capitalism

8 American Revolution
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AMERICAN REVOLUTION
The American Revolution stands out as one of modern history’s
few major political and philosophical movements that
resulted in an increase in liberty. It asserted, through words
and deeds, the equal rights of all individuals to governments
dedicated to the protection of their lives, liberties, and
pursuits of happiness. As Thomas Jefferson, one of the
Revolution’s leading statesmen, wrote in 1826, the
American independence movement advanced “the free right
to the unbounded exercise of reason and freedom of opinion.”
The era of the American Revolution embraces three
overlapping phases. In the first phase (1763–1776),
colonists in British North America rediscovered a rich ideological
tradition that emphasized freedom from coercion. In
the second phase (1775–1783), self-proclaimed citizens of
the new United States waged a war for independence that
asserted this principle, yet also tested it. The third and final
phase (1781–1791) witnessed attempts to reconcile the principles
for which the war had been fought with the lessons
that it and ensuing events seemed to teach. The success of
this long-term struggle owes much not only to the ideas
from which it emerged, but also from the commitment of the
individuals who thought, fought, and acted in its behalf.
In 1763, few American colonists contemplated independence.
Most exulted in their connection with Britain, which
they had recently helped in the defeat of French forces in
North America. Britain stood preeminent as the nation possessing
the most global power and, more important, enjoying
the most freedom. Ever since the Glorious Revolution
of 1688, Britons had claimed the collective right of selfgovernment.
In addition, as John Locke famously asserted
in his Two Treatises of Government (1690), Britons maintained
that the only legitimate object of their laws was to
protect the rights of each individual “to life, liberty, and
estate.” The English Bill of Rights of 1689 guaranteed these
rights and placed limits on the purposes and powers of government.
France, meanwhile, with its powerful monarchy
and hierarchical Roman Catholic Church, struck the British
Americans of 1763 as freedom’s defeated oppressor.
The war with France set in motion a chain of events that
undermined the optimism of American colonists and
caused them to question the British government’s commitment
to their rights. Britain’s debt doubled during the conflict,
which drove the French from the North American
continent, but merely humbled their American Indian allies.
To help soothe tensions with Indians and reduce the costly
need for the stationing of British troops along the frontiers
of settlement, King George III issued the Proclamation of
1763, which prohibited the growing colonial population’s
expansion west of the Appalachian Mountains. Even more
disturbing to most colonists, in March 1765, Parliament
passed the Stamp Act, which aimed to help compensate the
British government for the cost of maintaining soldiers in
the colonies. It required that colonists pay for official seals
affixed to documents such as newspapers, legal contracts,
diplomas, and customs records.
American colonists responded with anger tempered by
principle. Previously, Parliament had claimed authority
only over the colonies’ external trade and appealed to colonial
assemblies for revenue. In levying the Stamp Act, however,
Parliament for the first time taxed colonists directly
and without the consent of their elected representatives.
The colonists protested the law through public demonstrations,
harassment of tax collectors, and a boycott of British
goods. In 1765, a Stamp Act Congress was called to formally
protest the tax, to which nine colonies sent delegates.
Responding to these measures, Parliament repealed the
Stamp Act a year after its passage. However, Parliament
then enacted a Declaratory Act, asserting its legislative
authority over the colonies “in all cases whatsoever.”
The Stamp Act crisis served to rehearse the patterns of
protest that characterized the colonists’ responses to subsequent
British legislation, including the 1767 Townshend
Acts, which taxed imported products such as glass, lead,
paint, and tea. In this instance, Parliament again reacted
with partial capitulation. In 1770, it repealed all the duties
except for the one on tea. The December 16, 1773, Boston
Tea Party, however, provoked not retreat by Parliament,
but a renewed commitment to punish colonists who
engaged in extralegal activities. Although the men who
had dumped 342 chests of taxed tea did so as anonymous
private citizens, the Coercive Acts, passed in 1774, punished
all the people of Massachusetts by closing Boston
Harbor and provided that trials of British soldiers and
officials accused of crimes in Massachusetts would be
held in England, thus effectively shutting down local and
colonial government. Parliament also passed a law that
permitted British troops to be billeted in private homes