Hail Columbia! – Forgotten History of the Republic

It is both amazing and troubling to me that in the relatively short span of seventy-eight years, a important piece of American history can be almost wholly wiped from the minds of the populous. Perhaps it is no coincidence that as America took its first giant lurch towards becoming a socialist democracy with the then largest government intrusion to date in 1931, that the intrinsic ideals of inherent liberty and federalism, ergo Columbia would be legislatively and culturally  removed from the public consciousness.

Columbia began solely as the poetic name ascribed to the United States of America following the Latin neologic tradition of combining a surname, i.e. Columbus and -ia commonly meaning “land of “. In time, Columbia began to be used by the Founding Generation as an allegorical embodiment of the principles of the American Revolution after a native African female slave, named Phillis Wheatley, wrote a poetic tribute to George Washington, on October 26th, 1775.¹

By the conclusion of the Constitutional Convention held in Philadelphia, Columbia had become the national personification of the newly birthed American Republic.

For George Washington’s inauguration in 1789, Phillip Phile composed and Joseph Hopkins wrote a piece originally entitled “The President’s March”. This song which was later called “Hail Columbia” was our de facto national anthem until 1931 when it was replaced by an act of Congress, with the “Star Spangled Banner”. A modified version of the song is still in use and is played to announce the arrival of the Vice-President.

For One Hundred and Forty-two years, her allegorical representation appeared everywhere, from money to pamphlets, to monuments to national expositions, to political cartoons; Columbia and what she represented was an ingrained part of the American psyche. The Founding Generation was so dedicated to securing the principles of the Revolution and federalism, that they named the land surrounding the national capitol, the Territory of Columbia in her honor and as a reflection of these ideals. Moreover, the chief architect and Founding Fathers involved with the planning and design of the new capitol also believed that the citizens who lived and worked within the Territory should be so dedicated to upholding these ideals and service to the Republic, that they prohibited residents from voting for their own self interest, and thus purposefully withheld a voice in Congress.

Columbia has gone by many names, from the Statue of the Republic, during the 1898  Columbian Exposition in Chicago, to the Statue of Freedom, which sits atop the Capitol building and faces directly towards the Washington Monument.

Yet once the nation fell into the Great Depression thanks to the money manipulators from the FEDERAL RESERVE and the incompetent government meddling into the economy started by President Hoover and expanded by President Roosevelt, Columbia and her pull yourself up by your bootstraps, live free and independent mantra was pushed aside. Superseding her place, is the scraggly unscrupulous looking figure named “Uncle Sam”; who reminds us to pay our taxes to the King and urges our men and women to enlist in order to be sent off to die in pursuit of Neo-America’s Imperial foreign policy.

It is my wish that one day, the sunshine of Liberty and the ideals embodied within Columbia, may wash back over the shores of our beloved Republic.

Source(s): ¹The New England Historical and Genealogical Register By Henry Fritz-Gilbert Waters, New England Historic Genealogical Society, page 310