The Origins of the American Revolution - Essay Example

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 2007 The American Revolution The last decades of the 18th century witnessed several events that dramatically changed the political, social, and cultural image of the world. The American Revolution represented arguably the most important of them. A wide range of intellectual and social transformation that occurred in the former British colony not only gave birth to the new nations, but also became a material symbol of the utopian Enlightenment belief in the world of liberty, equality and justice. The great influence of that event on the history of Europe and both Americas makes the American Revolution one of the most interesting fields of historical inquiry. The Origins of the Revolution The American Revolution was a unique event in the great cycle of bourgeois revolutions that occurred in Europe and Americas during the 17th - 18th centuries. Struggle with the external enemy - the British Empire - accompanied by deep domestic transformations led to emergence of the first democratic republic of the new historic epoch. Although some residuals of the colonial past continued to persist (for example, slavery, structure of the local governments, etc) the newly born stat embodied the political ideals of the Enlightenment. However, struggle with the 'old order' which characterised the European revolutions of that period was not characteristic of the American Revolution. Perhaps the major reason for this was that the American Revolution took place in an absolutely new country without almost any history, while, for example, the French Revolution occurred in one of the eldest European states. Consequently, the participants of the American Revolution did not have to overthrow the established aristocratic society and absolute monarchy in order to proclaim either equality of people (because they were equal) or sovereignty of their new state (the British monarch was geographically too far from them). In other words, the birth of the new society in the United States occurred without major tension though the American Revolution pursued the same principles of the natural human rights the French Revolution did leaving the disgraceful legacy of terror and violence equalled by no other event of that period. Despite certain disagreement between scholars as for the causes and preconditions of the American Revolution (Nash, 2005) the assertion that the major causes were similar to those of European bourgeois revolutions seems to be correct. The American Revolution was largely caused by the economic pressure of Britain, which was economically dependent on the colonies. The decision to raise taxation on the American colonies (the Stamp Act of 1765) was largely made due to serious expenses suffered by the Empire in the Seven Year War with France. However, the raise itself did not represent a serious problem for the colonists whom paid lower taxes than citizens of Britain. The key issue was that the colonies had not been preliminary consulted about the new taxes, as they had no representation in Parliament: in other words, the Empire failed to adequately justify the new though not too heavy burden of taxes. This problem - often termed 'taxation without representation' - is reported to be one of the most essential factors that eventually led to the revolutionary situation (Wood 1998). Strong protest from the colonies forced the British to repeal the raise in 1766 (McKay, Hill & Buckler, 2005). Some scholars believe that the great deal of independence historically exercised by American colonists also played a role in the onset of the American Revolution. Absence of the stable system of hereditary class system was one important element of this independence. From this perspective the problem of representation was only a pretext as the colonists were no less represented than inhabitants of British Islands: the colonists strongly believed that their status gave them the right to make their own laws (McKay, Hill & Buckler, 2005). Evidently, such point of view implies that the American Revolution should be perceived not as a bourgeois revolution which sought to realise the ideals of Enlightenment but as a colonial war for independence. Although this point of view does have the right to exist it seems too controversial and unjustified to be perceived as the dominant one. The Outbreak and the Course Political and economic instability caused by the Sugar Act, the Stamp Act, and the Townshend Acts coupled with the presence of British soldiers in Boston and New York contributed to increasing tensions between the colonists and the British troops. The tension peaked on March 5, 1770 when a group of British soldiers shot five colonists during a public protest action against the Townshend Acts and the excessive presence of British troops in Boston and New York. The soldiers, struck by snow and ice balls thrown by the crowd, fired into the colonists killing five and wounding half a dozen people (Zobel, 1970). The Boston Massacre is considered the turning point in political and social developments of those days. On the one hand, it made many colonists realize that the monopoly would readily resort to violence in the confrontation with the colonies; on the other hand, the anti-British opposition adopted more radical vision of the future relations with the monopoly. Although the American Revolution broke out only five years after the incident, the Boston Massacre is reasonably believed to play highly important role in setting up the stage for it (Zobel, 1970). Consequently, the radical ideas of Thomas Paine, expressed in the bestselling Common Sense, and the Declaration of Independence, written by Thomas Jefferson and passed by the Second Continental Congress (1776) further reinforced the public opinion in favour of independence. As a result, the independence movement gradually gained serious support from all layers of the colonists though many Americans still remained loyal to Britain (McKay, Hill & Buckler, 2005). Perhaps such wide and well-documented support of the independence movement is the main factor that makes many believe that the American Revolution was not in fact a revolution but a war for independence. However, the prehistory leading to the spread of independence ideas convincingly demonstrates that economic factors played the primary role in the onset of the Revolution. The course of the American Revolution was peaceful as compared with the developments of the French Revolution. The military history of the Revolution began in 1775 in Boston, held by the British soldiers but surrounded by militia from neighbouring colonies. The Colonists led by George Washington forced the British out the city in March 1776. By that time the colonists took control over virtually all of the 13 colonies (Mackesy, 1993). Return of the British in August 1776 led to the largest military action in the Revolution's history, namely the Battle of Long Island and the British seizure of New York City. The eventual successes of the British forced France to officially enter the war in the beginning of 1778 with Spain and Netherlands joining France in 1779 (Mackesy, 1993). During the revolutionary decade the army of colonists and their new allies engaged in a number of clashes with the British troops until finally forcing them out of the controlled territory. Britain was forced to cope with military threats from several directions and a blockade of the Atlantic (Mackesy, 1993). The situation was slowly but steadily deteriorating for the British and after several years of unsuccessful attempts to restore control over the southern colonies paralleled by a stalemate in the northern front Britain signed the peace treaty known as the Treaty of Paris. According to the agreement the U.S. received all territories east of the Mississippi River and south of the Great Lakes excluding Florida (McKay, Hill & Buckler, 2005). Although the British troops stayed in the U.S. for five more years they were not involved in any military actions with the new state. The Outcomes The newly established sovereign society in America focused on gradual development of its political institutions and other domestic affairs. The Constitution and the Bill of Rights established the foundations of modern American democracy designing the three branches of the government, distributing the powers between the federal government and the states, and clearly defining the rights of the individual (McKay, Hill & Buckler, 2005). Although, as it has been mentioned in the above discussion, some residuals of colonial survived through the Revolution, the Bill of Rights and the Constitution had exceptional importance those days because they embodied many of the ideas which had previously been perceived as utopian. Their importance is illustrated by the documented and widely recognised influence the American Revolution had on the political development in both hemispheres. Great Britain, Ireland, France, and the Netherlands felt the impact of the Revolution very quickly. Many European nations perceived it as a valuable lesson of how to fight the oppression. Unfortunately, the political and economic differences between the colonies and Europe did not allow for repeating the relatively peaceful American Revolution. Thus, the newly established society in France passed trough the terrible period of the Reign of Terror, engaged in warfare with other European states, which peaked during the Napoleonic wars and was followed by the restoration of the monarchy and two subsequent revolutions (Doyle, 2002). However, such dreadful implementation of the Enlightenment ideas only reinforced the positive image of the American Revolution typically watched upon with fascination by European nations. The American Revolution also strongly impacted political development in the colonies located in Latin America. In fact, this influence was even more serious that the Revolution's influence in Europe due to geographical proximity of the U.S. The struggle for independence led by many American colonies followed the same patterns the American Revolution did which is acknowledged by past and modern historians of Latin American states (Lynch, 1985). References Doyle, W. (2002). Oxford history of the French Revolution, 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Lynch, J. (1985). The Origins of Spanish American Independence. In: Bethell, L. (Ed.), The Cambridge History of Latin America, Volume III. Cambridge University Press, 45-46. Mackesy, P. (1993). The War for America: 1775-1783. Bison Books. McKay, J. P., Hill, B. D. & Buckler, J. (2005). A History of Western Society, Volume II (From Absolutism to the Present). Houghton Mifflin Company. Nash, G. B. (2005). The Unknown American Revolution: The Unruly Birth of Democracy and the Struggle to Create America. New York: Viking. Wood, G. S. (1998). The Creation of the American Republic, 1776-1787. The University of North Carolina Press. Zobel, H. B. (1970). The Boston Massacre. Norton Read More