“Sweet Land of Liberty”

Since its foundation and even before, the notion of freedom (or liberty — the two will be regarded as for all intents and purposes synonymous here) has been a crucial one in the ideology of Americans¹.

• At least in the mythology surrounding the British colonization of the New World in the seventeenth century, one of the factors that drove early settlers to the continent was the desire for religious freedom: the Pilgrims, and others like them, left their friends and family behind to go to an entirely new world, weeks away at best from the familiar surroundings of Europe, in order to escape being persecuted by public authorities for their religious practices and beliefs.
• Similarly, the movement for independence in the 1770s grew out of a conviction that the rights and liberties of the colonists were infringed, indeed betrayed, by the imperial government of the King and Parliament in Westminster.
• The question of whether the institution of slavery should be maintained or abolished was of course debated in terms of freedom, as were the issues of expanding the suffrage for men, of various rights for women, of temperance (freedom from the slavery of alcoholism), as well as other reform movements in the nineteenth century.
• US involvement in the two world wars of the twentieth century was justified in terms of defending freedom abroad; the arguments for the civil rights movement in the 1960s were also often couched in the language of freedom.
• Most recently, when the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon were attacked, on September 11, 2001, President George W. Bush addressed the nation later in the day saying, "Today, our fellow citizens, our way of life, our very freedom came under attack in a series of deliberate and deadly terrorist acts." The next day, September 12, he said, "Freedom and democracy are under attack." Though he did not make explicit the nature of the freedom that he had in mind², what he said unquestionably struck a responsive chord among Americans. The military code-names for the invasions, first of Afghanistan, "Operation Enduring Freedom", then of Iraq, "Operation Iraqi Freedom", also referred to the notion of freedom.

The importance of the notion of freedom in US political discourse since independence and before would unquestionably warrant a lecture course on the topic in itself, as Eric Foner's book more than amply demonstrates. However it was President Bush's use of the term that first prompted my decision to inquire further into the topic. I suppose I should here acknowledge my debt to him for the interesting facts and interpretations I have thus been able to find out about...

The expression "sweet land of liberty" is obviously intended as a reference to the United States and also serves as a link with the other major theme of the course: music, especially vocal music, and its connections with freedom. The expression is the second line of one of the best known patriotic songs, learned by school-children since the early nineteenth century, when it was written. [More about the song here.]

Music has been an expression of liberty or a celebration of liberty for as long as liberty has been such an important feature of American political and civilian life. Songs sung by slaves before emancipation and abolition, like the jazz and blues that grew out of the slaves' music, are simultaneously demands for liberty and escapes from the constraints and bonds of everyday life. As such, they contribute to expanding freedom.

¹I use the term "American" for want of a better: strictly speaking, an American is any inhabitant of the American continents, including Mexicans, Canadians, Paraguayans and Brazilians, as well as inhabitants of the United States, but there is no adjective that usefully designates inhabitants of the United States.

²One issue worthy of discussion is what might be called the "grammatical complement" to the word "freedom": "freedom of what?", "freedom to do what?" and "freedom from what?".