December 7, 2023

In 21st-century America, the music of Christmas represents peace, joy, and hope and has become a genre of its very own. My cousin, the psychiatrist Theodore Branfman, theorized that “Christmas time is filled with nostalgia, and we long to feel the ‘Christmas magic’ that excited us as children.” (Branfman, T. The psychology of sentimentality. Psych Quar 28, 624–634 1954).

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If we combine this belief with the words of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, “Music is the universal language of mankind,” we can understand our delight when hearing the harmonious acappella of Christmas Carols at our doorsteps.

But contrary to common thought, Christmas in America was not always something to sing about.

The Pilgrims forbid any observance of Christmas—too much debauchery and promiscuity. Even after America’s independence, celebrations continued to be discouraged. Until the early 19th Century, Christmas was a raucous carnival, dreaded by the “upper class” and anticipated with trepidation by local authorities. Public celebrations were outlawed in Boston, and anyone exhibiting the Christmas spirit was fined five shillings.

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In 1806, New York City’s Christmas Riots resulted “in-the-line-of-duty” death of public servant Christian Luswanger. In 1828, Gotham City’s Yuletide riots were so violent that New York City’s first paid professional police force was founded partially because of these heated hooligans.

There are complex sociopolitical theories for this oft-forgotten, post-pilgrim, pre-Grinch glitch in Christmas history, but most attribute its ill reputation to wintry weather, high unemployment, and class conflict.

Image by AI.

Then America boomed. The transcontinental railroad premiered, and Andrew Carnegie established our nation’s first steel mills. Rockefeller made energy affordable. Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Edison appeared on the scene. They introduced more than inventions; they pioneered a new American passion: Philanthropy.

As much as they competed to see who could amass the most, they also raced to see who could give the most away. Carnegie gave away more than 350 million dollars. Rockefeller? A whopping five hundred million. Translated into today’s market, this is well over one hundred billion dollars. We became both the envy and the pride of the planet.

By the late 19th century, fourteen million immigrants descended upon the land of opportunity—not to take advantage but to benefit from American liberties. As America’s melting pot simmered, Christmas was embraced like never before.

On June 26, 1870, Congress declared “the twenty-fifth day of December, commonly called Christmas Day,” a national holiday by an act of Congress. Although Jesus was born in the springtime, a fourth-century prophetic marketing decision by Emperor Constantine predicted that more people would embrace Christmas if it coincided with and then replaced prior pagan celebrations. Genius!