Week 2.  New World Revolutionaries

1: Origins of American Political Radicalism:

1) British “salutary neglect” in the colonies: imperial authority largely limited to trade regulation and enforced inefficiently; royal administrators lack power base.

2) Britain fails to impose direct control: collapse of Andros’ Dominion of New England and Leisler’s Rebellion in New York during Glorious Revolution.

3) Royal and proprietary governors lack effective power or reliable patronage networks.

4) Local assemblies assume direct control over taxation and evolve a uniquely “American” notion of direct, local self-government.

5) Parliamentary authority remote: no direct British taxation of the colonies; trade regulation only real source of revenue.

6) Deferential politics tempered by emergence of  relatively widespread suffrage and political participation

7) A distinctive “British America” takes shape from earlier scattered settlements (despite rejection of Franklin’s plan for colonial union at 1754 Albany Congress).

8) Radical political ideas from European and classical sources spread through the colonies.

2: Intellectual and Religious Trends:

1) Americans adapt Enlightenment ideas about self-government and arbitrary power.

2) American political leaders and writers absorb 18^th century skepticism about human nature and reason; uneasy about republican or democratic government.

3) Decline of 17^th century piety: existence of many diverse sects makes religious toleration a practical necessity and reality.

4) General schooling emerges as the means to create literate believers.

5) Scattering of population and settlements loosens ties with organized religion; nascent separation of church and state.

6) Religious revivals (the Great Awakening) reflect anxiety over new secularization.

7) Emergence of a secular culture and a growing, prosperous and influential  middle class.

3: The Imperial Crisis:

1) British victory (1763) in Seven Year’s War: need for revenue to recover war expenses, offset the costs of trade regulation and govern new territories won from France leads to new colonial policy.

2) Royal governor of Massachusetts, Francis Bernard, urges complete reorganization and centralization of British colonial administration.

3) Parliament imposes direct taxes on the colonies; Americans insist taxation a local prerogative; reject Parliament’s right to tax without representation.

4) Sugar Act (1764): absentee tax officials ordered to colonies; violators to be tried in British naval courts, enumerated cargo lists required at all American ports.

5) Stamp Act Congress (1765) and boycott of English goods affirms new colonial unity.

6) Townshend Acts and British crackdown; standing army leads to Boston Massacre.

7) Even after the Boston Tea Party, the Coercive Acts, Lexington and Concord and the First and Second Continental Congresses, the divided colonies reluctantly repudiate the Crown in 1776; impact of Tom Paine’s Common Sense on the Declaration of Independence.

8) Military and political outcome of the Revolution very much in doubt.

4: The Revolutionary War:

1) British attempts to subdue Americans by force create deep political divisions in England.

2) War erupts into full-scale conflict between European powers.

3) Many loyalists fight with the British (perhaps 1/3 of population); eventual persecution and expulsion of loyalists.

4) Native American tribes remain neutral or side with England in effort to limit colonial land claims.

5) Impact of the Revolution on slavery: blacks in North generally side with patriot cause in hopes of gaining freedom; in South, some 50,000 slaves fight for Britain in response to Virginia Governor Dunmore’s offer of freedom.

6) Anti-slavery societies founded in North; most southern states ban importation of slaves.

7) Women active in American cause; rhetoric of liberty spurs new demands for women’s rights and education.

8) French intervention critical to American victory; vital issues left unresolved: American colonial debts, compensation to loyalists, American rights on the high seas and presence of British troops in Northwest.

5: Codifying Liberty: Writing the State Constitutions:

1) 1777-1781: states codify political and legal experience of colonial era in state constitutions; states declared sovereign in all matters.

2) State constitutions embody permanent principles of government; declared superior to ordinary laws enacted by state legislatures.

3) Critical distinction established between a government and a constitution: “government of laws not of men.”

4) Complex amendment procedures adopted to discourage frivolous tinkering. 

5) Executive power curtailed: all states eliminate executive veto power, independent appointments and power to dissolve legislature; 11 states give governors one year term without reelection.

6) All states abolish plural office holding; only Virginia adopts complete separation of church and state.

7) Representation to expand automatically with population—free of executive manipulation.

8) Seven states include a bill of rights to protect the permanent rights of the people against usurpation by government.

9) Massachusetts constitution declares all men equal and courts soon abolish slavery.