A 1774 meeting on Portland’s ‘Great Hill’ should inform America’s struggle today | Opinion
As Portland’s streets fill with families grilling and the Eastern Prom prepares for its annual fireworks display, a quiet hill overlooking Casco Bay holds a story that shaped the nation’s birth.
In July 1774, two lawyers who had grown up together climbed the steep slope of what is now Munjoy Hill — then called the Great Hill — seeking a moment away from the bustling courthouse in Falmouth. One was John Adams, recently chosen as a delegate to the First Continental Congress; the other was Jonathan Sewall, the king’s attorney general for Massachusetts and Adams’ closest friend.
The men strolled along the open summit, gazing at the Calendar Islands and the Atlantic beyond. Sewall, a loyalist devoted to the Crown, used the walk to urge Adams to stay clear of the upcoming congress. He warned that the assembly was tantamount to treason, reminded his friend of Britain’s overwhelming military power, and warned that opposing the king could mean a trip to the gallows. His aim was simple: to spare Adams from ruin.
Adams listened to the man he trusted most. As Sewall laid out the dangers, any lingering hope for a compromise evaporated. Adams later recalled that the conversation forced him to see that his duty lay with the colonial cause, even if it meant risking his life. He answered Sewall with a line that has echoed through history:
“I know Great Britain is determined on her system, and that very determination, determines me on mine … The die is now cast; I had passed the Rubicon; swim or sink, live or die, survive or perish with my country, was my unalterable determination.”
When the talk ended, Adams turned to his friend and said,
“This adieu is the sharpest thorn on which I ever set my foot.”
The two walked down the hill, went their separate ways, and did not speak again for fourteen years. Just over a year after that painful parting, British ships entered the harbor and burned Falmouth to the ground — a grim reminder that the rupture of friendship on the hill foreshadowed the war to come.
Historians point to that exchange as a vivid illustration that independence was not forged by easy agreement but by stark, personal choices. The episode shows how the revolutionary spirit emerged from individuals who chose principle over safety, even when it meant losing the people they loved most.
Today, the lesson feels freshly relevant. A recent Pew Research Center poll found that nearly one‑third of Americans believe an authoritarian leader who can bypass Congress and the courts would be a good way to govern. That figure mirrors the temptation Sewall represented — trading the messy work of self‑rule for the illusion of order under a strong hand.
The story of Munjoy Hill urges citizens to treat July 4 not as a day of passive celebration but as a reminder that democracy survives only when each person defends it actively, even when the cost is personal. As the fireworks fade over Portland Harbor, the echo of Adams’ resolve — “swim or sink” with his country — offers a quiet call to safeguard the fragile experiment he helped launch.
Sam Spencer, CEO of CEI‑Boulos Capital Management and former White House staff member under President Clinton, contributed to this report.
