Politics of the United States

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The United States is a federal constitutional republic, in which the President of the United
States(the head of state and head of government), Congress, and judiciary share powers reserved to
the national government, and the federal government shares sovereignty with the state governments.
Federal and state elections generally take place within a two-party system, although this is not
enshrined in law.

The executive branch is headed by a President and is independent of the legislature. Legislative
power is vested in the two chambers of Congress, the Senate and the House of Representatives. The
judicial branch (or judiciary), composed of the Supreme Court and lower federal courts,
exercises judicial power (or judiciary). The judiciary's function is to interpret the United States
Constitution and federal laws and regulations. This includes resolving disputes between the executive
and legislative branches. The federal government of the United States was established by the
Constitution. Two parties, the Democratic Party and the Republican Party, have dominated American
politics since the American Civil War, although other parties have also existed.

There are major differences between the political system of the United States and that of most other
developed democracies. These include increased power of the upper house of the legislature, a wider
scope of power held by the Supreme Court, the separation of powers between the legislature and the
executive, and the dominance of only two main parties. The United States is one of the world's
developed democracies where third parties have the least political influence.

The federal entity created by the Constitution is the dominant feature of the American governmental
system. However, some people are also subject to a state government, and all are subject to various
units of local government. The latter include counties, municipalities, and special districts.

This multiplicity of jurisdictions reflects the country's history. The federal government
was created by the states, which as colonies were established separately and governed
themselves independently of the others. Units of local government were created by the
colonies to efficiently carry out various state functions. As the country expanded, it
admitted new states modeled on the existing ones.
Contents
[hide]

1 State government

o 1.1 Local government

o 1.2 County government

o 1.3 Town and village government

2 Campaign finance

3 Political culture

4 Political parties and elections

o 4.1 Political parties

o 4.2 Elections

o 4.3 Organization of American political parties

5 Political pressure groups

o 5.1 General developments

o 5.2 Development of the two-party system in the United States

o 5.3 Political spectrum of the two major parties

6 See also

7 Bibliography

8 References

9 External links

[edit]State government

States governments have the power to make laws on all subjects that are not granted to the federal
government or denied to the states in the U.S. Constitution. These include education, family
law, contract law, and most crimes. Unlike the federal government, which only has those powers
granted to it in the Constitution, a state government has inherent powers allowing it to act unless
limited by a provision of the state or national constitution.

Like the federal government, state governments have three branches: executive, legislative, and
judicial. The chief executive of a state is its popularly elected governor, who typically holds office for a
four-year term (although in a some states the term is two years). Except for Nebraska, which
has unicameral legislature, all states have a bicameral legislature, with the upper house usually called
the Senate and the lower house called the House of Representatives, the House of
Delegates, Assembly or something similar. In most states, senators serve four-year terms, and
members of the lower house serve two-year terms.

The constitutions of the various states differ in some details but generally follow a pattern similar to
that of the federal Constitution, including a statement of the rights of the people and a plan for
organizing the government. State constitutions are generally more detailed, however.

[edit]Local government
There are 89,500 local governments, including 3,033 counties, 19,492 municipalities, 16,500
townships, 13,000 school districts, and 37,000 other special districts that deal with issues like fire
protection.[1] To a greater extent than on the federal or state level, the local governments directly serve
the needs of the people, providing everything from police and fire protection to sanitary codes, health
regulations, education, public transportation, and housing.

About 28% of the people live in cities of 100,000 or more population. City governments are chartered
by states, and their charters detail the objectives and powers of the municipal government. For most
big cities, cooperation with both state and federal organizations is essential to meeting the needs of
their residents.
Types of city governments vary widely across the nation. However, almost all have a central council,
elected by the voters, and an executive officer, assisted by various department heads, to manage the
city's affairs.

There are three general types of city government: the mayor-council, the commission, and the council-
manager. These are the pure forms; many cities have developed a combination of two or three of
them.

Mayor-Council. This is the oldest form of city government in the United States and, until the beginning
of the 20th century, was used by nearly all American cities. Its structure is like that of the state and
national governments, with an elected mayor as chief of the executive branch and an elected council
that represents the various neighborhoods forming the legislative branch. The mayor appoints heads
of city departments and other officials, sometimes with the approval of the council. He or she has the
power of veto over ordinances (the laws of the city) and often is responsible for preparing the city's
budget. The council passes city ordinances, sets the tax rate on property, and apportions money
among the various city departments. As cities have grown, council seats have usually come to
represent more than a single neighborhood.

The Commission. This combines both the legislative and executive functions in one group of officials,
usually three or more in number, elected city-wide. Each commissioner supervises the work of one or
more city departments. One is named chairperson of the body and is often called the mayor, although
his or her power is equivalent to that of the other commissioners.

Council-Manager. The city manager is a response to the increasing complexity of urban problems
that need management ability not often possessed by elected public officials. The answer has been to
entrust most of the executive powers, including law enforcement and provision of services, to a highly
trained and experienced professional city manager.

The city manager plan has been adopted by a large number of cities. Under this plan, a small, elected
council makes the city ordinances and sets policy, but hires a paid administrator, also called a city
manager, to carry out its decisions. The manager draws up the city budget and supervises most of the
departments. Usually, there is no set term; the manager serves as long as the council is satisfied with
his or her work.

[edit]County government
The county is a subdivision of the state, sometimes (but not always) containing two or
more townships and several villages. New York City is so large that it is divided into five separate
boroughs, each a county in its own right. On the other hand, Arlington County, Virginia, the United
States' smallest county, located just across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C., is both an
urbanized and suburban area, governed by a unitary county administration. In other cities, both the city
and county governments have merged, creating a consolidated city–county government.

In most U.S. counties, one town or city is designated as the county seat, and this is where the
government offices are located and where the board of commissioners or supervisors meets. In small
counties, boards are chosen by the county; in the larger ones, supervisors represent separate districts
or townships. The board collects taxes for state and local governments; borrows and appropriates
money; fixes the salaries of county employees; supervises elections; builds and maintains highways
and bridges; and administers national, state, and county welfare programs. In very small counties, the
executive and legislative power may lie entirely with a sole commissioner, who is assisted by boards to
supervise taxes and elections. In some New England states, counties do not have any governmental
function and are simply a division of land.

[edit]Town and village government

Thousands of municipal jurisdictions are too small to qualify as city governments. These are chartered
as towns and villages and deal with such strictly local needs as paving and lighting the streets,
ensuring a water supply, providing police and fire protection and waste management. Note that in
many states, the term "town" does not have any specific meaning; it is simply an informal term applied
to populated places (both incorporated and unincorporated municipalities). Moreover, in some states,
the term town is equivalent to how civil townships are used in other states.

The government is usually entrusted to an elected board or council, which may be known by a variety
of names: town or village council, board of selectmen, board of supervisors, board of commissioners.
The board may have a chairperson or president who functions as chief executive officer, or there may
be an elected mayor. Governmental employees may include a clerk, treasurer, police and fire officers,
and health and welfare officers.

One unique aspect of local government, found mostly in the New England region of the United States,
is the town meeting. Once a year, sometimes more often if needed, the registered voters of the town
meet in open session to elect officers, debate local issues, and pass laws for operating the
government. As a body, they decide on road construction and repair, construction of public buildings
and facilities, tax rates, and the town budget. The town meeting, which has existed for more than three
centuries in some places, is often cited as the purest form of direct democracy, in which the
governmental power is not delegated, but is exercised directly and regularly by all the people.

Suffrage

Main article: Voting rights in the United States

Suffrage is nearly universal for citizens 18 years of age and older. All 50 states and the District of
Columbia contribute to the electoral vote for President. However, the District, and other U.S. holdings
like Puerto Rico and Guam, lack the states' representation in Congress. These constituencies do not
have the right to choose any political figure outside their respective areas. Each commonwealth,
territory, or district can only elect a non-voting delegate to serve in the House of Representatives.

Voting rights are sometimes restricted as a result of felony conviction, but such laws vary widely by
state. Election of the president is an indirect suffrage: Voters vote for electors, who in turn vote for
President. In theory, these electors vote as they please, but in modern practice, they do not vote
against the wishes of their constituencies (though they have abstained from voting in protest).

[edit]Campaign finance
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Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may
be challenged andremoved. (October 2008)

Main article: Campaign finance in the United States

Successful participation, especially in federal elections, requires large amounts of money, especially
for television advertising[citation needed]. This money is very difficult to raise by appeals to a mass base [citation
needed]
, although in the 2008 election, candidates from both parties had success with raising money from
citizens over the Internet.[citation needed], as had Howard Dean with his Internet appeals. Both parties
generally depend on wealthy donors and organizations - traditionally the Democrats depended on
donations from organized labor while the Republicans relied on business donations [citation needed]. Since
1984, however, the Democrats' business donations have surpassed those from labor
organizations[citation needed]. This dependency on donors is controversial, and has led to laws limiting
spending on political campaigns being enacted (see campaign finance reform). Opponents of
campaign finance laws cite the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech, and challenge campaign
finance laws because they attempt to circumvent the people's constitutionally guaranteed rights. Even
when laws are upheld, the complication of compliance with the First Amendment requires careful and
cautious drafting of legislation, leading to laws that are still fairly limited in scope, especially in
comparison to those of other countries such as the United Kingdom, France or Canada.

[edit]Political culture

Most schools in the United States teach the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Bill of
Rights, and writings of the Founding Fathers as the definition of the country's governing ideology.
Among the core tenets of this ideology are the following:
 Democracy: The government is answerable to citizens, who may change the representatives
through elections.

 Equality before the law: The laws should attach no special privilege to any citizen.
Government officials are subject to the law just as others are.
 Freedom of religion and separation of church and state: The government can neither support
nor suppress religion.
 Freedom of speech: The government cannot restrict through law or action the personal, non-
violent speech of a citizen; amarketplace of ideas.

At the time of the United States' founding, the economy was predominantly one of agriculture and
small private businesses, and state governments left welfare issues to private or local initiative. As in
the UK and other industrialized countries, laissez-faire ideology was largely discredited during the
Great Depression. Between the 1930s and 1970s, fiscal policy was characterized by the Keynesian
consensus, a time during which modern American liberalism dominated economic policy virtually
unchallenged.[2][3]Since the late 1970s and early 1980s, however, laissez-faire ideology has once more
become a powerful force in American politics.[4] While the American welfare state expanded more than
threefold after WWII, it has been at 20% of GDP since the late 1970s. [5][6] Today, modern American
liberalism, and modern American conservatism are engaged in a continuous political battle,
characterized by what the Economist describes as "greater divisiveness [and] close, but bitterly fought
elections."[7]

Before World War II, the United States pursued a noninterventionist policy of in foreign affairs by not
taking sides in conflicts between foreign powers. The country abandoned this policy when it became
a superpower, and the country mostly supportsinternationalism.

[edit]Political parties and elections

The United States Constitution is silent on political organizations, mainly because most of the founding
fathers disliked them. Yet, major and minor political parties and groups soon arose.

In partisan elections, candidates are nominated by a political party or seek public office as an
independent. Each state has significant discretion in deciding how candidates are nominated, and thus
eligible to appear on the election ballot. Typically, major party candidates are formally chosen in a party
primary or convention, whereas minor party and Independents are required to complete a petitioning
process.
Registered Democrats, Republicans andindependents in millions as of 2004.[8]

[edit]Political parties
Main article: Political parties in the United States

The modern political party system in the United States is a two-party systemdominated by
the Democratic Party and the Republican Party. These two parties have won every United States
presidential election since 1852 and have controlled the United States Congress since at least 1856.
Several other third parties from time to time achieve relatively minor representation at the national and
state levels.

[edit]Elections

For other political parties see List of political parties in the United States. An overview on elections and
election results is included in Elections in the United States.
[edit]Organization of American political parties
See also: Political party strength in U.S. states

American political parties are more loosely organized than those in other countries. The two major
parties, in particular, have no formal organization at the national level that controls membership,
activities, or policy positions, though some state affiliates do. Thus, for an American to say that he or
she is a member of the Democratic or Republican party, is quite different from a Briton's stating that he
or she is a member of the Conservative or Labour party. In the United States, one can often become a
"member" of a party, merely by stating that fact. In some U.S. states, a voter can register as a member
of one or another party and/or vote in the primary election for one or another party. Such participation
does not restrict one's choices in any way. It also does not give a person any particular rights or
obligations within the party, other than possibly allowing that person to vote in that party's primary
elections. A person may choose to attend meetings of one local party committee one day and another
party committee the next day. The sole factor that brings one "closer to the action" is the quantity and
quality of participation in party activities and the ability to persuade others in attendance to give one
responsibility.

Party identification becomes somewhat formalized when a person runs for partisan office. In most
states, this means declaring oneself a candidate for the nomination of a particular party and intent to
enter that party's primary election for an office. A party committee may choose to endorse one or
another of those who is seeking the nomination, but in the end the choice is up to those who choose to
vote in the primary, and it is often difficult to tell who is going to do the voting.

The result is that American political parties have weak central organizations and little central ideology,
except by consensus. A party really cannot prevent a person who disagrees with the majority of
positions of the party or actively works against the party's aims from claiming party membership, so
long as the voters who choose to vote in the primary elections elect that person. Once in office, an
elected official may change parties simply by declaring such intent.

At the federal level, each of the two major parties has a national committee (See, Democratic National
Committee, Republican National Committee) that acts as the hub for much fund-raising and campaign
activities, particularly in presidential campaigns. The exact composition of these committees is different
for each party, but they are made up primarily of representatives from state parties and affiliated
organizations, and others important to the party. However, the national committees do not have the
power to direct the activities of members of the party.

Both parties also have separate campaign committees which work to elect candidates at a specific
level. The most significant of these are the Hill committees, which work to elect candidates to each
house of Congress.

State parties exist in all fifty states, though their structures differ according to state law, as well as party
rules at both the national and the state level.

[edit]Political pressure groups

See also: Advocacy group

Special interest groups advocate the cause of their specific constituency. Business organizations will
favor low corporate taxes and restrictions of the right to strike, whereas labor unions will support
minimum wage legislation and protection for collective bargaining. Other private interest groups, such
as churches and ethnic groups, are more concerned about broader issues of policy that can affect their
organizations or their beliefs.
One type of private interest group that has grown in number and influence in recent years is
the political action committee or PAC. These are independent groups, organized around a single
issue or set of issues, which contribute money to political campaigns forU.S. Congress or
the presidency. PACs are limited in the amounts they can contribute directly to candidates in federal
elections. There are no restrictions, however, on the amounts PACs can spend independently to
advocate a point of view or to urge the election of candidates to office. PACs today number in the
thousands.

"The number of interest groups has mushroomed, with more and more of them operating offices in
Washington, D.C., and representing themselves directly to Congress and federal agencies,"
says Michael Schudson in his 1998 book The Good Citizen: A History of American Civic Life. "Many
organizations that keep an eye on Washington seek financial and moral support from ordinary citizens.
Since many of them focus on a narrow set of concerns or even on a single issue, and often a single
issue of enormous emotional weight, they compete with the parties for citizens' dollars, time, and
passion."

The amount of money spent by these special interests continues to grow, as campaigns become
increasingly expensive. Many Americans have the feeling that these wealthy interests, whether
corporations, unions or PACs, are so powerful that ordinary citizens can do little to counteract their
influences.

A survey of members of the American Economic Association find the vast majority regardless of
political affiliation to be discontent with the current state of democracy in America. The primary concern
relates to the prevalence and influence of special interest groups within the political process, which
tends to lead to policy consequences that only benefit such special interest groups and politicians.
Some conjecture that maintenance of the policy status quo and hesitance to stray from it perpetuates
a political environment that fails to advance society's welfare. [9]

[edit]General developments
See also: History of the United States Republican Party and History of the United States Democratic
Party

Many of America's Founding Fathers hated the thought of political parties. They were sure quarreling
factions would be more interested in contending with each other than in working for the common good.
They wanted citizens to vote for candidates without the interference of organized groups, but this was
not to be.

By the 1790s, different views of the new country's proper course had already developed, and those
who held these opposing views tried to win support for their cause by banding together. The followers
of Alexander Hamilton, the Hamiltonian faction, took up the name "Federalist"; they favored a strong
central government that would support the interests of commerce and industry. The followers
of Thomas Jefferson, the Jeffersonians and then the "Anti-Federalists," took up the name "Democratic-
Republicans"; they preferred a decentralized agrarian republic in which the federal government had
limited power. By 1828, the Federalists had disappeared as an organization, replaced by the Whigs,
brought to life in opposition to the election that year of President Andrew Jackson. Jackson's
presidency split the Democratic-Republican Party: Jacksonians became the Democratic Party and
those following the leadership of John Quincy Adams became the "National Republicans." The two-
party system, still in existence today, was born. (Note: The National Republicans of John Quincy
Adams is not the same party as today's Republican Party.)

In the 1850s, the issue of slavery took center stage, with disagreement in particular over the question
of whether slavery should be permitted in the country's new territories in the West. The Whig Party
straddled the issue and sank to its death after the overwhelming electoral defeat by Franklin Pierce
in 1852 presidential election. Ex-Whigs joined the Know Nothings or the newly formed Republican
Party. While the Know Nothing party was short-lived, Republicans would survive the intense politics
leading up to the Civil War. The primary Republican policy was that slavery be excluded from all the
territories. Just six years later, this new party captured the presidency when Abraham Lincoln won the
election of 1860. By then, parties were well established as the country's dominant political
organizations, and party allegiance had become an important part of most people's consciousness.
Party loyalty was passed from fathers to sons, and party activities, including spectacular campaign
events, complete with uniformed marching groups and torchlight parades, were a part of the social life
of many communities.

By the 1920s, however, this boisterous folksiness had diminished. Municipal reforms, civil service
reform, corrupt practices acts, and presidential primaries to replace the power of politicians at national
conventions had all helped to clean up politics.

[edit]Development of the two-party system in the United States

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Since the 1790s, the country has been run by two major parties. The United States does not have a
parliamentary system, in which governing coalitions are formed after elections, so coalitions are
formed before elections under the umbrella of the party organizations. In the absence of a
parliamentary system, third parties cannot thrive. Since the Civil War, the two major parties have been
called the Republican and Democratic parties. Many minor or third political parties appear from time to
time. They tend to serve a means to advocate policies that eventually are adopted by the two major
political parties. At various times the Socialist Party, the Farmer-Labor Party and the Populist Party for
a few years had considerable local strength, and then faded away. At present, the Libertarian Party is
the most successful third party.

Most officials in America are elected from single-member districts and win office by beating out their
opponents in a system for determining winners called first-past-the-post; the one who gets
the plurality wins, (which is not the same thing as actually getting amajority of votes). This encourages
the two-party system; see Duverger's law.

Another critical factor has been ballot access law. Originally, voters went to the polls and publicly
stated which candidate they supported. Later on, this developed into a process whereby each political
party would create its own ballot and thus the voter would put the party's ballot into the voting box. In
the late nineteenth century, states began to adopt the Australian Secret Ballot Method, and it
eventually became the national standard. The secret ballot method ensured that the privacy of voters
would be protected (hence government jobs could no longer be awarded to loyal voters) and each
state would be responsible for creating one official ballot. The fact that state legislatures were
dominated by Democrats and Republicans provided these parties an opportunity to pass
discriminatory laws against minor political parties, yet such laws did not start to arise until the first Red
Scare that hit America afterWorld War I. State legislatures began to enact tough laws that made it
harder for minor political parties to run candidates for office by requiring a high number of petition
signatures from citizens and decreasing the length of time that such a petition could legally be
circulated.

It should also be noted that while more often than not, party members will "toe the line" and support
their party's policies, they are free to vote against their own party and vote with the opposition ("cross
the aisle") when they please.

"In America the same political labels (Democratic and Republican) cover virtually all public
officeholders, and therefore most voters are everywhere mobilized in the name of these two parties,"
says Nelson W. Polsby, professor of political science, in the book New Federalist Papers: Essays in
Defense of the Constitution. "Yet Democrats and Republicans are not everywhere the same. Variations
(sometimes subtle, sometimes blatant) in the 50 political cultures of the states yield considerable
differences overall in what it means to be, or to vote, Democratic or Republican. These differences
suggest that one may be justified in referring to the American two-party system as masking something
more like a hundred-party system."

[edit]Political spectrum of the two major parties

This section does not cite any references or sources.
Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may
bechallenged and removed. (January 2009)
During the 20th century, the overall political philosophy of both the Republican Party and the
Democratic Party underwent a dramatic shift from their earlier philosophies. From the 1860s to the
1950s the Republican Party was considered to be the more classically liberal of the two major parties
and the Democratic Party the more classically conservative/populist of the two.

This changed a great deal with the presidency of Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt, whose New
Deal included the founding of Social Security as well as a variety of other federal services and public
works projects. Roosevelt's success in the twin crises of the Depression and World War II led to a sort
of polarization in national politics, centered around him; this combined with his increasingly liberal
policies to turn FDR's Democrats to the left and the Republican Party further to the right.

During the 1950s and the early 1960s, both parties essentially expressed a more centrist approach to
politics on the national level and had their liberal, moderate, and conservative wings influential within
both parties.

From the early 1960s, the conservative wing became more dominant in the Republican Party, and the
liberal wing became more dominant in the Democratic Party. The 1964 presidential election heralded
the rise of the conservative wing among Republicans. The liberal and conservative wings within the
Democratic Party were competitive until 1972, when George McGovern's candidacy marked the
triumph of the liberal wing. This similarly happened in the Republican Party with the candidacy and
later landslide election ofRonald Reagan in 1980, which marked the triumph of the conservative wing.

By the 1980 election, each major party had largely become identified by its dominant political
orientation. Strong showings in the 1990s by reformist independent Ross Perot pushed the major
parties to put forth more centrist presidential candidates, like Bill Clinton and Bob Dole. Polarization in
Congress was said by some[who?] to have been cemented by the Republican takeover of 1994. Others
say that this polarization had existed since the late 1980s when the Democrats controlled both houses
of Congress.

Liberals within the Republican Party and conservatives within the Democratic Party and
the Democratic Leadership Councilneoliberals have typically fulfilled the roles of so-called political
mavericks, radical centrists, or brokers of compromise between the two major parties. They have also
helped their respective parties gain in certain regions that might not ordinarily elect a member of that
party; the Republican Party has used this approach with centrist Republicans such as Rudy
Giuliani, George Pataki, Richard Riordan and Arnold Schwarzenegger. The 2006 elections sent many
centrist or conservative Democrats to state and federal legislatures including several, notably in
Kansas and Montana, who switched parties.

[edit]See also
 Federal government of the United States

 International Politics of the United States

 Law of the United States
 List of famous American sports figures who became politicians
 Political arguments of gun politics in the United States
 Political divisions of the United States
 Political ideologies in the United States
 List of political parties in the United States
 American Nazi Party
 American Third Position Party
 Communist Party USA
 Constitution Party
 Democratic Party
 Green Party
 Modern Whig Party
 Libertarian Party
 Reform Party
 Republican Party
 Socialist Party USA
 Politics of the Southern United States
 Tea Party movement

[edit]Bibliography

 "AlterNet: It's time to recognize America's huge progressive majority". Retrieved 2007-06-18.

 Michael Barone and Richard E. Cohen. The Almanac of American Politics, 2006 (2005) 1920
pages covers every member of Congress and governor in depth.
 Michael Crane, ed. The Political Junkie Handbook (2004)
 George C. Edwards, Martin P. Wattenberg, and Robert L. Lineberry. Government in America:
People, Politics, and Policy (12th Edition, 2005)
 Robert Eisinger, Ph.D., The Evolution of Presidential Polling, Cambridge University Press,
2003.
 Marjorie R. Hershey. Party Politics in America (12th Edition, 2006)
 Marc J. Hetherington and William J. Keefe. Parties, Politics, And Public Policy in
America (10th edition, 2006)
 L. Sandy Maisel, ed. Political Parties and Elections in the United States: an Encyclopedia 2
vol (Garland, 1991). (ISBN 0-8240-7975-2)
 L. Sandy Maisel, American Political Parties and Elections: A Very Short Introduction (2007),
144 pp
 Karen O'Connor and Larry J. Sabato. American Government: Continuity and Change (8th
Edition, 2006)
 "Welcome to the Campaign for America's Future". Retrieved 2007-06-18.
 James Q. Wilson and John J. Diiulio. American Government: Institutions and Policies (8th ed.
2000)

[edit]References

1. ^ Statistical Abstract: 2010 p. 416.

2. ^ Weeks, J. (2007). Inequality Trends in Some Developed OECD Countries. In J. K. S. & J. Baudot

(Eds.) Flat world, big gaps: Economic liberalization, globalization, poverty & inequality (159-176).

New York: Zed Books.

3. ^ "Thomas, E. (March 10, 2008). He knew he was right. Newsweek.". Retrieved 2008-04-19.

4. ^ Clark, B. (1998). Political economy: A comparative approach. Westport, CT: Preager.

5. ^ Alber, J. (1988). Is There a crisis of the welfare state? Cross-national evidence from Europe,

North America, and Japan. European Sociological Review, 4(3), 181-207.

6. ^ Barr, N. (2004). Economics of the welfare state. New York: Oxford University Press (USA).

7. ^ "Economist Intelligence Unit. (July 11, 2007). United States: Political Forces.". Retrieved 2008-

06-03.

8. ^ "Neuhart, P. (22 January, 2004). Why politics is fun from catbirds' seats. USA Today.". 2004-01-

22. Retrieved 2007-07-11.

9. ^ Davis, William L., and Bob Figgins. 2009. Do Economists Believe American Democracy Is

Working? Econ Journal Watch 6(2): 195-202. Econjwatch.org

[edit]External links

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  Official Democratic Party Web Site
 Official Republican Party Web Site
 Official Green Party Web Site
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American Revolution
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about political and social developments, and the origins and aftermath of the war. For
military actions, see American Revolutionary War. For other uses, see American Revolution
(disambiguation).
In this article, inhabitants of the thirteen colonies that supported the American Revolution are
primarily referred to as "Americans," with occasional references to "Patriots," "Whigs,"
"Rebels" or "Revolutionaries." Colonists who supported the British in opposing the Revolution
are usually referred to as "Loyalists" or "Tories." The geographical area of the thirteen
colonies is often referred to simply as "America."
John Trumbull's Declaration of Independence, showing the five-man committee in charge of drafting the
Declaration in 1776 as it presents its work to the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia

The American Revolution was the political upheaval during the last half of the 18th century in
which thirteen colonies in North America joined together to break free from the British Empire,
combining to become the United States of America. They first rejected the authority of
the Parliament of Great Britain to govern them from overseas without representation, and then
expelled all royal officials. By 1774 each colony had established a Provincial Congress, or an
equivalent governmental institution, to form individual self-governing states. The British
responded by sending combat troops to re-impose direct rule. Through representatives sent in
1775 to the Second Continental Congress, the new states joined together at first to defend their
respective self-governance and manage the armed conflict against the British known as
the American Revolutionary War (1775–83, also American War of Independence). Ultimately, the
states collectively determined that the British monarchy, by acts oftyranny, could no
longer legitimately claim their allegiance. They then severed ties with the British Empire in July
1776, when the Congress issued the Declaration of Independence, rejecting the monarchy on
behalf of the new nation. The war ended with effective American victory in October 1781,
followed by formal British abandonment of any claims to the United States with the Treaty of
Paris in 1783.

The American Revolution initiated a series of social, political, and intellectual transformations in
early American society and government. Americans rejected the oligarchies common
in aristocratic Europe at the time, championing instead the development of republicanism based
on the Enlightenment understanding of liberalism. Among the significant results of the revolution
was the creation of a representative government responsible to the will of the people. However,
sharp political debates erupted over the appropriate level of democracy desirable in the new
government, with a number of Founders fearing mob rule.
Many fundamental issues of national governance were settled with the ratification of
the Constitution of the United States in 1788, which replaced the relatively weaker first attempt at
a national government, the Articles of Confederation adopted in 1781. In contrast to the
looseconfederation, the Constitution established a strong federated government. The United
States Bill of Rights (1791), comprising the first 10 constitutional amendments, quickly followed.
It guaranteed many natural rights that were influential in justifying the revolution, and attempted
to balance a strong national government with relatively broad personal liberties. The American
shift to liberal republicanism, and the gradually increasing democracy, caused an upheaval of
traditional social hierarchy and gave birth to the ethic that has formed a core of political values in
the United States.[1]

Contents
[hide]

1 Origins

o 1.1 Summary

 1.1.1 Liberalism, republicanism, and religion

o 1.2 Incendiary British legislation

 1.2.1 Navigation Acts

 1.2.2 Western Frontier

 1.2.3 Taxation without representation

 1.2.4 1764 – new taxes

 1.2.5 Stamp Act 1765

 1.2.6 Townshend Act 1767 and Boston Massacre 1770

 1.2.7 Tea Act 1773

 1.2.8 Intolerable Acts 1774

o 1.3 American political opposition

2 Factions: Patriots, Loyalists and Neutrals

o 2.1 Patriots – The Revolutionaries

 2.1.1 Psychology

 2.1.2 Class factors

o 2.2 Loyalists and neutrals

o 2.3 Women

3 Other participants
o 3.1 Spain

o 3.2 France
o 3.3 Native Americans

o 3.4 Slaves

4 Military hostilities begin

o 4.1 Prisoners

5 Creating new state constitutions

6 Independence and Union

7 Defending the Revolution

o 7.1 British return: 1776–1777

o 7.2 American alliances after 1778

o 7.3 The British move South, 1778–1783

 7.3.1 Yorktown 1781

8 Peace treaty
o 8.1 Impact on Britain

9 Immediate aftermath
o 9.1 Interpretations

o 9.2 Loyalist expatriation

o 9.3 As an example or inspiration

o 9.4 National debt

10 See also

11 Bibliography
o 11.1 Notes

o 11.2 Reference works

o 11.3 Surveys

o 11.4 Specialized studies

o 11.5 Primary sources

12 External links

[edit]Origins
Before the Revolution: The Thirteen Colonies are in pink

The American Revolution was predicated by a number of ideas and events that, combined, led to
a political and social separation of colonial possessions from the home nation and a coalescing
of those former individual colonies into an independent nation.

[edit]Summary

The revolutionary era began in 1763, when the French military threat to British North American
colonies ended.

Adopting the policy that the colonies should pay an increased proportion of the costs associated
with keeping them in the Empire, Britain imposed aseries of direct taxes followed by other
laws intended to demonstrate British authority, all of which proved extremely unpopular in
America. Because the colonies lacked elected representation in the governing British
Parliament,many colonists considered the laws to be illegitimate and a violation of theirrights as
Englishmen. In 1772, groups of colonists began to create committees of correspondence, which
would lead to their own Provincial Congresses in most of the colonies. In the course of two
years, the Provincial Congresses or their equivalents rejected the Parliament and effectively
replaced the British ruling apparatus in the former colonies, culminating in 1774 with the
coordinating First Continental Congress.[2]

In response to protests in Boston over Parliament's attempts to assert authority, the British sent
combat troops, dissolved local governments, and imposed direct rule by Royal officials.
Consequently, the Colonies mobilized their militias, and fighting broke out in 1775. First
ostensibly loyal to King George III, the repeated pleas by the First Continental Congress for royal
intervention on their behalf with Parliament resulted in the declaration by the King that the states
were "in rebellion", and Congress traitors. In 1776, representatives from each of the original
thirteen states voted unanimously in the Second Continental Congress to adopt a Declaration of
Independence, which now rejected theBritish monarchy in addition to its Parliament. The
Declaration established the United States, which was originally governed as a
looseconfederation through a representative government selected by state legislatures
(see Second Continental Congress and Congress of the Confederation).

[edit]Liberalism, republicanism, and religion

Main articles: American Enlightenment, Republicanism in the United States, and Liberalism in
the United States
Further information: A Summary View of the Rights of British America, Letters from a Farmer in
Pennsylvania, and Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms

John Locke's ideas on liberty greatly influenced the political thinking behind the revolution. Jean-
Jacques Rousseau's theory of the "social contract" influenced Locke's belief that among
humanity's natural rights was the right of the people to overthrow their leaders, should those
leaders betray the historic rights of Englishmen.[3][4] In terms of writing state and national
constitutions, the Americans used Montesquieu's analysis of the "balanced" British Constitution.

A motivating force behind the revolution was the American embrace of a political ideology called
"republicanism", which was dominant in the colonies by 1775. The republicanism was inspired by
the "country party" in Britain, whose critique of British government emphasized
thatcorruption was a terrible reality in Britain.[5] Americans feared the corruption was crossing the
Atlantic; the commitment of most Americans to republican values and to their rights, energized
the revolution, as Britain was increasingly seen as hopelessly corrupt and hostile to American
interests. Britain seemed to threaten the established liberties that Americans enjoyed. [6] The
greatest threat to liberty was depicted as corruption—not just in London but at home as well. The
colonists associated it with luxury and, especially, inherited aristocracy, which they condemned. [7]

The Founding Fathers were strong advocates of republican values, particularly Samuel
Adams, Patrick Henry, George Washington, Thomas Paine, Benjamin Franklin, John
Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and Alexander Hamilton[8], which required men to put
civic duty ahead of their personal desires. Men had a civic duty to be prepared and willing to fight
for the rights and liberties of their countrymen and countrywomen. John Adams, writing to Mercy
Otis Warren in 1776, agreed with some classical Greek and Roman thinkers in that "Public Virtue
cannot exist without private, and public Virtue is the only Foundation of Republics." He
continued:

"There must be a positive Passion for the public good, the public Interest, Honour, Power, and
Glory, established in the Minds of the People, or there can be no Republican Government, nor
any real Liberty. And this public Passion must be Superior to all private Passions. Men must be
ready, they must pride themselves, and be happy to sacrifice their private Pleasures, Passions,
and Interests, nay their private Friendships and dearest connections, when they Stand in
Competition with the Rights of society." [9]

For women, "republican motherhood" became the ideal, exemplified by Abigail Adams and Mercy
Otis Warren; the first duty of the republican woman was to instil republican values in her children
and to avoid luxury and ostentation.

Tom Paine's best-seller pamphlet Common Sense appeared in January 1776, after the
Revolution had started. It was widely distributed and loaned, and often read aloud in taverns,
contributing significantly to spreading the ideas of republicanism and liberalism, bolstering
enthusiasm for separation from Britain, and encouraging recruitment for the Continental Army.
Paine provided a new and widely accepted argument for independence, by advocating a
complete break with history. Common Sense is oriented to the future in a way that compels the
reader to make an immediate choice. It offered a solution for Americans disgusted and alarmed
at the threat of tyranny.[10]

Dissenting (i.e. Protestant, non-Church of England) churches of the day were the "school of
democracy”[11] President John Witherspoon of the College of New Jersey (now Princeton
University) wrote widely circulated sermons linking the American Revolution to the teachings of
the Hebrew Bible. Throughout the colonies dissenting Protestant congregations
(Congregationalist, Baptist, and Presbyterian) preached Revolutionary themes in their sermons,
while most Church of England ministers preached loyalty to the King. [12] Religious motivation for
fighting tyranny reached across socioeconomic lines to encompass rich and poor, men and
women, frontiersmen and townsmen, farmers and merchants.[13]

The classical authors read in the Enlightenment period taught an abstract ideal of republican
government that included hierarchical social orders of king, aristocracy and commoners. It was
widely believed that British liberties relied on the balance of power between these three social
orders, maintaining the hierarchal deference to the privileged class. [14] Historian Bernard
Bailyn notes, "Puritanism … and the epidemic evangelism of the mid-eighteenth century, had
created challenges to the traditional notions of social stratification” by preaching that the Bible
taught all men are equal, that the true value of a man lies in his moral behavior, not his class,
and that all can be saved."[15]

[edit]Incendiary British legislation

The Revolution was predicated by a number of pieces of legislation originating from the British
Parliament that, for Americans, were illegitimate acts of a government that had no right to pass
laws on Englishmen in the Americas who did not have elected representation in that government.
For the British, policy makers saw these laws as necessary to rein in colonial subjects who, in
the name of economic development that was designed to benefit the home nation, had been
allowed near-autonomy for too long.

[edit]Navigation Acts

Main article: Navigation Acts

The British Empire at the time operated under the mercantile system, where economic assets,
or capital, are represented by bullion (gold, silver, and trade value) held by the state, which is
best increased through a positive balance of trade with other nations (exports minus imports).
Mercantilism suggests that the ruling government should advance these goals through playing
a protectionist role in the economy, by encouraging exports and discouraging imports, especially
through the use of tariffs. Great Britain regulated the economies of the colonies through
the Navigation Acts according to the doctrines of mercantilism. Widespread evasion of these
laws had long been tolerated. Eventually, through the use of open-ended search warrants (Writs
of Assistance), strict enforcement of these Acts became the practice. In
1761, Massachusetts lawyer James Otis argued that the writs violated the constitutional rights of
the colonists. He lost the case, but John Adams later wrote, "American independence was then
and there born"[16].

In 1762, Patrick Henry argued the Parson's Cause in Virginia, where the legislature had passed
a law and it was vetoed by the King. Henry argued, "that a King, by disallowing Acts of this
salutary nature, from being the father of his people, degenerated into a Tyrant and forfeits all
right to his subjects' obedience".[17]

[edit]Western Frontier

Main articles: British Royal Proclamation of 1763 and Quebec Act

Following the French and Indian War, the British government sought to minimize defense costs
wherever possible and was keen to maintain peaceful relations with those Indian tribes that had
allied with the French. To this end, the Proclamation of 1763 restricted settlement across
the Appalachian Mountains as this was designated an Indian Reserve. Regardless, groups of
settlers continued to move west and establish farms. The proclamation was soon modified and
was no longer a hindrance to settlement, but its promulgation and the fact that it had been written
without consulting colonists angered them. The Quebec Act of 1774 extended Quebec's
boundaries to the Ohio River, shutting out the claims of the thirteen colonies. By then, however,
the Americans had little regard for new laws from London; they were drilling militia and
organizing for war.[18]
[edit]Taxation without representation

Main article: No taxation without representation

Further information: Massachusetts Circular Letter

By 1763, Great Britain possessed vast holdings in North America. In addition to the thirteen
colonies, twenty-two smaller colonies were ruled directly by royal governors. Victory in the Seven
Years' War had given Great Britain New France (Canada), Spanish Florida, and the Native
American lands east of the Mississippi River. In 1765 however, the colonists still considered
themselves loyal subjects of the British Crown, with the same historic rights and obligations as
subjects in Britain.[19]

The British did not expect the colonies to contribute to the interest or the retirement of debt
incurred during the French and Indian War, but they did expect a portion of the expenses for
colonial defense to be paid by the Americans. Estimating the expenses of defending the
continental colonies and the West Indies to be approximately £200,000 annually, the British goal
after the end of this war was that the colonies would be taxed for £78,000 of this amount.

The real point for London was for the tax to demonstrate that Parliament was in full control.
[20]
The main issue with the colonists was not that the taxes were high (they were low) but that the
colonies had no representation in the Parliament which passed the taxes. On the one hand,Lord
North in 1775 argued for the British position that Englishmen paid on average twenty-five
shillings annually in taxes whereas Americans paid only sixpence. [21] The colonists countered that
such an argument failed to take into consideration the taxes collected by colonial governments -
they believed, especially considering the economic restraints the British were keen to enforce in
the colonies, that any additional tax burden from London was excessive.

The colonists never objected to the principle of contributing to the cost of their own defense
(colonial legislatures spent large sums raising and outfitting militias during the French and Indian
War), however they disputed the need to station regular British troops in North America when
they considered colonial militias (which were funded by taxes raised by colonial legislatures) to
be sufficient in the absence of a French threat[22]. Many colonists were even in favour of
maintaining regular military units for the purpose of defending the colonies from Indian attacks.
[citation needed]
One problem with that proposal was that the British were unwilling to commission
colonial officers nor would they recognize colonial commissions, effectively negating the will or
even the legal authority of the colonies to contribute to defense in that sort of way. [citation needed] The
real underpinnings of British objections to colonial preferences with regards to defense were
based on politics as opposed to military necessity. There were some 1,500 well-connected British
officers that would have potentially become redundant in the aftermath the French and Indian
War, and the only realistic options for London would have been to discharge them (which was
politically unacceptable)[why?] or post them to America[23].

The slogan "No taxation without representation" became popular in many American circles.
London argued that the colonists were "virtually represented"; but most Americans rejected this.
[24]

[edit]1764 – new taxes

Main articles: Sugar Act, Paper Bills of Credit Act 1763, and Quartering Act

In 1764, Parliament enacted the Sugar Act and the Currency Act, further vexing the colonists.
Protests led to a powerful new weapon, the systematic boycott of British goods. The British
pushed the colonists even further that same year by also enacting the Quartering Act, which
stated that British soldiers were to be quartered at the expense of residents in certain areas.

[edit]Stamp Act 1765

Main article: Stamp Act 1765

Burning of the Gaspée

In 1765 the Stamp Act was the first direct tax ever levied by Parliament on the colonies. All
official documents, newspapers, almanacs, and pamphlets—even decks of playing cards—were
required to have the stamps. All 13 colonies protested vehemently, as popular leaders such
as Patrick Henry in Virginia andJames Otis in Massachusetts, rallied the people in opposition. A
secret group, the "Sons of Liberty" formed in many towns and threatened violence if anyone sold
the stamps, and no one did.[25] In Boston, the Sons of Liberty burned the records of the vice-
admiralty court and looted the elegant home of the chief justice, Thomas Hutchinson. Several
legislatures called for united action, and nine colonies sent delegates to the Stamp Act
Congress in New York City in October 1765. Moderates led by John Dickinson drew up a
"Declaration of Rights and Grievances" stating that taxes passed without representation violated
theirRights of Englishmen. Lending weight to the argument was an economic boycott of British
merchandise, as imports into the colonies fell from £2,250,000 in 1764 to £1,944,000 in 1765. In
London, the Rockinghamgovernment came to power and Parliament debated whether to repeal
the stamp tax or send an army to enforce it. Benjamin Franklin made the case for the boycotters,
explaining the colonies had spent heavily in manpower, money, and blood in defense of the
empire in a series of wars against the French and Native Americans, and that further taxes to
pay for those wars were unjust and might bring about a rebellion. Parliament agreed and
repealed the tax, but in a "Declaratory Act" of March 1766 insisted that parliament retained full
power to make laws for the colonies "in all cases whatsoever".[17]

[edit]Townshend Act 1767 and Boston Massacre 1770

Main articles: Townshend Act and Boston Massacre

In 1767, the Parliament passed the Townshend Acts, which placed a tax on a number of
essential goods including paper, glass, and tea. Angered at the tax increases, colonists
organized a boycott of British goods. In Boston on March 5, 1770, a large mob gathered around
a group of British soldiers. The mob grew more and more threatening, throwing snowballs, rocks
and debris at the soldiers. One soldier was clubbed and fell. All but one of the soldiers fired into
the crowd. Eleven people were hit; three civilians were killed at the scene of the shooting, and
two died after the incident. The event quickly came to be called the Boston Massacre. Although
the soldiers were tried and acquitted (defended by John Adams), the widespread descriptions
soon became propaganda to turn colonial sentiment against the British. This in turn began a
downward spiral in the relationship between Britain and the Province of Massachusetts.

[edit]Tea Act 1773

This 1846 lithograph has become a classic image of the Boston Tea Party

Main article: Tea Act

Further information: Boston Tea Party
In June 1772, in what became known as the Gaspée Affair, a British warship that had been
vigorously enforcing unpopular trade regulations was burned by American patriots. Soon
afterwards, Governor Thomas Hutchinson of Massachusetts reported that he and the royal
judges would be paid directly from London, thus bypassing the colonial legislature.

On December 16, 1773, a group of men, led by Samuel Adams and dressed to evoke American
Indians, boarded the ships of the government-favored British East India Company and dumped
an estimated £10,000 worth of tea on board (approximately £636,000 in 2008) into the harbor.
This event became known as the Boston Tea Party and remains a significant part of American
patriotic lore.

[edit]Intolerable Acts 1774

An American version of London cartoon that denounces the "rape" of Boston in 1774 by the Intolerable Acts

Main article: Intolerable Acts

The British government responded by passing several Acts which came to be known as
theIntolerable Acts, which further darkened colonial opinion towards the British. They consisted
of four laws enacted by the British parliament. [26] The first was the Massachusetts Government
Act, which altered the Massachusetts charter and restricted town meetings. The second Act,
theAdministration of Justice Act, ordered that all British soldiers to be tried were to be arraigned
in Britain, not in the colonies. The third Act was the Boston Port Act, which closed the port of
Boston until the British had been compensated for the tea lost in the Boston Tea Party (the
British never received such a payment). The fourth Act was the Quartering Act of 1774, which
allowed royal governors to house British troops in the homes of citizens without requiring
permission of the owner.

[edit]American political opposition

See also: Suffolk Resolves, Declaration of Rights and Grievances, Continental
Association, Petition to the King (1774), Declaration and Resolves of the First Continental
Congress, Conciliatory Resolution, Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up
Arms, Olive Branch Petition, and Hutchinson Letters Affair

American political opposition was initially through the colonial assemblies such as the Stamp Act
Congress, which included representatives from across the colonies. In 1765, the Sons of
Liberty were formed which used public demonstrations, violence and threats of violence to
ensure that the British tax laws were unenforceable. While openly hostile to what they
considered an oppressive Parliament acting illegally, colonists persisted in numerous petitions
and pleas for intervention from a monarch to whom they still claimed loyalty. In late 1772, after
theGaspée Affair, Samuel Adams set about creating new Committees of Correspondence, which
linked Patriots in all thirteen colonies and eventually provided the framework for a rebel
government. In early 1773 Virginia, the largest colony, set up its Committee of Correspondence,
on which Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson served.[27]

In response to the Massachusetts Government Act, Massachusetts and then other colonies
formed local governments called "Provincial Congresses". In 1774, the First Continental
Congress convened, consisting of representatives from each of the Provincial Congresses or
their equivalents, to serve as a conduit for deliberation and collective action.
Standing Committees of Safety were created by each Provincial Congress or equivalent for the
enforcement of the resolutions by the Committee of Correspondence, Provincial Congress, and
the Continental Congress. British colonies in North America that did not have government
responsible to its people did not join the Continental Congress, but remained loyal to the Crown.
They included: Quebec, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, Bermuda, West Florida and East Florida.

[edit]Factions: Patriots, Loyalists and Neutrals

The population of the Thirteen Colonies was far from homogeneous, particularly in their political
views and attitudes. Loyalties and allegiances varied widely not only within regions and
communities, but also within families and sometimes shifted during the course of the Revolution.

[edit]Patriots – The Revolutionaries

Main article: Patriot (American Revolution)
See also: Sons of Liberty

At the time, revolutionaries were called "Patriots", "Whigs", "Congress-men", or "Americans".

They included a full range of social and economic classes, but a unanimity regarding the need to
defend the rights of Americans. After the war, Patriots such as George Washington,James
Madison, John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay were deeply devoted to republicanism
while also eager to build a rich and powerful nation, while Patriots such as Patrick
Henry, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson represented democratic impulses and the
agrarian plantation element that wanted a localized society with greater political equality.

The word "patriot" refers to a person in the colonies who sided with the American Revolution.
Calling the revolutionaries "patriots" is a long-standing historical convention, which began prior to
the war. For example, the term “Patriot” was in use by American colonists during the 1760s.

Generally speaking, during the enlightenment era, the word "patriot" was not used
interchangeably with "nationalist", as it is today. Rather, the concept of patriotism was linked to
enlightenment values concerning a common good, which transcended national and social
boundaries. Patriotism, thus, did not require someone to support their leader's actions or a
nation's policies in all circumstances, and there wouldn't necessarily be a contradiction between
being a patriot and revolting against king and country. [28]

[edit]Psychology

One way to understand the Patriots is to compare their psychology with that of the Loyalists.
Labaree (1948) has identified eight characteristics of the Loyalists that made them essentially
conservative; opposite traits characterized the patriots. Psychologically, Loyalists were older,
better established, and resisted innovation. They thought resistance to the Crown—the legitimate
government—was morally wrong, while the Patriots thought morality was on their side. They
were alienated when the Patriots resorted to violence, such as burning houses and tarring and
feathering. Loyalists wanted to take a middle-of-the road position and were angry when forced by
the Patriots to declare their opposition. Many Loyalists, especially merchants in the port cities,
had a long-standing sentimental attachment to Britain (often with business and family links to
other parts of the British Empire). Some Loyalists were procrastinators who realized that
independence was bound to come some day, but wanted to postpone the moment; the Patriots
wanted to seize the moment. Loyalists were cautious and afraid of anarchy or tyranny that might
come from mob rule; Patriots made a systematic effort to use and control mob violence. Finally,
Labaree argues that Loyalists were pessimists who lacked the confidence in the future displayed
by the Patriots.[29][30][31]

[edit]Class factors

Historians, such as J. Franklin Jameson in the early 20th century, examined the class
composition of the Patriot cause, looking for evidence that there was a class war inside the
revolution. In the last 50 years, historians have largely abandoned that interpretation,
emphasizing instead the high level of ideological unity. [32] Just as there were rich and poor
Loyalists, the Patriots were a 'mixed lot', with the richer and better educated more likely to
become officers in the Army. Ideological demands always came first: the Patriots viewed
independence as a means of freeing themselves from British oppression and taxation and,
above all, reasserting what they considered to be their rights. Most yeomen farmers, craftsmen,
and small merchants joined the patriot cause as well, demanding more political equality. They
were especially successful in Pennsylvania and less so in New England, where John Adams
attacked Thomas Paine's Common Sense for the "absurd democratical notions" it proposed. [33]

[edit]Loyalists and neutrals

Main article: Loyalist (American Revolution)

While there is no way of knowing the actual numbers, historians have estimated that about 15–
20% of the population remained loyal to the British Crown; these were known at the time as
"Loyalists", "Tories", or "King's men".[34][35] The Loyalists never controlled territory unless the
British Army occupied it.[36] Loyalists were typically older, less willing to break with old loyalties,
often connected to the Church of England, and included many established merchants with
business connections across the Empire, as well as royal officials such as Thomas Hutchinson of
Boston. The revolution sometimes divided families; for example, the Franklins. William Franklin,
son of Benjamin Franklin and Governor of New Jersey remained Loyal to the Crown throughout
the war and never spoke to his father again. Recent immigrants who had not been fully
Americanized were also inclined to support the King, such as recent Scottish settlers in the back
country; among the more striking examples of this, see Flora MacDonald.[37]

Most Native Americans rejected pleas that they remain neutral and supported the king. The
tribes that depended most heavily upon colonial trade tended to side with the revolutionaries,
though political factors were important as well. The most prominent Native American leader
siding with the king was Joseph Brant of the Mohawk nation, who led frontier raids on isolated
settlements in Pennsylvania and New York until an American army under John Sullivan secured
New York in 1779, forcing the Loyalist Indians permanently into Canada. [38]

Some African-American slaves became politically active and supported the king, especially in
Virginia where the royal governor actively recruited black men into the British forces in return
for manumission, protection for their families, and the promise of land grants. Following the war,
many of these "Black Loyalists" settled in Nova Scotia, Upper and Lower Canada, and other
parts of the British Empire, where the descendants of some remain today. [39]

A minority of uncertain size tried to stay neutral in the war. Most kept a low profile. However,
the Quakers, especially in Pennsylvania, were the most important group that was outspoken for
neutrality. As patriots declared independence, the Quakers, who continued to do business with
the British, were attacked as supporters of British rule, "contrivers and authors of seditious
publications" critical of the revolutionary cause.[40]
After the war, the great majority of the 450,000–500,000 Loyalists remained in America and
resumed normal lives. Some, such as Samuel Seabury, became prominent American leaders.
Estimates vary, but about 62,000 Loyalists relocated to Canada, and others to Britain (7,000) or
to Florida or the West Indies (9,000). This made up approximately 2% of the total population of
the colonies. When Loyalists left the Southin 1783, they took thousands of blacks with them as
slaves to the British West Indies.[41]

[edit]Women

Abigail Adams

Main article: Women in the American Revolution

Several types of women contributed to the American Revolution in multiple ways. Like men,
women participated on both sides of the war. Among women, European Americans, African
Americans, and Native Americans also divided between the Patriot and Loyalist causes.

While formal Revolutionary politics did not include women, ordinary domestic behaviors became
charged with political significance as patriot women confronted a war that permeated all aspects
of political, civil, and domestic life. They participated by boycotting British goods, spying on the
British, following armies as they marched, washing, cooking, and tending for soldiers, delivering
secret messages, and in a few cases like Deborah Samson fighting disguised as men. Above all,
they continued the agricultural work at home to feed the armies and their families. [42]

The boycott of British goods required the willing participation of American women; the boycotted
items were largely household items such as tea and cloth. Women had to return to spinning and
weaving—skills that had fallen into disuse. In 1769, the women of Boston produced 40,000
skeins of yarn, and 180 women in Middletown, Massachusetts, wove 20,522 yards (18,765 m) of
cloth.[43]

A crisis of political loyalties could also disrupt the fabric of colonial America women’s social
worlds: whether a man did or did not renounce his allegiance to the king could dissolve ties of
class, family, and friendship, isolating women from former connections. A woman’s loyalty to her
husband, once a private commitment, could become a political act, especially for women in
America committed to men who remained loyal to the king. Legal divorce, usually rare, was
granted to patriot women whose husbands supported the king. [44]

[edit]Other participants
[edit]Spain

Spain joined in full the cause of the American Revolution by declaring war on England on June
21, 1779. Bernardo de Gálvez y Madrid, general of the Spanish forces in New Spain who also
served as governor of Louisiana was sent to Florida at the head of an expedition of colonial
[45]
troops to aid the American colonists in their rebellion against Britain . The importance of
Galvez's campaign from the American perspective was that he denied the British the opportunity
of encircling the American rebels from the south, and kept open a vital conduit for supplies. In
recognition to his help to the American cause, George Washington took him to his right in the
parade of July 4 and the American Congress cited Gálvez for his aid during the Revolution. [46][47]

[edit]France

In early 1776, France set up a major program of aid to the Americans, and the Spanish secretly
added funds. Each country spent one million "livres tournaises" to buy munitions. A dummy
corporation run by Pierre Beaumarchais concealed their activities. Americans obtained some
munitions through Holland as well as French and Spanish ports in the West Indies.[48]

[edit]Native Americans
The great majority of the 200,000 Native Americans east of the Mississippi distrusted the
colonists and supported the British cause.[49] Even though there was no major Native American
participation during the war, the British provided funding and weapons to attack American
outposts. Some Indians tried to remain neutral, seeing little value in participating yet again in a
European conflict. A few supported the American cause. [50]

The British provided arms for the Indians, under Loyalist leadership, to raid frontier settlements
from the Carolinas to New York, threatening to massacre the settlers, especially in Pennsylvania.
The most prominent was Mohawk chief Joseph Brant, who led a band of 300 Indian warriors and
100 white loyalists in 1778 and 1780 multiple attacks on small settlements in New York and
Pennsylvania.[51] In 1776 Cherokee war parties attacked all along the southern frontier. [52]

While the Cherokee could launch raids numbering a couple hundred warriors, as seen in
the Chickamauga Wars, they could not mobilize enough forces to fight a major invasion without
allies. In 1779 Washington sent General John Sullivan with four brigades of Continental soldiers
to drive the Iroquois out of upstate western New York. There was little combat but Sullivan
systematically burned 40 (empty) Indian villages and, most important, destroyed about 160,000
bushels of corn that comprised the winter food supply. Facing starvation the Iroquois
permanently fled to the Niagara Falls area and to Canada, where the British fed them. [53]

At the peace conference the British abandoned their Indian allies, and the Americans took
possession of all the land west of the Mississippi and north of Florida. Calloway concludes:

Burned villages and crops, murdered chiefs, divided councils and civil wars, migrations, towns
and forts choked with refugees, economic disruption, breaking of ancient traditions, losses in
battle and to disease and hunger, betrayal to their enemies, all made the American Revolution
one of the darkest periods in American Indian history. [54]

The British, however, did not give up their forts in the west until 1796 and kept alive the
dream of one day forming a satellite Indian nation in what is now the Ohio to Wisconsin
part of the Midwest. That goal was one of the causes of the War of 1812.[55][56]

[edit]Slaves

Some slaves understood Revolutionary rhetoric as promising freedom and equality. Both
British and American governments made promises of freedom for service and some slaves
fought in one or the other armies. Starting in 1777 abolition occurred in the North, usually
on a gradual schedule with no payments to the owners, but slavery persisted in the South
and took on new life after 1790.[57]

During the Revolution, efforts were made by the British to turn slavery against the
Americans,[35] but historian David Brion Davis explains the difficulties with a policy of
wholesale arming of the slaves:

But England greatly feared the effects of any such move on its own West Indies, where
Americans had already aroused alarm over a possible threat to incite slave insurrections.
The British elites also understood that an all-out attack on one form of property could easily
lead to an assault on all boundaries of privilege and social order, as envisioned by radical
religious sects in Britain’s seventeenth-century civil wars.[58]
Davis underscored the British dilemma: "Britain, when confronted by the rebellious
American colonists, hoped to exploit their fear of slave revolts while also reassuring the
large number of slave-holding Loyalists and wealthy Caribbean planters and merchants
that their slave property would be secure". [59] The colonists accused the British of
encouraging slave revolts.[60]

American advocates of independence were commonly lampooned in Britain for their

hypocritical calls for freedom, while many of their leaders were slave-holders. Samuel
Johnson snapped, "how is it we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the [slave] drivers
of the Negroes?"[61]Benjamin Franklin countered by criticizing the British self-congratulation
about "the freeing of one Negro" (Somersett) while they continued to permit the Slave
Trade.[62]

Phyllis Wheatley, a black poet who popularized the image of Columbia to represent
America, came to public attention when her Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and
Moral appeared in 1773[63]

[edit]Military hostilities begin

Further information: Shot heard round the world, Boston campaign, Invasion of Canada
(1775)

Join, or Die by Benjamin Franklin was recycled to encourage the former colonies to unite against
British rule.

The Battle of Lexington and Concord took place April 19, 1775, when the British sent a
force of roughly 1000 troops to confiscate arms and arrest revolutionaries in Concord.
[64]
They clashed with the local militia, marking the first fighting of the American
Revolutionary War. The news aroused the 13 colonies to call out their militias and send
troops to besiege Boston. The Battle of Bunker Hill followed on June 17, 1775. While a
British victory, it was at a great cost; about 1,000 British casualties from a garrison of about
6,000, as compared to 500 American casualties from a much larger force. [65][66]
The Second Continental Congress convened in 1775, after the war had started. The
Congress created the Continental Army and extended the Olive Branch Petition to the
crown as an attempt at reconciliation. King George III refused to receive it, issuing instead
the Proclamation of Rebellion, requiring action against the "traitors".

In the winter of 1775, the Americans invaded Canada. General Richard

Montgomery capturedMontreal but a joint attack on Quebec with the help of Benedict
Arnold failed.

In March 1776, with George Washington as the commander of the new army,
the Continental Army forced the British to evacuate Boston. The revolutionaries were now
in full control of all 13 colonies and were ready to declare independence. While there still
were many Loyalists, they were no longer in control anywhere by July 1776, and all of the
Royal officials had fled.[67]

[edit]Prisoners

Main article: Prisoners in the American Revolutionary War

In August 1775, the King declared Americans in arms against royal authority to
be traitors to the Crown. The British government at first started treating captured rebel
combatants as common criminals and preparations were made to bring them to trial for
treason. American Secretary Lord Germain and First Lord of the Admiralty Lord
Sandwich were especially eager to do so, with a particular emphasis on those who had
previously served in British units (and thereby sworn an oath of allegiance to the crown).

Many of the prisoners taken by the British at Bunker Hill apparently expected to be hanged,
but British authorities declined to take the next step: treason trials and executions. There
were tens of thousands of Loyalists under American control who would have been at risk
for treason trials of their own (by the Americans) [clarification needed], and the British built much of
their strategy around using these Loyalists. After the surrender at Saratoga in 1777, there
were thousands of British prisoners in American hands.

Therefore no American prisoners were put on trial for treason, although most were badly
treated and many died nonetheless, resulting in more deaths than every American
battlefield and naval action fatality, combined.[68][69] Eventually they were technically
accorded the rights of belligerents in 1782, by act of Parliament, when they were officially
recognized as prisoners of war rather than traitors. At the end of the war, both sides
released their surviving prisoners.[70]

[edit]Creating new state constitutions

Following the Battle of Bunker Hill in June 1775, the Patriots had control of most of the
territory and population; the Loyalists were powerless. [dubious – discuss] In all thirteen colonies,
Patriots had overthrown their existing governments, closing courts and driving British
governors, agents and supporters from their homes. They had elected conventions and
"legislatures" that existed outside of any legal framework; new constitutions were used in
each state to supersede royal charters. They declared they were states now, not colonies.
[71]

On January 5, 1776, New Hampshire ratified the first state constitution, six months before
the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Then, in May 1776, Congress voted to
suppress all forms of crown authority, to be replaced by locally created
authority. Virginia, South Carolina, and New Jersey created their constitutions before July
4. Rhode Island and Connecticut simply took their existing royal chartersand deleted all
references to the crown.[72]

The new states had to decide not only what form of government to create, they first had to
decide how to select those who would craft the constitutions and how the resulting
document would be ratified. In states where the wealthy exerted firm control over the
process, such as Maryland, Virginia, Delaware, New York and Massachusetts, the results
were constitutions that featured:

 Substantial property qualifications for voting and even more substantial requirements
for elected positions (though New York and Maryland lowered property qualifications);
[71]

 Bicameral legislatures, with the upper house as a check on the lower;

 Strong governors, with veto power over the legislature and substantial appointment
authority;
 Few or no restraints on individuals holding multiple positions in government;
 The continuation of state-established religion.
Dr. Benjamin Rush, 1783

In states where the less affluent had organized sufficiently to have significant power—
especially Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New Hampshire—the resulting constitutions
embodied

 universal white manhood suffrage, or minimal property requirements for voting or

holding office (New Jersey enfranchised some property owning widows, a step that it
retracted 25 years later);

 strong, unicameral legislatures;

 relatively weak governors, without veto powers, and little appointing authority;
 prohibition against individuals holding multiple government posts;

Whether conservatives or radicals held sway in a state did not mean that the side with less
power accepted the result quietly. The radical provisions of Pennsylvania's constitution
lasted only fourteen years. In 1790, conservatives gained power in the state legislature,
called a new constitutional convention, and rewrote the constitution. The new constitution
substantially reduced universal white-male suffrage, gave the governor veto power and
patronage appointment authority, and added an upper house with substantial wealth
qualifications to the unicameral legislature. Thomas Paine called it a constitution unworthy
of America.[73]

[edit]Independence and Union

Further information: United States Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation
and Perpetual Union

Common Sense by Thomas Paine

On January 10, 1776, Thomas Paine published a political pamphlet entitled Common
Sensearguing that the only solution to the problems with Britain was independence and a
liberal republic.[74] In the ensuing months, before the allied states declared independence in
unison in the name of the United States, the colonies had begun the process of creating
their own constitutions to form sovereign states and some of them individually took the step
to declare independence. Virginia, for instance, declared its independence from Great
Britain on May 15, 1776. The war had been underway since April 1775, and until this point,
the states had sought favorable peace terms; compromise was no longer a possibility,
despite belated British efforts to come to a political resolution. [75]
Johannes Adam Simon Oertel. Pulling Down the Statue of King George III, N.Y.C., ca. 1859. The
painting is a romanticised version of the Sons of Liberty destroying the symbol of monarchy following
the reading by George Washington of the United States Declaration of Independence to
the Continental Army and residents on the New York City commons, July 9th, 1776.

On June 11, 1776, the Second Continental Congress appointed a committee to prepare a
draft declaration of independence. Thomas Jefferson, with John Adams and Benjamin
Franklin, brought the draft before Congress on June 28. On July 2, 1776, Congress voted
the independence of the United States; two days later, on July 4, it adopted the Declaration
of Independence, which date is now celebrated as Independence Day in the United States.

On June 12, 1776, the Second Continental Congress resolved to appoint a committee of
thirteen to prepare a draft agreement on a governing constitution and a perpetual union of
the states. The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, commonly known as
the Articles of Confederation or simply the Articles, formed the first governing document of
the United States of America, based on a confederation type government. Of equal
importance is the fact that the Articles combined the sovereign states into a perpetual
Union. The Second Continental Congress approved the Articles for ratification by the
States on November 15, 1777, and began operating under their terms. The Articles were
formally ratified when the representatives of Maryland became the last to apply their
signatures to the document on March 1, 1781. At that point, the Continental Congress was
dissolved and on the following day a new government of the United States in Congress
Assembled took its place, with Samuel Huntington as President.[76][77]

[edit]Defending the Revolution

Main article: American Revolutionary War

George Washington rallying his troops at the Battle of Princeton

[edit]British return: 1776–1777

Further information: New York and New Jersey campaign, Staten Island Peace
Conference,Saratoga campaign, Philadelphia campaign

After Washington forced the British out of Boston in spring 1776, neither the British nor the
Loyalists controlled any significant areas. The British, however, were massing forces at
their great naval base at Halifax, Nova Scotia. They returned in force in July 1776, landing
in New York and defeating Washington's Continental Army in August at the Battle of
Brooklyn in one of the largest engagements of the war. The British requested a meeting
with representatives from Congress to negotiate an end to hostilities, and a delegation
including John Adams and Benjamin Franklin met Howe on Staten Island in New York
Harbor on September 11. Howe demanded a retraction of the Declaration of
Independence, which was refused, and negotiations ended until 1781. The British
then quickly seized New York City and nearly captured General Washington. They made
the city their main political and military base of operations in North America, holding it until
November 1783. New York City consequently became the destination for Loyalist refugees,
and a focal point of Washington's intelligence network.[78] The British also took New Jersey,
pushing the Continental Army into Pennsylvania, but in a surprise attack in late December
1776 Washington crossed the Delaware River back into New Jersey and defeated Hessian
and British armies at Trenton and Princeton, thereby regaining New Jersey. The victories
gave an important boost to pro-independence supporters at a time when morale was
flagging, and have become iconic events of the war.

In 1777, as part of a grand strategy to end the war, the British sent an invasion force from
Canada to seal off New England, which the British perceived as the primary source of
agitators. In a major case of mis-coordination, the British army in New York City went to
Philadelphia which it captured from Washington. The invasion army under Burgoyne waited
in vain for reinforcements from New York, and became trapped upstate. It surrendered after
the Battle of Saratoga, New York, in October 1777. From early October 1777 until
November 15 a pivotal siege atFort Mifflin, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania distracted British
troops and allowed Washington time to preserve the Continental Army by safely leading his
troops to harsh winter quarters at Valley Forge.

[edit]American alliances after 1778

Further information: France in the American Revolutionary War, Spain in the American
Revolutionary War

The capture of a British army at Saratoga encouraged the French to formally enter the war
in support of Congress, as Benjamin Franklin negotiated a permanent military alliance in
early 1778, significantly becoming the first country to officially recognize the Declaration of
Independence. William Pitt spoke out in parliament urging Britain to make peace in
America, and unite with America against France, while other British politicians who had
previously sympathised with colonial grievances now turned against the American rebels
for allying with British international rival and enemy. [79]

Later Spain (in 1779) and the Dutch (1780) became allies of the French, leaving the British
Empire to fight a global war alone without major allies, and requiring it to slip through a
combined blockade of the Atlantic. The American theater thus became only one front in
Britain's war.[80][81] The British were forced to withdraw troops from continental America to
reinforce the valuable sugar-producing Caribbean colonies, which were considered more
valuable.

Because of the alliance with France and the deteriorating military situation, Sir Henry
Clinton, the British commander, evacuated Philadelphia to reinforce New York City. General
Washington attempted to intercept the retreating column, resulting in the Battle of
Monmouth Court House, the last major battle fought in the north. After an inconclusive
engagement, the British successfully retreated to New York City. The northern war
subsequently became a stalemate, as the focus of attention shifted to the smaller southern
theater.[82]

[edit]The British move South, 1778–1783

Further information: Southern theater of the American Revolutionary War, Naval operations
in the American Revolutionary War

The British strategy in America now concentrated on a campaign in the southern colonies.
With fewer regular troops at their disposal, the British commanders saw the Southern
Strategy as a more viable plan, as the south was perceived as being more strongly
Loyalist, with a large population of recent immigrants as well as large numbers of slaves
who might be captured or run away to join the British. [83]

Beginning in late December 1778, the British captured Savannah and controlled the
Georgia coastline. In 1780 they launched a fresh invasion and took Charleston as well. A
significant victory at the Battle of Camden meant that royal forces soon controlled most of
Georgia and South Carolina. The British set up a network of forts inland, hoping the
Loyalists would rally to the flag. Not enough Loyalists turned out, however, and the British
had to fight their way north into North Carolina and Virginia, with a severely weakened
army. Behind them much of the territory they had already captured dissolved into a
chaotic guerrilla war, fought predominantly between bands of Loyalist and American militia,
which negated many of the gains the British had previously made. [84] The excesses brought
on by the guerilla warfare (though famously exaggerated in the 2000 film The Patriot) were
enough to erode support for the British in the region where it had been strongest.

[edit]Yorktown 1781

Main article: Siege of Yorktown

The siege of Yorktown ended with the surrender of a second British army, paving the way for the end
of the American Revolutionary War

The southern British army marched to Yorktown, Virginia where they expected to be
rescued by a British fleet which would take them back to New York. [85] When that fleet was
defeated by a French fleet, however, they became trapped in Yorktown.[86] In October 1781
under a combined siege by the French and Continental armies, the British, under the
command of General Cornwallis, surrendered. However, Cornwallis was so embarrassed at
his defeat that he had to send his second in command to surrender for him. [87]
News of the defeat effectively ended major offensive operations in America. Support for the
conflict had never been strong in Britain, where many sympathised with the rebels, but now
it reached a new low.[88]

Although King George III personally wanted to fight on, his supporters lost control of
Parliament, and no further major land offensives were launched in the American Theatre.
[89]
A final naval battle was fought on March 10, 1783 off the coast of Cape Canaveral by
CaptainJohn Barry and his crew of the USS Alliance who defeated three British warships
led by HMSSybil, who were trying to take the payroll of the Continental Army.

[edit]Peace treaty

Main article: Treaty of Paris (1783)

The peace treaty with Britain, known as the Treaty of Paris, gave the U.S. all land east of
the Mississippi River and south of the Great Lakes, though not including Florida (On
September 3, 1783, Britain entered into a separate agreement with Spain under which
Britain ceded Florida back to Spain.). The Native American nations actually living in this
region were not a party to this treaty and did not recognize it until they were defeated
militarily by the United States. Issues regarding boundaries and debts were not resolved
until the Jay Treaty of 1795.[90]

[edit]Impact on Britain
Losing the war and the 13 colonies was a shock to the British system. The war revealed
the limitations of Britain's fiscal-military state when it had powerful enemies, no allies,
depended on extended and vulnerable transatlantic lines of communication, and was faced
for the first time since the 17th century by both Protestant and Catholic foes. The defeat
heightened dissension and escalated political antagonism to the King's ministers. Inside
parliament, the primary concern changed from fears of an over-mighty monarch to the
issues of representation, parliamentary reform , and government retrenchment. Reformers
sought to destroy what they saw as widespread institutional corruption. The result was a
powerful crisis, 1776-1783. The peace in 1783 left France financially prostrate, while the
British economy boomed thanks to the return of American business. The crisis ended after
1784 thanks to the king's shrewdness in outwitting Charles James Fox (the leader of
theFox-North Coalition), and renewed confidence in the system engendered by the
leadership of the new Prime Minister, William Pitt. Historians conclude that loss of the
American colonies enabled Britain to deal with the French Revolution with more unity and
better organization than would otherwise have been the case. [91][92]
[edit]Immediate aftermath

See also: Annapolis Convention (1786), Philadelphia Convention, Constitution of the

United States of America, and United States Bill of Rights
[edit]Interpretations

Interpretations about the effect of the Revolution vary. Though contemporary participants
referred to the events as "the revolution",[93] at one end of the spectrum is the view that the
American Revolution was not "revolutionary" at all, contending that it did not radically
transform colonial society but simply replaced a distant government with a local one.
[94]
More recent scholarship pioneered by historians such asBernard Bailyn, Gordon Wood,
and Edmund Morgan accepts the contemporary view of the participants that the American
Revolution was a unique and radical event that produced deep changes and had a
profound impact on world affairs, based on an increasing belief in the principles of the
Enlightenment as reflected in how liberalism was understood during the period, and
republicanism. These were demonstrated by a leadership and government that espoused
protection of natural rights, and a system of laws chosen by the people. [95]

Some historians, such as Daniel Boorstin, see the motivation for the revolution as primarily
legal.[96] The adherence of the colonists to the British constitution and what they viewed to
be the tyrannical deprivation of English rights by the British Parliament, in concert with the
failure of King George III to protect his subjects from such abuses, are what he sees as
compelling the colonists to sever political ties with Great Britain.[96]

[edit]Loyalist expatriation
For roughly five percent of the inhabitants of the United States, defeat was followed by self-
exile. Of those, approximately 62,000 United Empire Loyalists left the newly founded
republic, most settling in the remaining British colonies in North America, such as
the Province of Quebec (concentrating in the Eastern Townships), Prince Edward Island,
and Nova Scotia. The new colonies of Upper Canada (now Ontario) and New
Brunswick were created by Britain for their benefit.[97]

[edit]As an example or inspiration

See also: Atlantic Revolutions

After the Revolution, genuinely democratic politics became possible. [98] The rights of the
people were incorporated into state constitutions. Thus came the widespread assertion of
liberty, individual rights, equality and hostility toward corruption which would prove core
values of republicanism to Americans. The greatest challenge to the old order in Europe
was the challenge to inherited political power and the democratic idea that government
rests on the consent of the governed. The example of the first successful revolution against
a European empire, and the first successful establishment of a republican form
of democratically elected government, provided a model for many other colonial peoples
who realized that they too could break away and become self-governing nations
with directly elected representative government.[99]

In 1777, Morocco was the first state to recognize the independence of the United States of
America. The two countries signed the Moroccan-American Treaty of Friendship ten years
later. Friesland, one of the seven United Provinces of the Dutch Republic, was the next to
recognize American independence (February 26, 1782), followed by the Staten-Generaal of
the Dutch Republic on April 19, 1782. John Adams became the first US Ambassador in The
Hague.[100].

Since the Dutch Republic was at war with the United Kingdom at the signing of the treaty in
1782, it is often considered that Sweden was the first neutral sovereign power that
recognized the United States of America. On April 3, 1783, Ambassador Extraordinary and
Plenipotentiary, Count Gustaf Philip Creutz, representing the King of Sweden,
and Benjamin Franklin, Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States of America, signed a
Treaty of Amity and Commerce in Paris, France. In the Treaty, they pledged, firm, inviolable
and universal peace and a true and sincere friendship between the King, his heirs and
successors, and the United States of America.[101].

The American Revolution was the first wave of the Atlantic Revolutions that took hold in
the French Revolution, the Haitian Revolution, and theLatin American wars of
independence. Aftershocks reached Ireland in the Irish Rebellion of 1798, in the Polish-
Lithuanian Commonwealth, and in the Netherlands.[102]

The Revolution had a strong, immediate impact in Great Britain, Ireland, the Netherlands,
and France. Many British and Irish Whigs spoke in favor of the American cause. The
Revolution, along with the Dutch Revolt (end of the 16th century) and the English Civil
War (in the 17th century), was one of the first lessons in overthrowing an old regime for
many Europeans who later were active during the era of the French Revolution, such
as Marquis de Lafayette. The American Declaration of Independence had some impact on
the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen of 1789.[103][104] The spirit of the
Declaration of Independence led to laws ending slavery in all the Northern states and the
Northwest Territory, with New Jersey the last in 1804—long before the British Parliament
acted in 1833 to abolish slavery in its colonies.[105]
[edit]National debt
See also: United States public debt, Federalist Papers, and Alexander Hamilton

The national debt after the American Revolution fell into three categories. The first was the
$11 million owed to foreigners—mostly debts to France during the American Revolution.
The second and third—roughly $24 million each—were debts owed by the national and
state governments to Americans who had sold food, horses, and supplies to the
revolutionary forces. Congress agreed that the power and the authority of the new
government would pay for the foreign debts. There were also other debts that consisted
of promissory notes issued during the Revolutionary War to soldiers, merchants, and
farmers who accepted these payments on the premise that the new Constitution would
create a government that would pay these debts eventually. The war expenses of the
individual states added up to $114,000,000, compared to $37 million by the central
government.[106] In 1790, at the recommendation of first Secretary of the
Treasury Alexander Hamilton, Congress combined the remaining state debts with the
foreign and domestic debts into one national debt totaling $80 million. Everyone received
face value for wartime certificates, so that the national honor would be sustained and the
national credit established.

[edit]See also

 Timeline of the American Revolution

 American Enlightenment
 Diplomacy in the American Revolutionary War
 List of plays and films about the American Revolution
 Second American Revolution

[edit]Bibliography

[edit]Notes

1. ^ Wood (1992); Greene & Pole (1994) ch. 70

2. ^ Douglas Brinkley "'The Sparck of Rebellion,'" American Heritage, Winter 2010.

3. ^ Charles W. Toth, Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite: The American Revolution & the

European Response. (1989) p. 26.

4. ^ page 101, Philosophical Tales, by Martin Cohen, (Blackwell 2008)

5. ^ Stanley Weintraub, Iron Tears: America's Battle for Freedom, Britain's Quagmire,

1775-1783 (2005) ch 1
6. ^ Bernard Bailyn, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution (1967)

7. ^ Gordon S. Wood The Radicalism of the American Revolution (1992) pp. 35, 174-5

8. ^ Robert E. Shalhope, "Toward a Republican Synthesis", William and Mary Quarterly,

29 (Jan. 1972), pp 49–80

9. ^ Adams quoted in Paul A. Rahe, Republics Ancient and Modern: Classical

Republicanism and the American Revolution. Volume: 2 (1994) P. 23.

10. ^ Robert A. Ferguson, "The Commonalities of Common Sense", William and Mary

Quarterly, July 2000, Vol. 57#3 pp 465-504 in JSTOR

11. ^ Bonomi, p 186

12. ^ William H. Nelson, The American Tory (1961) esp p. 186

13. ^ Bonomi, p. 186, Chapter 7 “Religion and the American Revolution

14. ^ Bernard Bailyn, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution 1992 p. 273-4,

299–300

15. ^ Bailyn, 1992 p.303

16. ^ Otis H. Stephens and Richard A. Glenn, Unreasonable searches and seizures: rights

and liberties under the law (2006) p. 306

17. ^ a b Miller (1943)

18. ^ Greene & Pole (1994) ch 15

19. ^ Greene & Pole (1994) ch 11

20. ^ Middlekauff pg. 62.

21. ^ Miller, p.89

22. ^ John Shy, Toward Lexington. The Role of the British Army in the Coming of the

American Revolution (1965)

23. ^ Shy, Toward Lexington (1965)

24. ^ William S. Carpenter, "Taxation Without Representation" in Dictionary of American

History, Volume 7 (1976); Miller (1943)

25. ^ Pauline Maier, From Resistance to Revolution: Colonial Radicals and the

Development of American Opposition to Britain, 1765–1776 (1972)

26. ^ Miller (1943) pp 353–76

27. ^ Greene & Pole (1994) ch 22–24

28. ^ Chisick, Harvey (2005-02). "Historical Dictionary of the Enlightenment". pp. 313–314

29. ^ Leonard Woods Larabee, Conservatism in Early American History (1948) pp 164-65

30. ^ See also N. E. H. Hull, Peter C. Hoffer and Steven L. Allen, "Choosing Sides: A

Quantitative Study of the Personality Determinants of Loyalist and Revolutionary

Political Affiliation in New York", Journal of American History, Vol. 65, No. 2 (Sept.

1978), pp. 344-366 in JSTOR

31. ^ The most in-depth study of the Patriot psychology is Edwin G. Burrows and Michael

Wallace, "The American Revolution: The Ideology and Psychology of National

Liberation", Perspectives in American History, (1972) vol. 6 pp 167-306

32. ^ Gordon S. Wood, "Rhetoric and Reality in the American Revolution", William and

Mary Quarterly, Vol. 23, No. 1 (Jan., 1966), pp. 4-32 in JSTOR

33. ^ Nash (2005); Resch (2006)

34. ^ Staff. Tory, Encyclopaedia Britannica

35. ^ a b Revolutionary War: The Home Front, The Library of Congress

36. ^ Calhoon, "Loyalism and neutrality" in Greene and Pole, A Companion to the

American Revolution (2000) p.235

37. ^ Calhoon, Robert M. "Loyalism and neutrality" in Greene and Pole, The Blackwell

Encyclopedia of the American Revolution (1991)

38. ^ Colin G. Calloway, The American Revolution in Indian Country: Crisis and Diversity

in Native American Communities (1995)

39. ^ Hill (2007), see also blackloyalist.com

40. ^ Gottlieb 2005

41. ^ Greene & Pole (1994) ch. 20–22

42. ^ Carol Berkin, Revolutionary Mothers: Women in the Struggle for America's

Independence (2005)

43. ^ Berkin (2005); Greene & Pole (1994) ch. 41

44. ^ Linda Kerber, Women of the Republic: Intellect and Ideology in Revolutionary

America (1997) ch. 4, 6; also see Mary Beth Norton, Liberty's Daughters: The

Revolutionary Experience of American Women (1980)

45. ^ Edward F. Butler, "Spain's Involvement in the American Revolutionary War" The SAR

Magazine Vol. 104 No. 1

46. ^ U.S. nps.gov, Bernardo de Gálvez: how much different American history might have

been without him!

47. ^ Thompson, Buchanan Parker, "Spain: Forgotten Ally of the American Revolution".

North Quincy, Mass.: Christopher Publishing House, 1976.

48. ^ Jonathan Dull, A Diplomatic History of the American Revolution (1985) pp 57–65

49. ^ Greene and Pole (2004) chapters 19, 46 and 51; Colin G. Calloway, The American

Revolution in Indian Country: Crisis and Diversity in Native American

Communities (1995)

50. ^ Joseph T. Glatthaar and James Kirby Martin, Forgotten Allies: The Oneida Indians

and the American Revolution (2007)

51. ^ see Barbara Graymont, "Thayendanegea", Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online

52. ^ Tom Hatley, The Dividing Paths: Cherokees and South Carolinians through the Era

of Revolution (1993); James H. O'Donnell, III, Southern Indians in the American

Revolution (1973)

53. ^ Joseph R. Fischer, A Well-Executed Failure: The Sullivan Campaign against the

Iroquois, July–September 1779 (1997).

54. ^ Calloway (1995) p. 290

55. ^ Dwight L. Smith, "A North American Neutral Indian Zone: Persistence of a British

Idea" Northwest Ohio Quarterly 1989 61(2–4): 46–63

56. ^ Francis M. Carroll, A Good and Wise Measure: The Search for the Canadian-

American Boundary, 1783–1842, 2001, page 23

57. ^ Benjamin Quarles, The Negro in the American Revolution (1961)

58. ^ Davis p. 148

59. ^ Davis p. 149

60. ^ Schama p.28-30 p. 78-90

61. ^ Stanley Weintraub, Iron Tears: America's Battle for Freedom, Britain's Quagmire,

1775-1783 (2005) p. 7

62. ^ Schama p.75

63. ^ Hochschild p.50-51

64. ^ Morrisey p.35

65. ^ Harvey p.208-210

66. ^ Urban p.74

67. ^ Miller (1948) p. 87

68. ^ Onderdonk, Henry. "Revolutionary Incidents of Suffolk and Kings Counties; With an

Account of the Battle of Long Island and the British Prisons and Prison-Ships at New

York". ISBN 978-0804680752

69. ^ Dring, Thomas and Greene, Albert. "Recollections of the Jersey Prison Ship"

(American Experience Series, No 8), 1986 (originally printed 1826). ISBN 978-

0918222923

70. ^ John C. Miller, Triumph of Freedom, 1775–1783 1948. Page 166.

71. ^ a b Nevins (1927); Greene & Pole (1994) ch 29

72. ^ Nevins (1927)

73. ^ Wood (1992)

74. ^ Greene and Pole (1994) ch 26.

75. ^ Greene and Pole (1994) ch 27.

76. ^ Greene and Pole (1994) ch 30;

77. ^ Klos, Stanley L. (2004). President Who? Forgotten Founders. Pittsburgh,

Pennsylvania: Evisum, Inc.. ISBN 0-9752627-5-0.

78. ^ Schecter, Barnet. The Battle for New York: The City at the Heart of the American

Revolution. (2002); McCullough, 1776 (2005)

79. ^ Stanley Weintraub, Iron Tears: America's Battle for Freedom, Britain's Quagmire,

1775-1783 (2005) p. 151

80. ^ Mackesy, 1992

81. ^ Higginbotham (1983)

82. ^ Higginbotham, p 83

83. ^ Jeffrey J. Crow and Larry E. Tise, eds. The Southern Experience in the American

Revolution (1978)

84. ^ Henry Lumpkin, From Savannah to Yorktown: The American Revolution in the

South (2000)

85. ^ Harvey p.493-95

86. ^ Harvey p.502-06

87. ^ Harvey p.515

88. ^ Harvey p.528

89. ^ Mackesy, 1992; Higginbotham (1983)

90. ^ Miller (1948), pp 616–48

91. ^ William Hague, William Pitt the Younger (2004)

92. ^ Jeremy Black, George III: America’s Last King(2006)

93. ^ McCullough, David. John Adams. Simon & Schuster, 2001. ISBN-9780743223133

94. ^ Greene, Jack. "The American Revolution Section 25". The American Historical

Review. Retrieved 2007-01-06.

95. ^ Wood (2003)

96. ^ a b Boorstin, Daniel J. (1953). The Genius of American Politics. Chicago: University of

Chicago Press.

97. ^ Van Tine American Loyalists 1902

98. ^ Wood, Radicalism, p. 278-9

99. ^ Palmer, (1959)

100.^ "Frisians first to recognize USA! (After an article by Kerst Huisman, Leeuwarder

Courant 29th Dec. 1999)". Retrieved 2009-10-29.

101.^ "Proclamation by the President of the United States, April 4, 1983". Retrieved 2009-

07-20.

102.^ Palmer, (1959); Greene & Pole (1994) ch 53–55

103.^ Palmer, (1959); Greene & Pole (1994) ch 49–52.

 104.^ "Enlightenment and Human Rights". Retrieved 2007-01-06.

105.^ Greene and Pole p. 409, 453-54

106.^ Jensen, The New Nation (1950) p 379

[edit]Reference works

 Barnes, Ian, and Charles Royster. The Historical Atlas of the American
Revolution (2000), maps and commentary

 Blanco, Richard. The American Revolution: An Encyclopedia 2 vol (1993), 1850 pages
 Boatner, Mark Mayo, III. Encyclopedia of the American Revolution. (1966); revised
1974. ISBN 0-8117-0578-1; new expanded edition 2006 ed. by Harold E. Selesky
 Fremont-Barnes, Gregory, and Richard A. Ryerson, eds. The Encyclopedia of the
American Revolutionary War: A Political, Social, and Military History (5 vol. 2006) 1000
entries by 150 experts, covering all topics
 Greene, Jack P. and J. R. Pole, eds. A Companion to the American Revolution (2004),
777pp an expanded edition of Greene and Pole, eds. The Blackwell Encyclopedia of
the American Revolution (1994); comprehensive coverage of political and social
themes and international dimension; thin on military
 Purcell, L. Edward. Who Was Who in the American Revolution (1993); 1500 short
biographies
 Resch, John P., ed. Americans at War: Society, Culture and the Homefront vol 1
(2005), articles by scholars

[edit]Surveys

 Axelrod, Alan. The Real History of the American Revolution: A New Look at the
Past (2009), well-illustrated popular history

 Bancroft, George. History of the United States of America, from the discovery of the
American continent. (1854–78), vol 4–10 online edition, classic 19th century narrative;
highly detailed
 Black, Jeremy. War for America: The Fight for Independence 1775-1783 (2001) 266pp;
by leading British scholar
 Cogliano, Francis D. Revolutionary America, 1763–1815; A Political History (2000),
British textbook
 Higginbotham, Don. The War of American Independence: Military Attitudes, Policies,
and Practice, 1763–1789 (1983) Online in ACLS Humanities E-book Project;
comprehensive coverage of military and domestic aspects of the war.
 Jensen, Merrill. The Founding of a Nation: A History of the American Revolution 1763–
1776. (2004)
 Knollenberg, Bernhard. Growth of the American Revolution: 1766–1775 (2003) online
edition
 Lecky, William Edward Hartpole. The American Revolution, 1763–1783 (1898), older
British perspective online edition
 Mackesy, Piers. The War for America: 1775–1783 (1992), British military study online
edition
 Middlekauff, Robert. The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763–
1789 (2005). The 1985 version is available online at online edition
 Miller, John C. Triumph of Freedom, 1775–1783 (1948) online edition
 Miller, John C. Origins of the American Revolution (1943) online edition, to 1775
 Rakove, Jack N. Revolutionaries: A New History of the Invention of America (2010)
interpretation by leading scholar excerpt and text search
 Weintraub, Stanley. Iron Tears: Rebellion in America 1775–83 (2005) excerpt and text
search, popular
 Wood, Gordon S. The American Revolution: A History (2003), short survey by leading
scholar
 Wrong, George M. Washington and His Comrades in Arms: A Chronicle of the War of
Independence (1921) online short survey by Canadian scholar

[edit]Specialized studies

 Bailyn, Bernard. The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution. Harvard

University Press, 1967. ISBN 0-674-44301-2

 Becker, Carl. The Declaration of Independence: A Study on the History of Political

Ideas (1922)online edition
 Bemis, Samuel Flagg. The Diplomacy of the American Revolution (1935) online edition
 Berkin, Carol.Revolutionary Mothers: Women in the Struggle for America's
Independence (2006)
 Breen, T. H. The Marketplace of Revolution: How Consumer Politics Shaped American
Independence (2005)
 Breen, T. H. American Insurgents, American Patriots: The Revolution of the
People (2010) 337 pages; examines rebellions in 1774-76 including loosely organized
militants who emptied the countryside of Crown officials and later channeled their
resistance through locally elected safety committees.
 Crow, Jeffrey J. and Larry E. Tise, eds. The Southern Experience in the American
Revolution (1978)
 Fischer, David Hackett. Washington's Crossing (2004). 1776 campaigns; Pulitzer prize.
ISBN 0–195–17034–2
 Greene, Jack, ed. The Reinterpretation of the American Revolution (1968) collection of
scholarly essays
 Kerber, Linda K. Women of the Republic: Intellect and Ideology in Revolutionary
America (1979)
 McCullough, David. 1776 (2005). ISBN 0-7432-2671-2; highly readable narrative of the
year
 Maier, Pauline. American Scripture: Making the Declaration of
Independence (1998) excerpt and text search
 Morris, Richard B. ed. The Era of the American revolution (1939); older scholarly
essays
 Nash, Gary B. The Unknown American Revolution: The Unruly Birth of Democracy and
the Struggle to Create America. (2005). ISBN 0-670-03420-7
 Nevins, Allan; The American States during and after the Revolution, 1775–
1789 1927. online edition
 Norton, Mary Beth. Liberty's Daughters: The Revolutionary Experience of American
Women, 1750–1800 (1980)
 Palmer, Robert R. The Age of the Democratic Revolution: A Political History of Europe
and America, 1760–1800. vol 1 (1959) online edition
 Resch, John Phillips and Walter Sargent, eds. War and Society in the American
Revolution: Mobilization and Home Fronts (2006)
 Rothbard, Murray, Conceived in Liberty (2000), Volume III: Advance to Revolution,
1760–1775 and Volume IV: The Revolutionary War, 1775–1784. ISBN 0-945466-26-9,
libertarian perspective
 Schecter, Barnet. The Battle for New York: The City at the Heart of the American
Revolution. (2002). ISBN 0-8027-1374-2
 Van Tyne, Claude Halstead. American Loyalists: The Loyalists in the American
Revolution (1902) online edition
 Volo, James M. and Dorothy Denneen Volo. Daily Life during the American
Revolution (2003)
 Wahlke, John C. ed. The Causes of the American Revolution (1967) readings
 Wood, Gordon S. The Radicalism of the American Revolution: How a Revolution
Transformed a Monarchical Society into a Democratic One Unlike Any That Had Ever
Existed. (1992), by leading scholar

[edit]Primary sources

 The American Revolution: Writings from the War of Independence (2001), Library of
America, 880pp

 Commager, Henry Steele and Morris, Richard B., eds. The Spirit of 'Seventy-Six: The
Story of the American Revolution As Told by Participants (1975) (ISBN 0-06-010834-7)
short excerpts from hundreds of official and unofficial primary sources
 Dann, John C., ed. The Revolution Remembered: Eyewitness Accounts of the War for
Independence (1999) excerpt and text search, recollections by ordinary soldiers
 Humphrey, Carol Sue ed. The Revolutionary Era: Primary Documents on Events from
1776 to 1800 (2003), 384pp; newspaper accountsexcerpt and text search
 Jensen, Merill, ed. Tracts of the American Revolution, 1763-1776 (1967). American
pamphlets
 Jensen, Merill, ed. English Historical Documents: American Colonial Documents to
1776: Volume 9 (1955), 890pp; major collection of important documents
 Morison, Samuel E. ed. Sources and Documents Illustrating the American Revolution,
1764–1788, and the Formation of the Federal Constitution (1923). 370 pp online
version
 Tansill, Charles C. ed.; Documents Illustrative of the Formation of the Union of the
American States. Govt. Print. Office. (1927). 1124 pages online version
 Martin Kallich and Andrew MacLeish, eds. The American Revolution through British
eyes (1962) primary documents

[edit]External links

 Library of Congress Guide to the American Revolution

 Pictures of the Revolutionary War: Select Audiovisual Records, National Archives and
Records Administration selection of images, including a number of non-military events
and portraits
  American Revolution Digital Learning Project, New-York Historical Society
 PBS Television Series
 Smithsonian study unit on Revolutionary Money
 The American Revolution: Lighting Freedom's Flame, US National Park Service
website
 Haldimand Collection Letters regarding the war to important generals. Fully indexed
 "Military History of Revolution" essay by Richard Jensen with links to documents,
maps, URLs
 American Independence Museum
 Black Loyalist Heritage Society
 Spanish and Latin American contribution to the American Revolution
 American Archives: Documents of the American Revolution at Northern Illinois
University Libraries
 The American Revolution as a People’s War by William F. Marina, The Independent
Institute, July 1, 1976
 American Revolution study guide and teacher resources
 AmericanRevolution.Org Resource for pre collegiate historical educational institutions
 The American Revolution

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