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7

The Roadto Revolution

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1763–1775

The Revolution was effected before the war commenced. The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people.

JOHN ADAMS, 1818

Victory in the Seven Years’ War made Britain themaster of a vastly enlarged imperial domain in

North America. But victory—including the subse-quent need to garrison ten thousand troops alongthe sprawling American frontier—was painfullycostly. The London government therefore struggledafter 1763 to compel the American colonists toshoulder some of the financial costs of empire. Thischange in British colonial policy reinforced anemerging sense of American political identity andhelped to precipitate the American Revolution.

The eventual conflict was by no meansinevitable. Indeed, given the tightening commer-cial, military, and cultural bonds between coloniesand mother country since the first crude settle-ments a century and a half earlier, it might be con-sidered remarkable that the Revolution happened at

all. The truth is that Americans were reluctant revo-lutionaries. Until late in the the day, they soughtonly to claim the “rights of Englishmen,” not to sep-arate from the mother country. But what began as asquabble about economic policies soon exposedirreconcilable differences between Americans andBritons over cherished political principles. Theensuing clash gave birth to a new nation.

The Deep Roots of Revolution

In a broad sense, America was a revolutionary forcefrom the day of its discovery by Europeans. The NewWorld nurtured new ideas about the nature of soci-ety, citizen, and government. In the Old World, many

humble folk had long lived in the shadow of grave-yards that contained the bones of their ancestors fora thousand years past. Few people born into suchchangeless surroundings dared to question theirlowly social status. But European immigrants in theNew World were not so easily subdued by the scowlof their superiors. In the American wilderness, theyencountered a world that was theirs to make afresh.

Two ideas in particular had taken root in theminds of the American colonists by the mid-eigh-teenth century: one was what historians call repub-licanism. Looking to the models of the ancientGreek and Roman republics, exponents of republi-canism defined a just society as one in which all citi-zens willingly subordinated their private, selfishinterests to the common good. Both the stability of society and the authority of government thusdepended on the virtue of the citizenry—its capac-ity for selflessness, self-sufficiency, and courage, andespecially its appetite for civic involvement. By itsvery nature, republicanism was opposed to hierar-chical and authoritarian institutions such as aris-tocracy and monarchy.

A second idea that fundamentally shapedAmerican political thought derived from a group ofBritish political commentators know as “radicalWhigs.” Widely read by the colonists, the Whigsfeared the threat to liberty posed by the arbitrarypower of the monarch and his ministers relative toelected representatives in Parliament. The Whigsmounted withering attacks on the use of patronageand bribes by the king’s ministers—symptoms of awider moral failure in society that they called “cor-ruption,” in the sense of rot or decay. The Whigswarned citizens to be on guard against corruptionand to be eternally vigilant against possible conspir-acies to denude them of their hard-won liberties.Together, republican and Whig ideas predisposedthe American colonists to be on hair-trigger alertagainst any threat to their rights.

The circumstances of colonial life had donemuch to bolster those attitudes. Dukes and princes,barons and bishops were unknown in the colonies,while property ownership and political participa-tion were relatively widespread. The Americans hadalso grown accustomed to running their own affairs,largely unmolested by remote officials in London.Distance weakens authority; great distance weakensauthority greatly. So it came as an especially joltingshock when Britain after 1763 tried to enclose itsAmerican colonists more snugly in its grip.

Mercantilism and Colonial Grievances

Britain’s empire was acquired in a “fit of absent-mindedness,’’ an old saying goes, and there is muchtruth in the jest. Not one of the original thirteencolonies except Georgia was formally planted by theBritish government. All the others were haphazardlyfounded by trading companies, religious groups, orland speculators.

The British authorities nevertheless embraced atheory, called mercantilism, that justified their con-trol over the colonies. Mercantilists believed thatwealth was power and that a country’s economicwealth (and hence its military and political power)could be measured by the amount of gold or silverin its treasury. To amass gold or silver, a countryneeded to export more than it imported. Possessingcolonies thus conferred distinct advantages, sincethe colonies could both supply raw materials to themother country (thereby reducing the need for for-eign imports) and provide a guaranteed market forexports.

The London government looked on the Ameri-can colonists more or less as tenants. They wereexpected to furnish products needed in the mothercountry, such as tobacco, sugar, and ships’ masts; torefrain from making for export certain products,such as woolen cloth or beaver hats; to buy importedmanufactured goods exclusively from Britain; andnot to indulge in bothersome dreams of economicself-sufficiency or, worse, self-government.

From time to time, Parliament passed laws toregulate the mercantilist system. The first of these,the Navigation Law of 1650, was aimed at rival

New Ideas in the New World 123

Adam Smith (1723–1790), the Scottish“Father of Modern Economics,” frontallyattacked mercantilism in 1776:

“To prohibit a great people, however, frommaking all that they can of every part oftheir own produce, or from employing theirstock and industry in the way that they judgemost advantageous to themselves, is amanifest violation of the most sacred rightsof mankind.”

Dutch shippers trying to elbow their way into theAmerican carrying trade. Thereafter all commerceflowing to and from the colonies could be trans-ported only in British (including colonial) vessels.Subsequent laws required that European goods des-tined for America first had to be landed in Britain,where tariff duties could be collected and Britishmiddlemen could take a slice of the profits. Otherlaws stipulated that American merchants must shipcertain “enumerated” products, notably tobacco,exclusively to Britain, even though prices might bebetter elsewhere.

British policy also inflicted a currency shortageon the colonies. Since the colonists regularly boughtmore from Britain than they sold there, the differ-ence had to be made up in hard cash. Every yeargold and silver coins, mostly earned in illicit tradewith the Spanish and French West Indies, drainedout of the colonies, creating an acute money short-age. To facilitate everyday purchases, the colonists

resorted to butter, nails, pitch, and feathers for pur-poses of exchange.

Currency issues came to a boil when dire finan-cial need forced many of the colonies to issue papermoney, which swiftly depreciated. British mer-chants and creditors squawked so loudly that Parlia-ment prohibited the colonial legislatures fromprinting paper currency and from passing indulgentbankruptcy laws—practices that might harm Britishmerchants. The Americans grumbled that their wel-fare was being sacrificed for the well-being of Britishcommercial interests.

The British crown also reserved the right to nul-lify any legislation passed by the colonial assembliesif such laws worked mischief with the mercantilistsystem. This royal veto was used rather sparingly—just 469 times in connection with 8,563 laws. But the colonists fiercely resented its very existence—another example of how principle could weigh moreheavily than practice in fueling colonial grievances.

The Merits and Menace of Mercantilism

In theory the British mercantile system seemedthoroughly selfish and deliberately oppressive. Butthe truth is that until 1763, the various Naviga-tion Laws imposed no intolerable burden, mainlybecause they were only loosely enforced. Enterpris-ing colonial merchants learned early to disregard orevade troublesome restrictions. Some of the firstAmerican fortunes, like that of John Hancock, wereamassed by wholesale smuggling.

124 CHAPTER 7 The Road to Revolution, 1763–1775

The Boston Gazette declared in 1765,

“A colonist cannot make a button, ahorseshoe, nor a hobnail, but some snootyironmonger or respectable buttonmaker ofBritain shall bawl and squall that his honor’sworship is most egregiously maltreated,injured, cheated, and robbed by the rascallyAmerican republicans.”

Americans also reaped direct benefits from themercantile system. If the colonies existed for thebenefit of the mother country, it was hardly less truethat Britain existed for the benefit of the colonies.London paid liberal bounties to colonial producersof ship parts, over the protests of British competi-tors. Virginia tobacco planters enjoyed a monopolyin the British market, snuffing out the tiny Britishtobacco industry. The colonists also benefited fromthe protection of the world’s mightiest navy and astrong, seasoned army of redcoats—all without apenny of cost.

But even when painted in its rosiest colors, themercantile system burdened the colonists withannoying liabilities. Mercantilism stifled economicinitiative and imposed a rankling dependency onBritish agents and creditors. Most grievously, manyAmericans simply found the mercantilist system

debasing. They felt used, kept in a state of perpetualeconomic adolescence, and never allowed to comeof age. As Benjamin Franklin wrote in 1775,

We have an old mother that peevish isgrown;

She snubs us like children that scarce walkalone;

She forgets we’re grown up and have senseof our own.

Revolution broke out, as Theodore Roosevelt laterremarked, because Britain failed to recognize anemerging nation when it saw one.

The Stamp Tax Uproar

Victory-flushed Britain emerged from the SevenYears’ War holding one of the biggest empires in theworld—and also, less happily, the biggest debt,some £140 million, about half of which had beenincurred defending the American colonies. To jus-tify and service that debt, British officials nowmoved to redefine their relationship with theirNorth American colonies.

Prime Minister George Grenville first arousedthe resentment of the colonists in 1763 by orderingthe British navy to begin strictly enforcing the Navi-gation Laws. He also secured from Parliament theso-called Sugar Act of 1764, the first law ever passedby that body for raising tax revenue in the coloniesfor the crown. Among various provisions, it in-creased the duty on foreign sugar imported from

Mercantilism in Theory and Practice 125

English statesman Edmund Burke(1729–1797) warned in 1775,

“Young man, there is America—which at thisday serves for little more than to amuse youwith stories of savage men and uncouthmanners; yet shall, before you taste ofdeath, show itself equal to the whole of thatcommerce which now attracts the envy ofthe world.”

the West Indies. After bitter protests from thecolonists, the duties were lowered substantially,and the agitation died down. But resentment waskept burning by the Quartering Act of 1765. Thismeasure required certain colonies to provide foodand quarters for British troops.

Then in the same year, 1765, Grenville imposedthe most odious measure of all: a stamp tax, to raiserevenues to support the new military force. TheStamp Act mandated the use of stamped paper orthe affixing of stamps, certifying payment of tax.Stamps were required on bills of sale for about fiftytrade items as well as on certain types of commer-cial and legal documents, including playing cards,pamphlets, newspapers, diplomas, bills of lading,and marriage licenses.

Grenville regarded all these measures as reason-able and just. He was simply asking the Americansto pay a fair share of the costs for their own defense,through taxes that were already familiar in Britain.In fact, the British people for two generations hadendured a stamp tax far heavier than that passed forthe colonies.

Yet the Americans were angrily aroused at whatthey regarded as Grenville’s fiscal aggression. Thenew laws did not merely pinch their pocketbooks.Far more ominously, Grenville also seemed to bestriking at the local liberties they had come to

assume as a matter of right. Thus some colonialassemblies defiantly refused to comply with theQuartering Act, or voted only a fraction of the sup-plies that it called for.

Worst of all, Grenville’s noxious legislationseemed to jeopardize the basic rights of the col-onists as Englishmen. Both the Sugar Act and theStamp Act provided for trying offenders in the hatedadmiralty courts, where juries were not allowed. Theburden of proof was on the defendants, who wereassumed to be guilty unless they could prove them-selves innocent. Trial by jury and the precept of“innocent until proved guilty’’ were ancient privi-leges that British people everywhere, including theAmerican colonists, held most dear.

And why was a British army needed at all in thecolonies, now that the French were expelled fromthe continent and Pontiac’s warriors crushed? Couldits real purpose be to whip rebellious colonists intoline? Many Americans, weaned on radical Whig sus-picion of all authority, began to sniff the strongscent of a conspiracy to strip them of their historicliberties. They lashed back violently, and the StampAct became the target that drew their most fero-cious fire.

Angry throats raised the cry, “No taxation with-out representation.’’ There was some irony in theslogan, because the seaports and tidewater townsthat were most wrathful against the Stamp Act hadlong denied full representation to their own back-country pioneers. But now the aggravated coloniststook the high ground of principle.


The famous circular letter from theMassachusetts House of Representatives(1768) stated,

“. . . considering the utter impracticability oftheir ever being fully and equally representedin Parliament, and the great expense thatmust unavoidably attend even a partialrepresentation there, this House think that ataxation of their constituents, even withouttheir consent, grievous as it is, would bepreferable to any representation that couldbe admitted for them there.”

The Americans made a distinction between“legislation’’ and “taxation.’’ They conceded theright of Parliament to legislate about matters thataffected the entire empire, including the regulationof trade. But they steadfastly denied the right of Par-liament, in which no Americans were seated, toimpose taxes on Americans. Only their own electedcolonial legislatures, the Americans insisted, couldlegally tax them. Taxes levied by the distant BritishParliament amounted to robbery, a piratical assaulton the sacred rights of property.

Grenville dismissed these American protests ashairsplitting absurdities. The power of Parliamentwas supreme and undivided, he asserted, and in anycase the Americans were represented in Parliament.Elaborating the theory of “virtual representation,’’Grenville claimed that every member of Parliamentrepresented all British subjects, even those Ameri-cans in Boston or Charleston who had never votedfor a member of Parliament.

The Americans scoffed at the notion of virtualrepresentation. And truthfully, they did not reallywant direct representation in Parliament, whichmight have seemed like a sensible compromise. Ifthey had obtained it, any gouty member of theHouse of Commons could have proposed anoppressive tax bill for the colonies, and the Ameri-can representatives, few in number, would havestood bereft of a principle with which to resist.

Thus the principle of no taxation without rep-resentation was supremely important, and thecolonists clung to it with tenacious consistency.When the British replied that the sovereign power ofgovernment could not be divided between “legisla-tive’’ authority in London and “taxing’’ authority inthe colonies, they forced the Americans to deny theauthority of Parliament altogether and to begin toconsider their own political independence. Thischain of logic eventually led, link by link, to revolu-tionary consequences.

Parliament Forced to Repeal the Stamp Act

Colonial outcries against the hated stamp tax tookvarious forms. The most conspicuous assemblagewas the Stamp Act Congress of 1765, which broughttogether in New York City twenty-seven distin-guished delegates from nine colonies. After digni-

fied debate the members drew up a statement oftheir rights and grievances and beseeched the kingand Parliament to repeal the repugnant legislation.

The Stamp Act Congress, which was largelyignored in England, made little splash at the time inAmerica. Its ripples, however, began to erode sec-tional suspicions, for it brought together around thesame table leaders from the different and rivalcolonies. It was one more halting but significantstep toward intercolonial unity.

More effective than the congress was the wide-spread adoption of nonimportation agreementsagainst British goods. Woolen garments of home-spun became fashionable, and the eating of lambchops was discouraged so that the wool-bearingsheep would be allowed to mature. Nonimportationagreements were in fact a promising stride towardunion; they spontaneously united the Americanpeople for the first time in common action.

Mobilizing in support of nonimportation gaveordinary American men and women new opportu-nities to participate in colonial protests. Many peo-ple who had previously stood on the sidelines nowsigned petitions swearing to uphold the terms of theconsumer boycotts. Groups of women assembled inpublic to hold spinning bees and make homespuncloth as a replacement for shunned British textiles.Such public defiance helped spread revolutionaryfervor throughout American colonial society.

Conflict over Taxes 127

Sometimes violence accompanied colonialprotests. Groups of ardent spirits, known as Sons ofLiberty and Daughters of Liberty, took the law intotheir own hands. Crying “Liberty, Property, and NoStamps,” they enforced the nonimportation agree-ments against violators, often with a generous coatof tar and feathers. Patriotic mobs ransacked thehouses of unpopular officials, confiscated theirmoney, and hanged effigies of stamp agents on lib-erty poles.

Shaken by colonial commotion, the machineryfor collecting the tax broke down. On that dismalday in 1765 when the new act was to go into effect,the stamp agents had all been forced to resign, andthere was no one to sell the stamps. While flagsflapped at half-mast, the law was openly and fla-grantly defied—or, rather, nullified.

England was hard hit. America then boughtabout one-quarter of all British exports, and aboutone-half of British shipping was devoted to theAmerican trade. Merchants, manufacturers, andshippers suffered from the colonial nonimportationagreements, and hundreds of laborers were thrownout of work. Loud demands converged on Parlia-

ment for repeal of the Stamp Act. But many of themembers could not understand why 7.5 millionBritons had to pay heavy taxes to protect thecolonies, whereas some 2 million colonists refusedto pay for only one-third of the cost of their owndefense.

After a stormy debate, Parliament in 1766 grudg-ingly repealed the Stamp Act. Grateful residents ofNew York erected a leaden statue to King George III.But American rejoicing was premature. Having with-drawn the Stamp Act, Parliament in virtually thesame breath provocatively passed the DeclaratoryAct, reaffirming Parliament’s right “to bind” thecolonies “in all cases whatsoever.” The British gov-ernment thereby drew its line in the sand. It definedthe constitutional principle it would not yield:absolute and unqualified sovereignty over its NorthAmerican colonies. The colonists had already drawntheir own battle line by making it clear that theywanted a measure of sovereignty of their own andwould undertake drastic action to secure it. The stagewas set for a continuing confrontation. Within a fewyears, that statue of King George would be meltedinto thousands of bullets to be fired at his troops.


The Townshend Tea Taxand the Boston “Massacre’’

Control of the British ministry was now seized bythe gifted but erratic “Champagne Charley’’ Town-shend, a man who could deliver brilliant speechesin Parliament even while drunk. Rashly promisingto pluck feathers from the colonial goose with aminimum of squawking, he persuaded Parliamentin 1767 to pass the Townshend Acts. The mostimportant of these new regulations was a lightimport duty on glass, white lead, paper, paint, andtea. Townshend, seizing on a dubious distinctionbetween internal and external taxes, made this tax,unlike the Stamp Act, an indirect customs dutypayable at American ports. But to the increasinglyrestless colonists, this was a phantom distinction.For them the real difficulty remained taxes—in anyform—without representation.

Flushed with their recent victory over the stamptax, the colonists were in a rebellious mood. The im-post on tea was especially irksome, for an estimated1 million people drank the refreshing brew twice a day.

The new Townshend revenues, worse yet, wereto be earmarked to pay the salaries of the royal gov-ernors and judges in America. From the standpointof efficient administration by London, this was areform long overdue. But the ultrasuspicious Ameri-cans, who had beaten the royal governors into lineby controlling the purse, regarded Townshend’s taxas another attempt to enchain them. Their worst

fears took on greater reality when the London gov-ernment, after passing the Townshend taxes, sus-pended the legislature of New York in 1767 forfailure to comply with the Quartering Act.

Nonimportation agreements, previously potent,were quickly revived against the Townshend Acts.But they proved less effective than those devisedagainst the Stamp Act. The colonists, again enjoyingprosperity, took the new tax less seriously thanmight have been expected, largely because it waslight and indirect. They found, moreover, that theycould secure smuggled tea at a cheap price, andconsequently smugglers increased their activities,especially in Massachusetts.

British officials, faced with a breakdown of lawand order, landed two regiments of troops in Bostonin 1768. Many of the soldiers were drunken and pro-fane characters. Liberty-loving colonists, resentingthe presence of the red-coated “ruffians,’’ tauntedthe “bloody backs’’ unmercifully.

A clash was inevitable. On the evening of March5, 1770, a crowd of some sixty townspeople set upona squad of about ten redcoats, one of whom was hit

Aftermath of the Stamp Act 129

Giving new meaning to the proverbialtempest in a teapot, a group of 126 Bostonwomen signed an agreement, or“subscription list,” which announced,

“We the Daughters of those Patriots who haveand now do appear for the public interest . . .do with Pleasure engage with them indenying ourselves the drinking of ForeignTea, in hopes to frustrate a Plan that tendsto deprive the whole Community of . . . all that is valuable in Life.”

by a club and another of whom was knocked down.Acting apparently without orders but under extremeprovocation, the troops opened fire and killed orwounded eleven “innocent’’ citizens. One of the firstto die was Crispus Attucks, described by contempo-raries as a powerfully built runaway “mulatto’’ andas a leader of the mob. Both sides were in somedegree to blame, and in the subsequent trial (inwhich future president John Adams served asdefense attorney for the soldiers), only two of theredcoats were found guilty of manslaughter. Thesoldiers were released after being branded on thehand.

The Seditious Committees of Correspondence

By 1770 King George III, then only thirty-two yearsold, was strenuously attempting to assert the powerof the British monarchy. He was a good man in his

private morals, but he proved to be a bad ruler.Earnest, industrious, stubborn, and lustful forpower, he surrounded himself with cooperative “yesmen,’’ notably his corpulent prime minister, LordNorth.

The ill-timed Townshend Acts had failed to produce revenue, though they did produce near-rebellion. Net proceeds from the tax in one yearwere a paltry £295, and during that time the annualmilitary costs to Britain in the colonies hadmounted to £170,000. Nonimportation agreements,though feebly enforced, were pinching British man-ufacturers. The government of Lord North, bowingto various pressures, finally persuaded Parliamentto repeal the Townshend revenue duties. But thethree-pence toll on tea, the tax the colonists foundmost offensive, was retained to keep alive the prin-ciple of parliamentary taxation.

Flames of discontent in America continued tobe fanned by numerous incidents, including theredoubled efforts of the British officials to enforcethe Navigation Laws. Resistance was further kindled


by a master propagandist and engineer of rebellion,Samuel Adams of Boston, a cousin of John Adams.Unimpressive in appearance (his hands trembled),he lived and breathed only for politics. His friendshad to buy him a presentable suit of clothes whenhe left Massachusetts on intercolonial business.Zealous, tenacious, and courageous, he was ultra-sensitive to infractions of colonial rights. Cherishinga deep faith in the common people, he appealedeffectively to what was called his “trained mob.’’

Samuel Adams’s signal contribution was toorganize in Massachusetts the local committees ofcorrespondence. After he had formed the first onein Boston during 1772, some eighty towns in thecolony speedily set up similar organizations. Theirchief function was to spread the spirit of resistance

by interchanging letters and thus keep alive oppo-sition to British policy. One critic referred to thecommittees as “the foulest, subtlest, and most venomous serpent ever issued from the egg of sedition.’’

Intercolonial committees of correspondencewere the next logical step. Virginia led the way in1773 by creating such a body as a standing commit-tee of the House of Burgesses. Within a short time,every colony had established a central committeethrough which it could exchange ideas and infor-mation with other colonies. These intercolonialgroups were supremely significant in stimulatingand disseminating sentiment in favor of unitedaction. They evolved directly into the first Americancongresses.

Uniting for Rebellion 131

Tea Parties at Boston and Elsewhere

Thus far—that is, by 1773—nothing had happenedto make rebellion inevitable. Nonimportation wasweakening. Increasing numbers of colonists werereluctantly paying the tea tax, because the legal teawas now cheaper than the smuggled tea, evencheaper than tea in England.

A new ogre entered the picture in 1773. Thepowerful British East India Company, overburdenedwith 17 million pounds of unsold tea, was facingbankruptcy. If it collapsed, the London governmentwould lose heavily in tax revenue. The ministrytherefore decided to assist the company by award-ing it a complete monopoly of the American teabusiness. The giant corporation would now be ableto sell the coveted leaves more cheaply than everbefore, even with the three-pence tax tacked on. Butmany American tea drinkers, rather than rejoicingat the lower prices, cried foul. They saw this Britishmove as a shabby attempt to trick the Americans,with the bait of cheaper tea, into swallowing theprinciple of the detested tax. For the determinedAmericans, principle remained far more importantthan price.

If the British officials insisted on the letter of thelaw, violence would certainly result. Fatefully, theBritish colonial authorities decided to enforce thelaw. Once more, the colonists rose up in wrath to defyit. Not a single one of the several thousand chests of tea shipped by the East India Company everreached the hands of the consignees. In Philadel-phia and New York, mass demonstrations forced thetea-bearing ships to return to England with theircargo holds still full. At Annapolis, Marylandersburned both cargo and vessel, while proclaiming“Liberty and Independence or death in pursuit ofit.” In Charleston, South Carolina, officials seizedthe tea for nonpayment of duties after intimidatedlocal merchants refused to accept delivery. (Ironi-


Peter Oliver (1713–1791), the chief justice of Massachusetts, penned a Loyalist accountof the Revolution after the outbreak ofhostilities. Recalling the popular protests of the early 1770s, he wrote that

“[the colonial] upper & lower House consistedof Men generally devoted to the Interest ofthe Faction. The Foundations of Governmentwere subverted; & every Loyalist was obligedto submit to be swept away by the Torrent. . . . Some indeed dared to say that their Soulswere their own; but no one could call his Bodyhis own; for that was at the Mercy of theMob, who like the Inquisition Coach, would calla Man out of his Bed, & he must step inwhether he liked the Conveyance or not.”

cally, the confiscated Charleston tea was later auc-tioned to raise money for the Revolutionary army.)

Only in Boston did a British official stubbornlyrefuse to be cowed. Massachusetts governorThomas Hutchinson had already felt the fury of themob, when Stamp Act protesters had destroyed hishome in 1765. This time he was determined not tobudge. Ironically, Hutchinson agreed that the tea taxwas unjust, but he believed even more strongly thatthe colonists had no right to flout the law. Hutchin-son infuriated Boston’s radicals when he orderedthe tea ships not to clear Boston harbor until theyhad unloaded their cargoes. Sentiment against himwas further inflamed when Hutchinson’s enemiespublished a private letter in which he declared that“an abridgement of what are called English liber-ties” was necessary for the preservation of law andorder in the colonies—apparently confirming thedarkest conspiracy theories of the American radi-cals. Provoked beyond restraint, a band of Bostoni-ans, clumsily disguised as Indians, boarded thedocked tea ships on December 16, 1773. Theysmashed open 342 chests and dumped the contentsinto Boston harbor. A silent crowd watched approv-ingly as salty tea was brewed for the fish.

Reactions varied. Radicals exulted in the peo-ple’s zeal for liberty. Conservatives complained thatthe destruction of private property violated the fun-damental norms of civil society. Hutchinson, chas-tened and disgusted, betook himself to Britain,never to return. The British authorities, meanwhile,saw little alternative to whipping the upstartcolonists into shape. The granting of some measureof home rule to the Americans might at this stagestill have prevented rebellion, but few Britons ofthat era were blessed with such wisdom. Amongthose who were so blessed was Edmund Burke, thegreat conservative political theorist and a stoutchampion of the American cause. “To tax and toplease, no more than to love and be wise,” he sto-ically remarked, “is not given to men.”

Parliament Passes the “Intolerable Acts’’

An irate Parliament responded speedily to theBoston Tea Party with measures that brewed a revo-lution. By huge majorities in 1774, it passed a series

of acts designed to chastise Boston in particular,Massachusetts in general. They were branded inAmerica as “the massacre of American Liberty.’’

Most drastic of all was the Boston Port Act. Itclosed the tea-stained harbor until damages werepaid and order could be ensured. By other “Intolera-ble Acts”—as they were called in America—many ofthe chartered rights of colonial Massachusetts wereswept away. Restrictions were likewise placed on theprecious town meetings. Contrary to previous prac-tice, enforcing officials who killed colonists in theline of duty could now be sent to Britain for trial.There, suspicious Americans assumed, they wouldbe likely to get off scot-free.

By a fateful coincidence, the “Intolerable Acts’’were accompanied in 1774 by the Quebec Act.Passed at the same time, it was erroneouslyregarded in English-speaking America as part of theBritish reaction to the turbulence in Boston. Actu-ally, the Quebec Act was a good law in bad company.For many years the British government had debatedhow it should administer the sixty thousand or soconquered French subjects in Canada, and it hadfinally framed this farsighted and statesmanlikemeasure. The French were guaranteed theirCatholic religion. They were also permitted to retainmany of their old customs and institutions, whichdid not include a representative assembly or trial byjury in civil cases. In addition, the old boundaries ofthe province of Quebec were now extended south-ward all the way to the Ohio River.

The Quebec Act, from the viewpoint of theFrench-Canadians, was a shrewd and conciliatorymeasure. If Britain had only shown as much fore-sight in dealing with its English-speaking colonies,it might not have lost them.

But from the viewpoint of the Americancolonists as a whole, the Quebec Act was especiallynoxious. All the other “Intolerable Acts’’ lawsslapped directly at Massachusetts, but this one hada much wider range. It seemed to set a dangerousprecedent in America against jury trials and popularassemblies. It alarmed land speculators, who weredistressed to see the huge trans-Allegheny areasnatched from their grasp. It aroused anti-Catholics,who were shocked by the extension of RomanCatholic jurisdiction southward into a huge regionthat had once been earmarked for Protestantism—aregion about as large as the thirteen originalcolonies. One angry Protestant cried that thereought to be a “jubilee in hell’’ over this enormousgain for “popery.’’

The Eve of Rebellion 133

The Continental Congress andBloodshed

American dissenters responded sympathetically tothe plight of Massachusetts. It had put itself in thewrong by the violent destruction of the tea cargoes;now Britain had put itself in the wrong by brutalpunishment that seemed far too cruel for the crime.Flags were flown at half-mast throughout thecolonies on the day that the Boston Port Act wentinto effect, and sister colonies rallied to send food tothe stricken city. Rice was shipped even from far-away South Carolina.

Most memorable of the responses to the “Intol-erable Acts’’ was the summoning of a ContinentalCongress in 1774. It was to meet in Philadelphia toconsider ways of redressing colonial grievances.Twelve of the thirteen colonies, with Georgia alonemissing, sent fifty-five distinguished men, amongthem Samuel Adams, John Adams, George Washing-ton, and Patrick Henry. Intercolonial frictions werepartially melted away by social activity after work-ing hours; in fifty-four days George Washingtondined at his own lodgings only nine times.

The First Continental Congress deliberated forseven weeks, from September 5 to October 26, 1774.It was not a legislative but a consultative body—aconvention rather than a congress. John Adams

played a stellar role. Eloquently swaying his col-leagues to a revolutionary course, he helped defeatby the narrowest of margins a proposal by the mod-erates for a species of American home rule underBritish direction. After prolonged argument theCongress drew up several dignified papers. Theseincluded a ringing Declaration of Rights, as well assolemn appeals to other British American colonies,to the king, and to the British people.

The most significant action of the Congress wasthe creation of The Association. Unlike previousnonimportation agreements, The Association calledfor a complete boycott of British goods: nonimporta-tion, nonexportation, and nonconsumption. Yet it isimportant to note that the delegates were not yetcalling for independence. They sought merely torepeal the offensive legislation and return to thehappy days before parliamentary taxation. If colo-nial grievances were redressed, well and good; ifnot, the Congress was to meet again in May 1775.Resistance had not yet ripened into open rebellion.

But the fatal drift toward war continued. Parlia-ment rejected the Congress’s petitions. In Americachickens squawked and tar kettles bubbled as viola-tors of The Association were tarred and feathered.Muskets were gathered, men began to drill openly,and a clash seemed imminent.

In April 1775 the British commander in Bostonsent a detachment of troops to nearby Lexington


QUEBECQuebec

Montreal

NOVA SCOTIA

NEW YORK

PENNSYLVANIA

VIRGINIA

Ohio

R.

Mississippi R.

Quebec before 1774

Quebec after 1774,as envisioned by theQuebec Act.

Quebec Before and After 1774Young Alexander Hamilton voiced the fears of manycolonists when he warned that the Quebec Act of1774 would introduce “priestly tyranny” intoCanada, making that country another Spain orPortugal. “Does not your blood run cold,” he asked,“to think that an English Parliament should pass anact for the establishment of arbitrary power andPopery in such a country?”

and Concord. They were to seize stores of colonialgunpowder and also to bag the “rebel’’ ringleaders,Samuel Adams and John Hancock. At Lexington thecolonial “Minute Men’’ refused to disperse rapidlyenough, and shots were fired that killed eight Amer-icans and wounded several more. The affair wasmore the “Lexington Massacre’’ than a battle. Theredcoats pushed on to Concord, whence they wereforced to retreat by the rough and ready Americans,whom Emerson immortalized:

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,Here once the embattled farmers stood,And fired the shot heard round the world.*

The bewildered British, fighting off murderousfire from militiamen crouched behind thick stonewalls, finally regained the sanctuary of Boston. Lick-ing their wounds, they could count about threehundred casualties, including some seventy killed.Britain now had a war on its hands.

Imperial Strength and Weakness

Aroused Americans had brashly rebelled against amighty empire. The population odds were aboutthree to one against the rebels—some 7.5 millionBritons to 2.5 million colonists. The odds in mon-etary wealth and naval power overwhelminglyfavored the mother country.

Britain then boasted a professional army ofsome fifty thousand men, as compared with thenumerous but wretchedly trained American militia.George III, in addition, had the treasury to hire for-eign soldiers, and some thirty thousand Germans—so-called Hessians—were ultimately employed. TheBritish enrolled about fifty thousand American Loy-alists and enlisted the services of many Indians,who though unreliable fair-weather fighters, in-flamed long stretches of the frontier. One Britishofficer boasted that the war would offer no prob-lems that could not be solved by an “experiencedsheep herder.’’

Yet Britain was weaker than it seemed at firstglance. Oppressed Ireland was a smoking volcano,and British troops had to be detached to watch it.France, bitter from its recent defeat, was awaiting an

The Revolutionary War Begins 135

*Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Concord Hymn.”

opportunity to stab Britain in the back. The Londongovernment was confused and inept. There was noWilliam Pitt, “Organizer of Victory,’’ only the stub-born George III and his pliant Tory prime minister,Lord North.

Many earnest and God-fearing Britons had nodesire whatever to kill their American cousins.William Pitt withdrew a son from the army ratherthan see him thrust his sword into fellow Anglo-Saxons struggling for liberty. The English Whig fac-tions, opposed to Lord North’s Tory wing, openlycheered American victories—at least at the outset.Aside from trying to embarrass the Tories politically,many Whigs believed that the battle for British free-dom was being fought in America. If George III tri-umphed, his rule at home might become tyrannical.This outspoken sympathy in Britain, though plainlya minority voice, greatly encouraged the Americans.If they continued their resistance long enough, theWhigs might come into power and deal generouslywith them.

Britain’s army in America had to operate underendless difficulties. The generals were second-rate;the soldiers, though on the whole capable, werebrutally treated. There was one extreme case ofeight hundred lashes on the bare back for strikingan officer. Provisions were often scarce, rancid, andwormy. On one occasion a supply of biscuits, cap-tured some fifteen years earlier from the French,was softened by dropping cannonballs on them.

Other handicaps loomed. The redcoats had toconquer the Americans; restoring the pre-1763 statusquo would be a victory for the colonists. Britain wasoperating some 3,000 miles from its home base, anddistance added greatly to the delays and uncertain-ties arising from storms and other mishaps. Militaryorders were issued in London that, when receivedmonths later, would not fit the changing situation.

America’s geographical expanse was enormous:roughly 1,000 by 600 miles. The united colonies hadno urban nerve center, like France’s Paris, whosecapture would cripple the country as a whole.British armies took every city of any size, yet like aboxer punching a feather pillow, they made littlemore than a dent in the entire country. The Amer-icans wisely traded space for time. BenjaminFranklin calculated that during the prolonged cam-paign in which the redcoats captured Bunker Hilland killed some 150 Patriots, about 60,000 Americanbabies were born.

American Pluses and Minuses

The revolutionists were blessed with outstandingleadership. George Washington was a giant amongmen; Benjamin Franklin was a master among diplo-mats. Open foreign aid, theoretically possible fromthe start, eventually came from France. NumerousEuropean officers, many of them unemployed andimpoverished, volunteered their swords for pay. In aclass by himself was a wealthy young French noble-man, the Marquis de Lafayette. Fleeing from bore-dom, loving glory and ultimately liberty, at agenineteen the “French gamecock’’ was made a majorgeneral in the colonial army. His commission waslargely a recognition of his family influence andpolitical connections, but the services of thisteenage general in securing further aid from Francewere invaluable.

Other conditions aided the Americans. Theywere fighting defensively, with the odds, all thingsconsidered, favoring the defender. In agriculture,the colonies were mainly self-sustaining, like a kindof Robinson Crusoe’s island. The Americans alsoenjoyed the moral advantage that came from beliefin a just cause. The historical odds were not impos-sible. Other peoples had triumphed in the face ofgreater obstacles: Greeks against Persians, Swissagainst Austrians, Dutch against Spaniards.


Privately (1776) General George Washington(1732–1799) expressed his distrust of militia:

“To place any dependence upon militia isassuredly resting on a broken staff. . . . The sudden change in their manner of living. . . brings on sickness in many, impatience inall, and such an unconquerable desire ofreturning to their respective homes that itnot only produces shameful and scandalousdesertions among themselves, but infusesthe like spirit in others. . . . If I was calledupon to declare upon oath whether themilitia have been most serviceable or hurtfulupon the whole, I should subscribe to thelatter.”

Yet the American rebels were badly organizedfor war. From the earliest days, they had beenalmost fatally lacking in unity, and the new nationlurched forward uncertainly like an uncoordinatedcentipede. Even the Continental Congress, whichdirected the conflict, was hardly more than a debat-ing society, and it grew feebler as the struggledragged on. “Their Congress now is quite disjoint’d,’’gibed an English satirist, “Since Gibbits (gallows)[are] for them appointed.’’ The disorganizedcolonists fought almost the entire war before adopt-ing a written constitution—the Articles of Confeder-ation—in 1781.

Jealousy everywhere raised its hideous head.Individual states, proudly regarding themselves assovereign, resented the attempts of Congress toexercise its flimsy powers. Sectional jealousy boiledup over the appointment of military leaders; some

distrustful New Englanders almost preferred Britishofficers to Americans from other sections.

Economic difficulties were nearly insuperable.Metallic money had already been heavily drainedaway. A cautious Continental Congress, unwilling toraise anew the explosive issue of taxation, wasforced to print “Continental’’ paper money in greatamounts. As this currency poured from the presses,it depreciated until the expression “not worth aContinental’’ became current. One barber con-temptuously papered his shop with the near-worthless dollars. The confusion proliferated whenthe individual states were compelled to issue depre-ciated paper money of their own.

Inflation of the currency inevitably skyrocketedprices. Families of the soldiers at the fighting frontwere hard hit, and hundreds of anxious husbandsand fathers deserted. Debtors easily acquired hand-fuls of the quasi-worthless money and gleefully paidtheir debts “without mercy’’—sometimes with thebayonets of the authorities to back them up.

A Thin Line of Heroes

Basic military supplies in the colonies were danger-ously scanty, especially firearms. Legend to the con-trary, colonial Americans were not a well-armedpeople. Firearms were to be found in only a smallminority of households, and many of those gunswere the property of the local militia. Not a singlegun factory existed in the colonies, and an importedmusket cost the equivalent of two months’ salary fora skilled artisan. Small wonder that only one intwelve American militiamen reported for duty with

The Military Balance Sheet 137

General Washington’s disgust with hiscountrymen is reflected in a diary entry for1776:

“Chimney corner patriots abound; venality,corruption, prostitution of office for selfishends, abuse of trust, perversion of fundsfrom a national to a private use, andspeculations upon the necessities of thetimes pervade all interests.”

his own musket—or that Benjamin Franklin seri-ously proposed arming the American troops withbows and arrows. Among the reasons for the even-tual alliance with France was the need for a reliablesource of firearms.

Other shortages bedeviled the rebels. At ValleyForge, Pennsylvania, shivering American soldierswent without bread for three successive days in thecruel winter of 1777–1778. In one southern cam-paign, some men fainted for lack of food. Manufac-tured goods also were generally in short supply inagricultural America, and clothing and shoes wereappallingly scarce. The path of the Patriot fightingmen was often marked by bloody snow. At frigid Val-ley Forge, during one anxious period, twenty-eighthundred men were barefooted or nearly naked.Woolens were desperately needed against the win-try blasts, and in general the only real uniform of thecolonial army was uniform raggedness. During agrand parade at Valley Forge, some of the officersappeared wrapped in woolen bedcovers. One RhodeIsland unit was known as the “Ragged, Lousy, NakedRegiment.’’

American militiamen were numerous but alsohighly unreliable. Able-bodied American males—perhaps several hundred thousand of them—hadreceived rudimentary training, and many of theserecruits served for short terms in the rebel armies.But poorly trained plowboys could not stand up in

the open field against professional British troopsadvancing with bare bayonets. Many of these undis-ciplined warriors would, in the words of Washington,“fly from their own shadows.’’

A few thousand regulars—perhaps seven oreight thousand at the war’s end—were finallywhipped into shape by stern drillmasters. Notableamong them was an organizational genius, the saltyGerman Baron von Steuben. He spoke no Englishwhen he reached America, but he soon taught hismen that bayonets were not for broiling beefsteaksover open fires. As they gained experience, thesesoldiers of the Continental line more than held theirown against crack British troops.

Blacks also fought and died for the Americancause. Although many states initially barred themfrom militia service, by war’s end more than fivethousand blacks had enlisted in the American armedforces. The largest contingents came from the north-ern states with substantial numbers of free blacks.

Blacks fought at Trenton, Brandywine, Saratoga,and other important battles. Some, including PrinceWhipple—later immortalized in Emanuel Leutze’sfamous painting “Washington Crossing the Delaware”(see p. 153)—became military heroes. Others servedas cooks, guides, spies, drivers, and road builders.

African-Americans also served on the Britishside. In November 1775 Lord Dunmore, royal gover-nor of Virginia, issued a proclamation promisingfreedom for any enslaved black in Virginia whojoined the British army. News of Dunmore’s decreetraveled swiftly. Virginia and Maryland tightenedslave patrols, but within one month, three hundredslaves had joined what came to be called “Lord Dun-more’s Ethiopian Regiment.” In time thousands ofblacks fled plantations for British promises of eman-cipation. When one of James Madison’s slaves wascaught trying to escape to the British lines, Madisonrefused to punish him for “coveting that liberty” thatwhite Americans proclaimed the “right & worthypursuit of every human being.” At war’s end theBritish kept their word, to some at least, and evacu-ated as many as fourteen thousand “Black Loyalists”to Nova Scotia, Jamaica, and England.

Morale in the Revolutionary army was badlyundermined by American profiteers. Putting profitsbefore patriotism, they sold to the British becausethe invader could pay in gold. Speculators forcedprices sky-high, and some Bostonians made profitsof 50 to 200 percent on army garb while the Ameri-can army was freezing at Valley Forge. Washingtonnever had as many as twenty thousand effective


Enslaved blacks hoped that the Revolutionarycrisis would make it possible for them tosecure their own liberty. On the eve of the war in South Carolina, merchant JosiahSmith, Jr., noted such a rumor among theslaves:

“[Freedom] is their common Talk throughoutthe Province, and has occasioned impertinentbehavior in many of them, insomuch that ourProvincial Congress now sitting hath votedthe immediate raising of Two Thousand MenHorse and food, to keep those mistakencreatures in awe.”

Despite such repressive measures, slaveuprisings continued to plague the southerncolonies through 1775 and 1776.

troops in one place at one time, despite bounties ofland and other inducements. Yet if the rebels hadthrown themselves into the struggle with zeal, theycould easily have raised many times that number.

The brutal truth is that only a select minority ofthe American colonists attached themselves to the

cause of independence with a spirit of selfless devo-tion. These were the dedicated souls who bore theburden of battle and the risks of defeat; these werethe freedom-loving Patriots who deserved the grati-tude and esteem of generations yet unborn. Seldomhave so few done so much for so many.

Varying Viewpoints 139

Chronology

1650 First Navigation Laws to control colonialcommerce

1696 Board of Trade assumes governance of colonies

1763 French and Indian War (Seven Years’ War) ends

1764 Sugar Act

1765 Quartering ActStamp ActStamp Act Congress

1766 Declaratory Act

1767 Townshend Acts passedNew York legislature suspended by Parliament

1768 British troops occupy Boston

1770 Boston MassacreAll Townshend Acts except tea tax repealed

1772 Committees of correspondence formed

1773 British East India Company granted tea monopoly

Governor Hutchinson’s actions provoke Boston Tea Party

1774 “Intolerable Acts”Quebec ActFirst Continental CongressThe Association boycotts British goods

1775 Battles of Lexington and Concord

VARYING VIEWPOINTS

Whose Revolution?

Historians once assumed that the Revolution wasjust another chapter in the unfolding story of

human liberty—an important way station on adivinely ordained pathway toward moral perfectionin human affairs. This approach, often labeled the“Whig view of history,” was best expressed inGeorge Bancroft’s ten-volume History of the UnitedStates of America, published between the 1830s and1870s.

By the end of the nineteenth century, a group ofhistorians known as the “imperial school” chal-lenged Bancroft, arguing that the Revolution wasbest understood not as the fulfillment of nationaldestiny, but as a constitutional conflict within theBritish Empire. For historians like George Beer,

Charles Andrews, and Lawrence Gipson, the Revo-lution was the product of a collision between two different views of empire. While the Americanswere moving steadily toward more self-govern-ment, Britain increasingly tightened its grip, threaten-ing a stranglehold that eventually led to wrenchingrevolution.

By the early twentieth century, these ap-proaches were challenged by the so-called progres-sive historians, who argued that neither divinedestiny nor constitutional quibbles had much to do with the Revolution. Rather, the Revolutionstemmed from deep-seated class tensions withinAmerican society that, once released by revolt, pro-duced a truly transformed social order. Living them-

selves in a reform age when entrenched economicinterests cowered under heavy attack, progressivehistorians like Carl Becker insisted that the Revo-lution was not just about “home rule” within the British Empire, but also about “who should ruleat home” in America, the upper or lower classes. J. Franklin Jameson took Becker’s analysis one stepfurther in his influential The American RevolutionConsidered as a Social Movement (1926). He claimedthat the Revolution not only grew out of intensestruggles between social groups, but also inspiredmany ordinary Americans to seek greater economicand political power, fundamentally democratizingsociety in its wake.

In the 1950s the progressive historians fell out offavor as the political climate became more conser-vative. Interpretations of the American Revolutionas a class struggle did not play well in a countryobsessed with the spread of communism, and in itsplace arose the so-called consensus view. Historianssuch as Robert Brown and Edmund Morgan down-played the role of class conflict in the Revolutionaryera, but emphasized that colonists of all ranksshared a commitment to certain fundamental polit-ical principles of self-government. The unifyingpower of ideas was now back in fashion almost ahundred years after Bancroft.

Since the 1950s two broad interpretations havecontended with each other and perpetuated thecontroversy over whether political ideals or eco-nomic and social realities were most responsible forthe Revolution. The first, articulated most promi-nently by Bernard Bailyn, has emphasized ideologi-cal and psychological factors. Focusing on the powerof ideas to foment revolution, Bailyn argued that thecolonists, incited by their reading of seventeenth-

century and early-eighteenth-century English politi-cal theorists, grew extraordinarily (perhaps evenexaggeratedly) suspicious of any attempts to tightenthe imperial reins on the colonies. When confrontedwith new taxes and commercial regulations, thesehypersensitive colonists screamed “conspiracyagainst liberty” and “corrupt ministerial plot.” Intime they took up armed insurrection in defense oftheir intellectual commitment to liberty.

A second school of historians, writing duringthe 1960s and 1970s and inspired by the socialmovements of that turbulent era, revived the pro-gressive interpretation of the Revolution. GaryNash, in The Urban Crucible (1979), and EdwardCountryman, in A People in Revolution (1981),pointed to the increasing social and economic divi-sions among Americans in both the urban seaportsand the isolated countryside in the years leading upto the Revolution. Attacks by laborers on politicalelites and expressions of resentment toward wealthwere taken as evidence of a society that was breed-ing revolutionary change from within, quite asidefrom British provocations. While the concerns of theprogressive historians echo in these socioeconomicinterpretations of the Revolution, the neoprogres-sives have been more careful not to reduce theissues simplistically to the one-ring arena of eco-nomic self-interest. Instead, they have argued thatthe varying material circumstances of Americanparticipants led them to hold distinctive versions ofrepublicanism, giving the Revolution a less unifiedand more complex ideological underpinning thanthe idealistic historians had previously suggested.The dialogue between proponents of “ideas” and“interests” has gradually led to a more nuancedmeeting of the two views.


For further reading, see page A4 of the Appendix. For web resources, go to http://college.hmco.com.

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