions who thronged to celebrate the centennial of the Declaration of Independence in1876 had plenty of encouragement in reaffirming that Penn’s green country town was the cradle of liberty. Ownership of the cradle was strengthened as surging crowds paraded down Broad Street for the centennial of the Constitutional Convention in 1887.

Then into the twentieth century people of all political persuasions came to Philadelphia to embrace the Liberty Bell as the preeminent talisman of freedom. Among them were women suffragists during the Great War for whom the “cradle of liberty” terminology was dishonestly used while women were denied the suffrage.

Ideals vs. Realities

Similarly, when he was working to establish a National Freedom Day on which Americans could annually measure the distance between the nation’s glittering ideals and the somber realities on the ground, Richard R. Wright Sr., who had been born in slavery, knew just where to come. By laying a wreath in 1942 at the feet of the Liberty Bell, he furthered the notion of mending a splintered cradle of liberty. Civil rights activists repeated this ritual in the 1960s and 1970s by conducting sit-ins and demonstrations at Independence Hall

After World War II, leaders from newly independent countries—David Ben Gurion from Israel, Jomo Kenyetta from Kenya, a Ghanaian delegation, and many others—came not to New York or Boston but to Philadelphia, where they stood in Independence Hall and before the Liberty Bell to honor freedom’s birthplace that inspired their own quests for freedom. Cold War statesmen followed: Albert Tarchiani, the Italian ambassador to the U.S. in 1948; Ernst Reuter, mayor West Berlin, and Mohammed Mossedeq, premier of Iran, in 1951; Clement Atllee, prime minister of England in 1952; Nicholas Kallay and Mario Scelba, premiers of Hungary and Italy respectively in 1955.

The stream of international figures coming to pay their respects to Philadelphia as the cradle of liberty continues to the present day as they partake in the city’s historic role in building the nation. Yet the cradle still has cracks and blemishes. Perfecting it and keeping it in good repair requires an ongoing commitment to shoulder the responsibility of living up to the motto. This is the work of citizens, organizations, institutions, and politicians. Boasting about Philadelphia as the cradle of liberty is one thing; cradling liberty is another.

Gary B. Nash is Professor of History Emeritus at UCLA and the author of many books, including First City: Philadelphia and the Forging of Historical Memory (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002).

Topics: Freedom, Revolutions, and Social Justice

Abolitionism

Few regions in the United States can claim an abolitionist heritage as rich as Philadelphia. By the time Boston abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison (1805-79) launched The Liberator in 1831, the Philadelphia area’s confrontation with human bondage was nearly 150 years old. Still, Philadelphia abolitionism is often treated as a distant cousin of the epic nineteenth-century ⇒ Read More

Alien and Sedition Acts

A culmination of political battles between Democratic-Republicans and Federalists while Philadelphia served as capital of the United States, the federal Alien and Sedition Acts imposed stringent new rules governing political speech and writings, immigration rights, and non-naturalized immigrants. They also had an immediate impact on the political life of Philadelphia as they inflamed passions in ⇒ Read More

American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)

The American Civil Liberties Union, a national legal organization dedicated to the defense and preservation of civil liberties in the United States, has been organized in the Philadelphia region since 1951, when chapters formed in Pennsylvania and New Jersey as part of a move toward establishing branches throughout the nation. Both chapters played a role ⇒ Read More

Animal Protection

Moral doubt over the cruel usage of animals has a long history in Philadelphia. Public disapproval of such treatment surfaced by the late eighteenth century, but even with comprehensive laws designed to protect animals, and organizations devoted to enforcing those laws, the region has struggled to extend adequate protection to its nonhuman animals. Benjamin Franklin ⇒ Read More

Appeal of Forty Thousand Citizens

The Appeal of Forty Thousand Citizens, Threatened with Disfranchisement, to the People of Philadelphia attempted to persuade Philadelphians to vote against the ratification of a new constitution for Pennsylvania in 1838 because the word “white” had been inserted prior to “freemen” as a qualification for voting. Written by African American leader Robert Purvis (1810-98), the ⇒ Read More

Articles of Confederation

The Articles of Confederation established the Confederation Congress that governed the United States from 1781 to 1789. Meeting in Philadelphia, the Second Continental Congress appointed a committee that began drafting the Articles in 1776. However, the final draft was not complete until 1777 while the Continental Congress was ensconced in York, Pennsylvania, during the British ⇒ Read More

Artisans

As skilled laborers who hand-crafted their goods on a per-customer basis, artisans played a central role in the formation of Philadelphia’s prerevolutionary economy: producing essential goods and services and providing social stability within households composed not just of immediate family but also of journeymen and apprentices. American independence brought artisans new economic opportunities as the ⇒ Read More

Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin (The)

Over eighteen years, from 1771 until his death, Benjamin Franklin (1706-90) composed an unfinished record of his life’s tribulations and successes. Written in simple, often humorous language, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin offered readers in the new United States an accessible, exemplary narrative of American upward mobility. An integral thread in the fabric of Franklin’s ⇒ Read More

Bicentennial (1976)

Planners of Philadelphia’s Bicentennial celebration in 1976, aware of the incredible success of the 1876 Centennial as well as the flop of the 1926 Sesquicentennial, hoped to showcase the growth and ambitions of the city while also commemorating the two-hundredth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. While the big celebrations drew crowds of Americans, the ⇒ Read More

Black Power

Black Power, a movement significant to the black freedom struggle in Philadelphia, came to prominence in the 1960s and 1970s through the combined efforts of local and national organizations including the Church of the Advocate, the Black Panther Party, the Black United Liberation front, and MOVE. Before and after Stokely Carmichael (1941-98) of the national ⇒ Read More

British Occupation of Philadelphia

On September 26, 1777, the British army marched into Philadelphia, beginning an occupation that lasted until the following spring. Its arrival led patriots to flee and Loyalists to rejoice, although wartime shortages soon led to suffering for those who remained in the city. The occupation, however, led to no concrete gains, and the British abandoned ⇒ Read More

Capital of the United States (Selection of Philadelphia)

As the national capital from 1790 to 1800, Philadelphia was the seat of the federal government for a short but crucial time in the new nation’s history. How and why Congress selected Philadelphia as the temporary Unites States capital reflects the essential debates of the era, particularly the balance of power between North and South. ⇒ Read More

Centennial Exhibition (1876)

The International Exhibition of Arts, Manufactures and Products of the Soil and Mine, more simply known as “the Centennial,” opened in Fairmount Park to great fanfare on May 10, 1876, and closed with equal flourish six months later. Modeled after the Crystal Palace Great Exhibition in London in 1851, and the first in a long ⇒ Read More

Christiana Riot Trial

During the 1850s, Northern abolitionism developed, Southern defense of slavery hardened, and debates over the expansion of slavery gripped the nation. When pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions met at Christiana, Pennsylvania, a mere 20 miles north of the Mason-Dixon Line, the events that followed and the subsequent trial in Philadelphia became flashpoints that deepened the sectional ⇒ Read More

Civil Rights (African American)

Black Philadelphians have fought for civil rights since the nineteenth century and even before. Early demands focused on the abolition of slavery and desegregation of public accommodations. The movement gained greater power as the nineteenth century gave way to the twentieth and the World War I-era Great Migration brought tens of thousands of African Americans ⇒ Read More

Civil Rights (LGBT)

In the second half of the twentieth century, a growing number of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) Americans claimed political rights as people whose same-sex desire or gender presentation challenged prevailing social mores. As movements for African American, Latino American, and women’s rights gained traction and visibility, so too did movements for LGBT civil ⇒ Read More

Cold War

The period of international political and military tension known as the Cold War (1947-91) had military, political, and cultural implications for Greater Philadelphia. The region served as a first line of defense for a conflict that depended more on missiles than forts, and it provided the nation with an arsenal, a shipyard, and a source ⇒ Read More

Common Sense

Published in Philadelphia in its first edition in January 1776, Thomas Paine’s Common Sense became one of the most widely disseminated and most often read political treatises in history. It looked forward to democratic politics and universal human rights, yet it also reflected local circumstances in Philadelphia. Common Sense was thus an overture to democracy ⇒ Read More

Constitution Commemorations

As a cause for commemoration, the signing of the U.S. Constitution historically has struggled to compete with the Declaration of Independence for national recognition and ardor. In contrast to the dramatic act of independence, the framing of the national government is a more sober and complex narrative not easily celebrated with barbecues and fireworks. In ⇒ Read More

Constitutional Convention of 1787

The Constitutional Convention met in Philadelphia from May 25 to September 17, 1787, at Independence Hall (then known as the Pennsylvania State House). The convention drafted the United States Constitution, the world’s oldest written national constitution still in use. The document, which divides power between the federal government and the states, launched a new phase ⇒ Read More

Continental Congresses

At the conclusion of the Seven Years’ War in 1763, independence from the British Crown was an outlandish thought in the minds of many American colonists. They enjoyed the protections of one of the world’s most powerful empires and rights and freedoms granted to its subjects. Little more than a decade later, delegates from these ⇒ Read More

Crowds (Colonial and Revolution Eras)

Social and economic elites dominated formal politics in Pennsylvania and New Jersey during the colonial and revolutionary eras, but ordinary people, often those who were ineligible to vote, helped shape the political culture. To support or oppose economic conditions and policies imposed by imperial, provincial, and local legislators, they periodically engaged in public celebrations, civil ⇒ Read More

Declaration of Independence

Convening in the East Room of the Pennsylvania State House from May 1775 to July 1776, sixty-five delegates of the Second Continental Congress worked through deep political divisions to create the Declaration of Independence, which gave birth to a new nation and cemented Philadelphia’s reputation as a Cradle of Liberty. When the Second Continental Congress ⇒ Read More

Dewey’s Lunch Counter Sit-In

In 1965, protesters at a Dewey’s restaurant lunch counter in Center City Philadelphia demanded access to public accommodations for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people. It was the first known protest of its kind in Philadelphia, and one of the earliest such demonstrations in the United States. Dewey’s was a chain of hamburger restaurants ⇒ Read More

Eastern State Penitentiary

Eastern State Penitentiary, considered by many to be the world’s first full-scale penitentiary, opened in Philadelphia in 1829 and closed in 1971. Known for its system of total isolation of prisoners and remarkable architecture, Eastern State proved to be one of the most controversial institutions of the antebellum period. Abandoned as a prison in the ⇒ Read More

Fort Wilson

On October 4, 1779, the home of noted Pennsylvania lawyer and statesman James Wilson (1742-98) on the southwest corner of Third and Walnut Streets in Philadelphia became a flash point for Philadelphians divided by politics and class. The militia attack on “Fort Wilson” occurred in the wake of conflict over the Pennsylvania Constitution of 1776, ⇒ Read More

Forts and Fortifications

Constructed from the seventeenth through the mid-twentieth century, defensive fortifications along the lower Delaware River and bay guarded the region during times of international and sectional upheaval. As important structures with such long histories, forts help to explain the political, economic, and social history of the Greater Philadelphia region. The earliest fortifications in the lower ⇒ Read More

Free Black Communities

In the nineteenth century, Philadelphia and the region surrounding it came to contain free black communities that by most measures were the most vibrant, dynamic, and influential in the United States. Free African Americans relied on each other to confront the persistent power of slavery and white supremacy in Philadelphia and the region. At the ⇒ Read More

Freedom Train

On September 17, 1947, a seven-car train arrived in Philadelphia’s Broad Street Station carrying 130 articles of American history, including documents, prints, pictures, and flags, intended to represent this history’s most important legacy: freedom. After its launch in Philadelphia, the Freedom Train went on a 29,000-mile journey to three hundred communities throughout the United States, ⇒ Read More

French Revolution

The French Revolution of 1789 created political, social, and financial instability throughout Europe, prompting many terrified French aristocrats, businessmen, and intellectuals to flee to the United States. Philadelphia, with its cosmopolitan atmosphere, accessible port, and thriving commerce, attracted many of the French émigrés. Most settled along the Delaware River in the Mulberry district of Philadelphia ⇒ Read More

Fries Rebellion

In 1798, while Philadelphia served as capital of the United States, a new federal tax and the Alien and Sedition Acts sparked resistance in rural Bucks, Montgomery, and Northampton Counties of Pennsylvania. The reputed ringleader John Fries (1750-1818) was twice convicted of treason but received a presidential pardon. Beyond local disruption, the rebellion played a ⇒ Read More

Fugitives From Slavery

Immediately after passing the nation’s first gradual abolition law in 1780, Pennsylvania became a haven for fugitive slaves from neighboring states, putting the state at odds with slaveholders throughout the South and causing tension with Maryland in particular. Though New Jersey also attracted escaping slaves, and whites in both states had mixed reactions to the ⇒ Read More

Gayborhood

In the second half of the twentieth century, the Center City neighborhood that became known as the Gayborhood formed in the vicinity of Locust and Thirteenth Streets. The community and the geographical spaces it occupied played a vital role in the social and political struggles of LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) people locally and ⇒ Read More

General Trades Union Strike (1835)

The first general strike in the United States occurred in Philadelphia in 1835 when the short-lived General Trades’ Union (GTU) of the City and County of Philadelphia led a citywide general strike to demand a ten-hour workday. The successful action set a precedent followed by other labor organizations in the nation later in the nineteenth ⇒ Read More

Girard College

The history of Girard College, a boarding school for children from poor families headed by single parents or guardians, reflects the history of Philadelphia and the nation. Opened in 1848, Girard College was established under a bequest from wealthy philanthropist Stephen Girard (1750-1831), whose will specified a school for “poor white male orphans.” Girard College ⇒ Read More

Grand Federal Procession

Three hours long and a mile-and-a-half in length, the Grand Federal Procession was an ambitious act of political street theater, scripted by federalist supporters of the newly ratified U.S. Constitution and performed in the streets of Philadelphia on the Fourth of July 1788. From its commencement at Third and South Streets to its conclusion on ⇒ Read More

Greek War for Independence

During the Greek War for Independence (1821-28), when the Greeks of the Morea (Peloponessus) rose in rebellion after almost four centuries of Ottoman rule, Philadelphians helped to arouse public sentiment and sympathy in favor of the Greeks, raised money and provisions to aid the cause, and lobbied their representatives to recognize Hellenic independence. In Philadelphia ⇒ Read More

Haitian Revolution

The Haitian Revolution, the most successful slave revolt in the history of the modern world, caused large numbers of both blacks and whites to flee the Caribbean, with many relocating to the United States. In 1793 Philadelphia received hundreds of these refugees, including white slaveholders and their black slaves. Foreign policy decisions also were made ⇒ Read More

Independence Hall

Originally the Pennsylvania State House, this eighteenth-century landmark associated with the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution evolved from a workplace of government to a treasured shrine, tourist attraction, and World Heritage Site. Its history encompasses more than 275 years of struggles for freedom and public participation in creating, preserving, and debating the founding ⇒ Read More

Independence National Historical Park

Encompassing fifty-four acres in Center City Philadelphia, Independence National Historical Park preserves and provides access to Independence Hall, the Liberty Bell, and other sites associated with the American Revolution and early American history. Authorized by Congress in 1948 in response to lobbying by Philadelphians, creation of the park transformed an aging commercial district into a ⇒ Read More

Industrial Workers of the World

In the early 1900s thousands in greater Philadelphia belonged to the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW)—a militant, leftist labor union. Local 8, which organized the city’s longshoremen, was the largest and most powerful IWW branch in the Mid-Atlantic and the IWW’s most racially inclusive branch. Indeed, there might not have been a more egalitarian ⇒ Read More

Knights of Labor

The Knights of Labor, the first national industrial union in the United States, was founded in Philadelphia on December 9, 1869, by Uriah Stephens (1821-82) and eight other Philadelphia garment cutters. Intended to overcome the limitations of craft unions, the organization was designed to include all those who toiled with their hands. By mid-1886 nearly ⇒ Read More

Ladies Association of Philadelphia

Philadelphia was a center of patriotic fervor and activity during the American Revolution. Many of its residents, including women, participated in the war for independence by providing material and moral support for the “patriot” cause. On June 12, 1780, one such Philadelphian, Esther De Berdt Reed (1746-80), penned a broadside entitled “Sentiments of an American ⇒ Read More

Lafayette’s Tour

When the Marquis de Lafayette (1757-1834), a French hero of the American Revolution, returned to the United States in 1824-25, Philadelphians joined in a wave of nationwide affection for the nobleman who had volunteered for service in the Continental Army at the age of 19. Lafayette’s return to the region stirred increasing regard for preserving ⇒ Read More

Law and Lawyers

From its earliest days as an English colony, Pennsylvania needed lawyers to run the government, settle disputes, and keep the peace. As Philadelphia became a large city and important commercial, insurance, banking, and shipping center on the eve of the American Revolution, its lawyers were crucial to every civic endeavor, including the making of a ⇒ Read More

Liberty Bell

It is America’s most famous relic, a nearly sacred totem. Several million people each year make a pilgrimage to see it, many dabbing their eyes as they gaze at it intently. Around the world it is regarded as a universal symbol of freedom. It began inconspicuously as a two-thousand-pound mass of unstable metal; it nearly ⇒ Read More

Liberty County

City and state politicians representing Northeast Philadelphia, deeply unsettled by the shifting economy and demographic makeup of the city in the 1980s, proposed seceding to create “Liberty County,” a separate, suburban municipality to ostensibly address taxpayers’ demands for improved municipal services. The primary impetus for such a radical step, however, was reaction to Philadelphia’s first ⇒ Read More

Loyalists

During the American Revolution, Loyalists, or “Tories” as Patriots called them, included prominent Pennsylvania political and religious leaders as well as many less affluent individuals from the state’s Quaker and German pacifist communities. A large number of “neutrals” also struggled with increasing difficulty to remain uninvolved in the conflict. Religion, ethnicity, economic status, and local ⇒ Read More

Martin Luther King Jr. Day

Philadelphia has had a greater influence on Martin Luther King Jr. holiday traditions than any city other than King’s birthplace, Atlanta. Observed on the third Monday in January since 1986, the federal holiday commemorates King (1929-68) and his civil rights activism. Ceremonies at the Liberty Bell and a focus on community service are among Philadelphia’s ⇒ Read More

Mennonites

Philadelphia offered seventeenth-century Mennonite immigrants a gateway to the New World and their first permanent settlement in what would become the United States. Despite decades of migration to other parts of the country, Mennonites not only persisted in the city but also grew and diversified. By the early years of the twenty-first century, Mennonites in ⇒ Read More

Meschianza

On May 18, 1778, four hundred British officers and elite Philadelphians embarked on a regatta down the Delaware River. This aquatic procession kicked off the Meschianza, an extravagant fete to honor General William Howe (1729-1814) and his brother, Admiral Richard Howe (1726-99), on their departure from North America. General Howe’s army took control of Philadelphia ⇒ Read More

Militia

As the social and political center of colonial Pennsylvania, Philadelphia and the surrounding region served as a microcosm for the complex and often convoluted history of the colonial and early national militia. The role of Philadelphia militia also illustrates the nature of militia units during the American Revolutionary War. The first militia in the region ⇒ Read More

Modern Chivalry: Containing the Adventures of Captain John Farrago, and Teague O’Regan, his Servant

Modern Chivalry is a rich American novel, penned by the army chaplain, editor, Pennsylvania lawyer and judge, state legislator, and writer Hugh Henry Brackenridge (1748-1816), published in installments from 1792 to 1815. A social and political satire, it features two main characters, Captain John Farrago and his Irish servant, Teague O’Regan, who engage in humorous, ⇒ Read More

Mother Bethel AME Church:
Congregation and Community

Established in the crucible of the American revolutionary era, Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church is recognized as the genesis of black religious organizing spirit. The church is mother church of the African Methodist Episcopal denomination, formed in 1816. Located at Sixth and Lombard Streets in Philadelphia’s Society Hill neighborhood, the church sits on the ⇒ Read More

Murder of Octavius Catto

A tumultuous, racially polarized Election Day in Philadelphia set the stage for the October 10, 1871, murder and martyrdom of Octavius V. Catto (b. 1839), an African American leader who struggled against segregation and discrimination in transportation, sports, politics, and society. Election Day in 1871, just one year after the Fifteenth Amendment to the U.S. ⇒ Read More

National Freedom Day

Created in 1942 by a Philadelphian born in slavery, the annual National Freedom Day commemoration each February 1 calls attention to the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which ended slavery, and the continuing struggle for African American justice and equality. National Freedom Day began in the early months of U.S. involvement in World ⇒ Read More

National Negro Convention Movement

During the antebellum period, when Philadelphia was home to one the North’s largest free African American communities, the city’s black leaders launched the National Negro Convention Movement to address the hostility, discrimination, exclusion, and violence against African Americans by whites in northern cities. As national forums, the National Negro Conventions held from 1830 to 1864 ⇒ Read More

Nativism

While Philadelphia has not been alone in experiencing sharp undercurrents of nativism, virulent rhetoric and periodic waves of violence aimed at the foreign-born have often wracked the city. Clashes between nativists and immigrants between the 1720s and the 1920s helped to set the boundaries of the city as well as define the limits of American ⇒ Read More

Pacific World (Connections and Impact)

Historians have often situated Philadelphia in three geographic contexts: on the western edge of the “Atlantic World” during the colonial era, as an eastern metropole for hinterlands and the receding frontier to the west, and in the mid-Atlantic region between the North and South of the United States. These geographic frames all make sense, given ⇒ Read More

Pennhurst State School and Hospital

During eight decades of continuous operation (1908-87), Pennhurst evolved from a model facility into the subject of tremendous public scandal and controversy before the federal courts ordered it closed and the remaining residents moved elsewhere. Twenty years after its closure, the Pennhurst campus was recognized as an International Site of Conscience and its history became ⇒ Read More

Pennsylvania Charter of Privileges

The Charter of Privileges, effective October 28, 1701, and sometimes known as the Charter of Liberties, functioned as Pennsylvania’s constitution until the American Revolution. It replaced several attempts since the colony’s 1681 establishment to create a viable frame of government. Among the more permissive of colonial constitutions in British North America, the document guaranteed religious ⇒ Read More

Pennsylvania Emancipation Exposition (1913)

Held in 1913 in South Philadelphia, the Pennsylvania Emancipation Exposition marked the fiftieth anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation with events and exhibits celebrating African American progress. At a time when the African American population in Philadelphia was growing and gaining in political influence, the event’s organizers also experienced a backlash of criticism as they secured ⇒ Read More

Philadelphia (Warship)

Inspired by patriotic fervor during the Quasi-War with France, the people of Philadelphia raised money in one week during June 1798 to build the USS Philadelphia to help increase American naval power to protect commerce. Completed in 1799, the Philadelphia served in both the West Indies and the Mediterranean Sea, where it was captured in ⇒ Read More

Philadelphia Campaign

During the War for Independence, in 1777, the British moved to seize Philadelphia in a series of battles that contributed to a turning point in the war. While the Philadelphia campaign strained British resources and exposed serious leadership issues with General Sir William Howe (1729-1814), the effectiveness of American forces led by General George Washington (1732-99) ⇒ Read More

Philadelphia Lawyer

The term Philadelphia lawyer originated in the eighteenth century as a description of members of the Philadelphia bar, then widely considered the best trained in the American colonies and exceptionally skilled in the law and rhetoric. By the twentieth century the term had taken on a less flattering secondary meaning, to denote a clever attorney ⇒ Read More

Philadelphia Plan

Even as it underwent a painful process of economic restructuring in the years after World War II, Philadelphia garnered national attention from efforts to integrate historically white building trades. Dubbed the “Philadelphia Plan,” the program requiring federal contractors to practice nondiscrimination in hiring tested the liberal coalition formed in the aftermath of the New Deal ⇒ Read More

Philadelphia Transportation Company (PTC) Strike

The Philadelphia Transportation Company (PTC) strike, a five-day stoppage of the city’s mass transit system during World War II, resulted from longstanding racial animosities. Preceded by years of protest and ending only after the dispatching of federal troops, the strike exposed the dangers of workplace discrimination while threatening the material output of the nation’s third-largest ⇒ Read More

Political Parties (Origins, 1790s)

Philadelphia, long considered the “cradle of liberty” in America, was also the “cradle of political parties” that emerged in American politics during the 1790s, when the city was also the fledgling nation’s capital. A decade that began with the unanimously-chosen George Washington (1732-99) as the first President of the United States ended with partisan rancor, ⇒ Read More

Presidents of the United States (Presence in Region)

Presidents of the United States, seeing Philadelphia as the city most connected to American independence, often have turned to the city and region to campaign, advance their agendas, and commemorate the past. In the city where the nation’s first two presidents established the executive branch of government, presidential legacies have spurred commemoration as well as ⇒ Read More

Price of a Child (The)

Based on the life of Jane Johnson (c. 1814-22 to 1872) and her escape from slavery, the historical novel The Price of a Child (1995) by Philadelphia writer Lorene Cary (b. 1956) tells the tale of a freedwoman’s journey from bondage to freedom and describes the lives of freed African Americans in 1850s Philadelphia. The ⇒ Read More

Privateering

As one of the largest British ports in North America, during the eighteenth century Philadelphia held a prominent place in privateering, the practice of privately financed warships attacking enemy shipping during wartime. These vessels, either converted merchant vessels or purpose-built commerce raiders, were often investments of wealthy or enterprising merchants. In order to operate legally, ⇒ Read More

Reminder Days

On July 4, 1965, thirty-nine individuals gathered outside Independence Hall to picket for homosexual rights. This event, one of the earliest organized homosexual rights demonstrations in the United States, sought to remind the public that basic rights of citizenship were being denied to homosexual individuals. Reprised each year through 1969, the year of the Stonewall ⇒ Read More

Revolutionary Crisis (American Revolution)

The Stamp Act of 1765, the first direct tax ever imposed by the British government on colonial Americans, inadvertently provoked a ten-year clash of wills between Britain and the colonies that led to the American Revolutionary War. During this Revolutionary Crisis period (1765-75), colonists resisted imperial taxes and other Parliamentary innovations with protests and with ⇒ Read More

Scots Irish (Scotch Irish)

Pennsylvania’s Scots Irish, a hybrid people of Scots and Irish ancestry, were the most numerically predominant group within an Irish diaspora migration that brought between 250,000 and 500,000 Irish immigrants (most of them Protestants from Ulster and predominately Presbyterians) to America between 1700 and 1820. Philadelphia was one of their principal destinations. As the prototypical ⇒ Read More

Sesquicentennial International Exposition (1926)

In 1926, Philadelphia hosted the Sesquicentennial International Exposition, a world’s fair, to commemorate the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Although it opened to great fanfare, the exposition failed to attract enough visitors to cover its costs. The fair organization went into receivership in 1927 and its assets ⇒ Read More

Seven Years’ War

Philadelphia and the surrounding area played a significant role in the Seven Years’ War (1756-63), also known as the French and Indian War and the Great War for Empire. Beginning in North America and spreading to Europe, India, and the West Indies, the war was a struggle for colonial dominance between France and Great Britain ⇒ Read More

Slavery and the Slave Trade

Slavery and the slave trade were central to the history of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Philadelphia as the region economically benefited from the institution and dealt with tensions created by slave trading, slave holding, and abolitionism. Early Philadelphia, an Atlantic trading hub, became both a focal point for the slave trade and a community of enslaved ⇒ Read More

Spanish-American Revolutions

As a port with longstanding commercial, cultural, and political connections with Spanish America, Philadelphia played a significant role in the era of Spanish-American revolutions in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. The City of Brotherly Love welcomed individuals escaping Spanish domination and helped to support their ideas about liberty, equality and independence. Philadelphia’s ⇒ Read More

Sullivan Principles

The Global Sullivan Principles, launched in 1977 by Philadelphia civil rights leader Leon H. Sullivan (1922-2001), represent one of the twentieth century’s most powerful attempts to effect social justice through economic leverage. More a sustained movement than a static document, the principles sought to bring the power of American investment in South Africa to bear ⇒ Read More

Tourism

Philadelphia has been a tourist destination since leisure travel emerged as a common pastime for the middle and upper classes in the nineteenth century. By the twenty-first century, the region’s economy depended heavily on tourism to Philadelphia and nearby destinations such as the Brandywine Valley, Valley Forge, and the Jersey and Delaware shores. Historic sites ⇒ Read More

Trade Unions (1820s and 1830s)

As industrialization began changing the nature of work and society in the United States during the 1820s and 1830s, workers concerned with their low wages, long hours, and the growing power of employers organized to fight for what they believed to be the true ideals of the republic. During this period, Philadelphia workers organized trade ⇒ Read More

Trenton and Princeton Campaign (Washington’s Crossing)

One of the most significant events in the Revolutionary War was the Continental Army’s December 25, 1776, crossing of the Delaware River, led by General George Washington (1732-99), which preceded three crucial American victories—two at Trenton and one at Princeton, New Jersey—that reignited the virtually extinguished Patriot cause. Immortalized in the famous 1851 painting by ⇒ Read More

U.S. Congress (1790-1800)

During the 1790s, while Philadelphia served as the nation’s temporary capital, the U.S. Congress met problems and threats to the nation that tested the endurance of the Constitution and the republic it framed. Domestic issues of finance, taxation, sectionalism, Indian affairs, and slavery divided the delegates into bitter political camps, and international relations fomented disagreements ⇒ Read More

U.S. Presidency (1790-1800)

Although the federal government under the U.S. Constitution went into operation in New York City in April 1789, the capital moved to Philadelphia late in 1790 and remained until 1800. This decade encompassed formative years for the U.S. presidency, including nearly seven years of the administration of George Washington (1732-99) and more than three years ⇒ Read More

United States Colored Troops

During the American Civil War (1861-65), Philadelphians raised eleven regiments of the United States Colored Troops (USCT). This division of the United States Army, consisting of black soldiers led by white officers, provided much-needed manpower for federal forces in the final two years of the war. When the Civil War began, many African Americans across ⇒ Read More

Vagrancy

Vagrancy, generally defined as the act of continuous geographical movement by the poor, often has been interpreted to signify idleness, unemployment, and homelessness. Since the colonial era, it has been a driving social concern in the Mid-Atlantic region, where urban centers, including Philadelphia, attracted poor migrants seeking new economic prospects. Laws created to aid them ⇒ Read More

Valley Forge

In 1777 the Continental Army, unable to prevent the British forces from taking Philadelphia, retreated to Valley Forge for the winter of 1777-78. Selected for its strategic location between Philadelphia and York, along the Schuylkill River, Valley Forge had natural defensive positions, access to water, enough land to support the army, and was far enough ⇒ Read More

Veterans and Veterans’ Organizations

Military veterans began organizing in the Philadelphia area during the waning days of the Revolutionary War. As the Continental Army disbanded, its veterans often met at City Tavern and the first general meeting of America’s first veterans’ organization, the General Society of the Cincinnati, occurred there on May 4, 1784. Just as regularly, however, veterans ⇒ Read More

Vigilance Committees

As Pennsylvania and other northern states became havens for enslaved people who sought to escape bondage, free blacks and sympathetic whites organized Vigilance Associations, which operated Vigilance Committees (sometimes called Vigilant Committees) to protect fugitives and potential kidnap victims. After black abolitionist David Ruggles (1810-49) formed the first such organization in New York City in ⇒ Read More

Whig Party

The Whig Party thrived in the Philadelphia region from its founding in 1834 through its demise twenty years later. The party, which emerged from the National Republicans in opposition to Andrew Jackson (1767-1845) and his Democratic Party, claimed the Whig name from the patriots of the American Revolution. Whigs controlled Philadelphia government through electoral victories ⇒ Read More

Whiskey Rebellion Trials

The first two convictions of Americans for federal treason in United States history occurred in Philadelphia in the aftermath of the Whiskey Rebellion, an uprising against the federal excise tax on whiskey that took place primarily in western Pennsylvania in 1791-94. Philadelphia served as the nation’s capital during this period and therefore was the city ⇒ Read More

Woman Suffrage

While the Philadelphia region often led the way on progressive reforms, by the twentieth century, woman suffrage was not among them. The region boasted a number of early woman suffrage advocates, and women in New Jersey had the right to vote during the early years of the republic, but by the late nineteenth century, Pennsylvania ⇒ Read More

Gallery: Freedom, Revolutions, and Social Justice

Place and Symbol: Place and Symbol

Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia (Explore in Independence Hall and Liberty Bell).
London Coffee House: London Coffee House

Library Company of Philadelphia (Explore in Slavery and the Slave Trade).
Alice of Dunk’s Ferry: Alice of Dunk’s Ferry

Library Company of Philadelphia (Explore in Slavery and the Slave Trade).
Congress Voting Independence: Congress Voting Independence

Historical Society of Pennsylvania (Explore in Continental Congresses and Declaration of Independence).
Election Day 1815: Election Day 1815

Historical Society of Pennsylvania (Explore in Independence Hall).
Lucretia Mott: Lucretia Mott

Library of Congress (Explore in Abolitionism).
Silent No More: The Justice Bell: Silent No More: The Justice Bell

Historical Society of Pennsylvania (Explore in Liberty Bell).
Demonstrators, 1966: Demonstrators, 1966

Special Collections Research Center, Temple University Libraries (Explore in Girard College).
Parading for the Constitution, 1987: Parading for the Constitution, 1987

PhillyHistory.org (Explore in Constitution Commemorations).

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Timeline: Freedom, Revolutions, and Social Justice

Colonial Era: Colonial Era

1681: William Penn receives land grant for Pennsylvania; envisions a haven for Quakers and others seeking religious tolerance. Rights to vote and hold office limited to Protestants.

1684: First slave ship arrives in Philadelphia; labor also provided by indentured servants.

1701: Penn issues first Charter for Philadelphia, establishing civil government.

1751: Pennsylvania Assembly orders a bell for the State House with inscription from Leviticus 25:10: “Proclaim LIBERTY throughout all the Land unto all the inhabitants thereof.”

Image credit: Library Company of Philadelphia
American Revolution: American Revolution

1774: First Continental Congress meets in Carpenters’ Hall.

1775-81: Second Continental Congress meets in Pennsylvania State House (Independence Hall); declares independence from Great Britain (1776).

1776: First Pennsylvania Constitution, most radically democratic in nation, drafted in the State House (Independence Hall).

1780: Pennsylvania Assembly approves nation’s first gradual abolition law.

1787: U.S. Constitution drafted in the State House (Independence Hall).

Image credit: Historical Society of Pennsylvania
Capital of the United States: Capital of the United States

1790: Philadelphia becomes Capital of the United States for a ten-year period. While meeting in the County Court House (Congress Hall), U.S. Congress passes a Fugitive Slave Act (1793) and the Alien and Sedition Acts (1798).

1790s: Philadelphia attracts refugees and exiles from the Haitian Revolution, French Revolution, and Spanish-American revolutions.

1796: Oney Judge, slave and personal servant to Martha Washington, escapes from the President’s House.

Image credit: Library of Congress
Nineteenth Century Before 1854: Nineteenth Century Before 1854

1830: First National Negro Convention held in Philadelphia.

1830s: Boston abolitionists adopt the Old State House (Independence Hall) bell as a symbol, naming it “The Liberty Bell.”

1820s-30s: Workingmen’s demonstrations take place in Independence Square.

1830s-50s: Fates of accused fugitive slaves are decided by courts in the Old State House; apprentices sue masters for freedom.

1838: Pennsylvania Hall, dedicated to free speech, attacked and burned during Anti-Slavery Convention of American Women.

Image credit: Historical Society of Pennsylvania
Nineteenth Century After 1854: Nineteenth Century After 1854

1867: Philadelphia streetcars desegregated.

1871: Civil rights activist Octavius Catto killed during Election Day violence.

1876: Centennial of Declaration of Independence; Susan B. Anthony calls for women’s rights July 4 at Independence Hall.

1882: Indian Rights Association founded in Philadelphia.

1885: Liberty Bell exhibited in New Orleans; first of seven tours and exhibitions away from Philadelphia, 1885-1915.

1887: Centennial of U.S. Constitution (shown here).

1890s: Cuban Revolutionary Party clubs formed by Cuban cigar-makers working in Philadelphia.

Image credit: Historical Society of Pennsylvania
Twentieth Century Before 1945: Twentieth Century Before 1945

1913: Pennsylvania Emancipation Exposition in South Philadelphia marks fiftieth anniversary of Emancipation Proclamation.

1914-18: Liberty Bell used as symbol to generating patriotism during World War I.

1915-20: Justice Bell, copy of Liberty Bell, used in campaign for women’s suffrage.

1926: Sesquicentennial of Declaration of Independence (shown here).

1937: Sesquicentennial of U.S. Constitution.

1942: National Freedom Day created in Philadelphia to mark Thirteenth Amendment to U.S. Constitution (ending slavery).

Image credit: PhillyHistory.org
Twentieth Century After 1945: Twentieth Century After 1945

1948: Congress authorizes creation of Independence National Historical Park.

1951: Human Relations Commission established to enforce civil rights laws.

1953-68: Campaign to desegregate Girard College (shown here) culminates in victory with Supreme Court decision.

1965: Sit-ins at Dewey’s restaurant near Rittenhouse Square protest refusal of service to homosexuals.

1965-69: Gay rights demonstrations held each Fourth of July at Independence Hall.

1976: Bicentennial of Declaration of Independence.

1987: Bicentennial of U.S. Constitution.

Image credit: Temple University Libraries
Twenty-First Century: Twenty-First Century

2000: National Constitution Center opens.

2003: Liberty Bell Center opens.

2010: “The President’s House: Freedom and Slavery in the Making of a New Nation” (shown here, in foreground) opens in response to public demand for acknowledging slavery in the President’s House during the 1790s.

Image credit: Visit Philadelphia

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Map: Freedom, Revolutions, and Social Justice

Links & Related Reading: Freedom, Revolutions, and Social Justice

Collections

Independence National Historical Park Library and Archives, Merchants Exchange Building, 143 S. Third Street, Philadelphia.

Friends Historical Library, Swarthmore College, “Quakers and Slavery” online exhibition.

National Archives, The Charters of Freedom online exhibition.

Urban Archives, Temple University, “Civil Rights in a Northern City, Philadelphia” digital archive.