American Revolution

The American Revolution was a political upheaval that took place between 1765 and 1783 during which rebel colonists in the Thirteen American Colonies rejected the British monarchy and aristocracy, overthrew the authority of Great Britain, and founded the United States of America.

Starting in 1765, members of American colonial society rejected the authority of the British Parliament to tax them and resisted renewed British attempts to collect duties on goods such as sugar and molasses that for many years had gone uncollected through widespread smuggling by colonists. During the following decade, protests by rebellious colonistsâ€"known as patriotsâ€"continued to escalate, as in the Boston Tea Party in 1773 during which patriots destroyed a consignment of taxed English tea whose price had been reduced to combat smuggling. The British responded by imposing punitive lawsâ€"the Coercive Actsâ€"on Massachusetts in 1774 until the tea had been paid for, following which Patriots in the other colonies rallied behind Massachusetts. In late 1774 the Patriots set up their own alternative government to better coordinate their resistance efforts against Britain, while other colonists, known as loyalists, preferred to remain subjects of the British Crown. For some who identified themselves with the Patriot cause, particularly colonial merchants in Virginia, a break with Britain offered a chance to repudiate long-standing debts to British creditors.

Tensions escalated to the outbreak of fighting between Patriot militia and British regulars at Lexington and Concord in April 1775, after which the Patriot Suffolk Resolves effectively replaced the Royal government of Massachusetts and confined the British to control of the city of Boston. The conflict then evolved into a civil war, during which the Patriots (and later their French, Spanish and Dutch allies) fought the British and Loyalists in what became known as the American Revolutionary War (1775â€"1783). Patriots in each of the thirteen colonies formed a Provincial Congress that usurped power from the old colonial governments and suppressed Loyalism. Claiming King George III's rule to be tyrannical and infringing the colonists' "rights as Englishmen", the Continental Congress declared the colonies free and independent states in July 1776. The Patriot leadership professed the political philosophies of liberalism and republicanism to reject monarchy and aristocracy, and proclaimed that all men are created equal. Congress rejected British proposals for compromise that would keep them under the king.

The British were forced out of Boston in 1776, but then captured and held New York City for the duration of the war, nearly capturing General Washington and his army. The British blockaded the ports and captured other cities for brief periods, but failed to defeat Washington's forces. In early 1778, following a failed patriot invasion of Canada, a British army was captured by a patriot army at the Battle of Saratoga, following which the French entered the war as allies of the United States. The war later turned to the American South, where the British captured an army at South Carolina, but failed to enlist enough volunteers from Loyalist civilians to take effective control. A combined Americanâ€"French force captured a second British army at Yorktown in 1781, effectively ending the war in the United States. A peace treaty in 1783 confirmed the new nation's complete separation from the British Empire. The United States took possession of nearly all the territory east of the Mississippi River and south of the Great Lakes, with the British retaining control of Canada and Spain taking Florida.

In the period after the peace treaty in 1783, Loyalists were subjected to extreme suppression and acts of arbitrary violence, including murder by lynching, despite a promise by patriot leaders to British negotiators that Loyalist rights would be respected. A large proportion were driven off their land and forced to flee as refugees to Canada. American colonists were also free to move west unopposed, seizing Native American lands as they went.

Among the significant results of the revolution was the creation of a democratically-elected representative government theoretically responsible to the will of the people, but which as a result of the 'Three-Fifths Compromise' allowed the southern slaveholders to consolidate power and maintain slavery in America for another eighty years. The new Constitution established a relatively strong federal national government that included a strong elected president, national courts, a bicameral Congress that represented both states in the Senate and population in the House of Representatives. Congress had powers of taxation that were lacking under the old Articles. The United States Bill of Rights of 1791 comprised the first ten amendments to the Constitution, guaranteeing many "natural rights" that were influential in justifying the revolution, and attempted to balance a strong national government with strong state governments and 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.

Origins

Background to 1763

The British began colonizing North America in the 17th century. The colonies established along the Atlantic coast were governed by charters granted by the King, each permitting a substantial amount of self-governance. Crown colonies (Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, New Jersey, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia) imitated the "mixed monarchy" constitutional structure of Great Britain. Each had an elected assembly which constituted the lower house of the legislature, a council appointed (except in Massachusetts) by the crown constituting the upper house, and an appointed governor with executive powers representing the King. All laws had to be submitted to the home government for approval, but otherwise there was little interference. Proprietary colonies (Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland) also had elected assemblies but the proprietors, not the crown, appointed the governors. Charter colonies (Connecticut and Rhode island) elected both houses of the legislature and the governor and did not have to submit their laws for approval.

Parliament legislated regarding matters of an imperial concern. As early as 1621 London introduced legislation to levy duties on shipments of Virginian tobacco that passed into English ports, though in return the planters enjoyed protection and a guaranteed market. English growers were prohibited by law to raise tobacco crops, and producers of rice and indigo (a blue plant dye) in South Carolina received similar privileges. In common with all European nations which had colonies, the English Navigation Acts of the late 17th century restricted colonial trade for the benefit of the mother country in accordance with mercantilist theory. To ensure adequate auxiliary vessels were available in wartime, the Acts also encouraged the colonists to invest in shipping, but particularly in New England, an unintentional outcome was a flourishing and very hard to control, smuggling industry. The sheer scale of the problem of patrolling 3000 miles of American coastline with a tiny number of English customs and revenue cutters meant that colonial shippers could evade duties with comparative ease. Because the Acts did not apply to inter-colonial trade, colonial shippers were afforded plenty of opportunities for bypassing the meagre British customs controls, using a mixture of convoluted routes, bribery and false paperwork which misrepresented or under-declared their cargoes so that very little duty was paid at all. The close proximity of the European island plantations in the Caribbean provided easy transit points for colonial shippers, who made regular round trips south to with livestock, timber, grain and tobacco which they bartered for slaves, fine cloth, linens, soap, sugar and molasses, used in the production of rum.

The French and Indian War ended in 1763 with the conquest of French Canada and the expulsion of France from mainland North America by British and provincial forces. The war left Britain in considerable debt, and it therefore made plans to ensure a more productive collection of existing duties from the colonists. In addition, following the Pontiac Rebellion, which led to considerable loss of life and territory by Native Americans, the British Crown issued the Royal Proclamation of 1763, which set a boundary running along the foot of the Appalachian Mountains from Florida and Georgia to the Gulf of the St. Lawrence beyond which colonists were not to settle. The purpose was to save money from having to administer any new lands and prevent additional war with the inhabitants.

1764â€"1766: Taxes imposed and withdrawn

In 1764 Parliament passed the Currency Act to restrain the use of paper money that British merchants saw as a means to evade debt payments. Parliament also passed the Sugar Act imposing customs duties on a number of articles. That same year Prime Minister George Grenville proposed to impose direct taxes on the colonies to raise revenue, but delayed action to see if the colonies would propose some way to raise the revenue themselves. None did, and in March 1765 Parliament passed the Stamp Act which imposed direct taxes on the colonies for the first time. All official documents, newspapers, almanacs and pamphletsâ€"even decks of playing cardsâ€"were required to have the stamps.

The colonists objected chiefly on the grounds not that the taxes were high (they were low), but because they had no representation in the Parliament. Benjamin Franklin testified in Parliament in 1766 that Americans already contributed heavily to the defense of the Empire. He said local governments had raised, outfitted and paid 25,000 soldiers to fight Franceâ€"as many as Britain itself sentâ€"and spent many millions from American treasuries doing so in the French and Indian War alone. Stationing a standing army in Great Britain during peacetime was politically unacceptable. London had to deal with 1,500 politically well-connected British officers who became redundant; it would have to discharge them or station them in North America.

In 1765 the Sons of Liberty formed. They used public demonstrations, boycott, 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 sending numerous petitions and pleas for intervention from a monarch to whom they still claimed loyalty. In Boston, the Sons of Liberty burned the records of the vice-admiralty court and looted the 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 their rights as Englishmen. At the same time, however, they rejected the idea of being provided with representation in Parliament, declaring it impossible due to the distance involved. Colonists emphasized their determination by boycotting imports of British merchandise.

The Parliament at Westminster saw itself as the supreme lawmaking authority throughout all British possessions and thus entitled to levy any tax without colonial approval. They argued that the colonies were legally British corporations that were completely subordinate to the British parliament and pointed to numerous instances where Parliament had made laws binding on the colonies in the past. They did not see anything in the unwritten British constitution that made taxes special and noted that Parliament had taxed American trade for decades. Parliament insisted that the colonies effectively enjoyed a "virtual representation" like most British people did, as only a small minority of the British population elected representatives to Parliament. Americans such as James Otis maintained the Americans were not in fact virtually represented.

In London, the Rockingham government came to power (July 1765) and Parliament debated whether to repeal the stamp tax or to send an army to enforce it. Benjamin Franklin made the case for repeal, 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 Indians, and that further taxes to pay for those wars were unjust and might bring about a rebellion. Parliament agreed and repealed the tax (February 21, 1766), but in the Declaratory Act of March 1766 insisted that parliament retained full power to make laws for the colonies "in all cases whatsoever". The repeal nonetheless caused widespread celebrations in the colonies.

1767â€"1773: Townshend Acts and the Tea Act

In 1767 the Parliament passed the Townshend Acts, which placed duties on a number of essential goods including paper, glass, and tea and established a Board of Customs in Boston to more rigorously execute trade regulations. The new taxes were enacted on the belief that Americans only objected to internal taxes and not external taxes like custom duties. The Americans, however, argued against the constitutionality of the act because its purpose was to raise revenue and not regulate trade. Colonists responded by organizing new boycotts of British goods. These boycotts were less effective, however, as the Townshend goods were widely used.

In February 1768 the Assembly of Massachusetts Bay issued a circular letter to the other colonies urging them to coordinate resistance. The governor dissolved the assembly when it refused to rescind the letter. Meanwhile, in June 1768 a riot broke out in Boston over the seizure of the sloop Liberty, owned by John Hancock, for alleged smuggling. Custom officials were forced to flee, prompting the British to deploy troops to Boston. A Boston town meeting declared no obedience was due to parliamentary laws and called for the convening of a convention. A convention assembled but only issued a mild protest before dissolving itself. In January 1769 Parliament responded to the unrest by reactivating the Treason Act 1543 which permitted subjects outside the realm to face trials for treason in England. The governor of Massachusetts was instructed to collect evidence of said treason, and although the threat was not carried out it caused widespread outrage.

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. There was no order to fire but the soldiers fired into the crowd anyway. They hit 11 people; three civilians died 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.

A new ministry under Lord North came to power in 1770 and Parliament withdrew all taxes except the tax on tea, giving up its efforts to raise revenue while maintaining the right to tax. This temporarily resolved the crisis and the boycott of British goods largely ceased, with only the more radical patriots such as Samuel Adams continuing to agitate.

In June 1772, in what became known as the Gaspee Affair, American patriots including John Brown burned a British warship that had been vigorously enforcing unpopular trade regulations. The affair was investigated for possible treason, but no action was taken.

In 1772 it became known that the Crown intended to pay fixed salaries to the governors and judges in Massachusetts. Samuel Adams in Boston set about creating new Committees of Correspondence, which linked Patriots in all 13 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.

A total of about 7000 to 8000 Patriots served on "Committees of Correspondence" at the colonial and local levels, comprising most of the leadership in their communities â€" Loyalists were excluded. The committees became the leaders of the American resistance to British actions, and largely determined the war effort at the state and local level. When the First Continental Congress decided to boycott British products, the colonial and local Committees took charge, examining merchant records and publishing the names of merchants who attempted to defy the boycott by importing British goods.

In 1773 private letters were published where Massachusetts Governor Thomas Hutchinson claimed the colonists could not enjoy all English liberties, and Lieutenant Governor Andrew Oliver called for the direct payment of colonial officials. The letters, whose contents were used as evidence of a systematic plot against American rights, discredited Hutchinson in the eyes of the people the Assembly petitioned for his recall. Benjamin Franklin, post-master general for the colonies, acknowledged that he leaked the letters which led to him being berated by British officials and fired from his job.

Meanwhile, Parliament passed the Tea Act to lower the price of taxed tea exported to the colonies in order to help the East India Company undersell smuggled Dutch tea. Special consignees were appointed to sell the tea in order to bypass colonial merchants. The act was opposed not only by those who resisted the taxes but also by smugglers who stood to lose business. In most instances the consignees were forced to resign and the tea was turned back, but Massachusetts governor Hutchinson refused to allow Boston merchants to give into pressure. A town meeting in Boston determined that the tea would not be landed, and ignored a demand from the governor to disperse. On December 16, 1773 a group of men, led by Samuel Adams and dressed to evoke American Indians, boarded the ships of the British East India Company and dumped £10,000 worth of tea from their holds (approximately £636,000 in 2008) into Boston Harbor. Decades later this event became known as the Boston Tea Party and remains a significant part of American patriotic lore.

1774â€"1775: Intolerable Acts and the Quebec Act

The British government responded by passing four new laws, the Coercive Acts which the Patriots called the Intolerable Acts. The first, the Massachusetts Government Act, altered the Massachusetts charter and restricted town meetings. The second Act, the Administration 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 fourth Act was the Quartering Act of 1774, which Patriots claimed allowed royal governors to house British troops in the homes of citizens without requiring permission of the owner. The 1774 Quartering Act was actually a clarification of previous legislation from 1765 which made no mention of troops intruding in private homes. Only the original 1765 act included taverns, alehouses, and inns among the locations that officials could commandeer for the regulars if necessary. Even then, provinces were to pay innkeepers and tavern owners for the use of their property.

In response, Massachusetts patriots issued the Suffolk Resolves and formed an alternative shadow government known as the "Provincial Congress" which began training militia outside British-occupied Boston. In September 1774, the First Continental Congress convened, consisting of representatives from each of the colonies, to serve as a vehicle for deliberation and collective action. During secret debates conservative Joseph Galloway proposed the creation of a colonial Parliament that would be able to approve or disapprove of acts of the British Parliament but his idea was not accepted. The Congress instead endorsed the proposal of John Adams that Americans would obey Parliament voluntarily but would resist all taxes in disguise. Congress called for a boycott beginning on 1 December 1774 of all British goods; it was enforced by new committees authorized by the Congress.

The Quebec Act of 1774 extended Quebec's boundaries to the Ohio River, shutting out the claims of the 13 colonies. By then, however, the Americans had little regard for new laws from London; they were drilling militia and organizing for war.

The British retaliated by confining all trade of the New England colonies to Britain and excluding them from the Newfoundland fisheries. Lord North advanced a compromise proposal in which Parliament would not tax so long as the colonies made fixed contributions for defense and to support civil government. This would also be rejected.

Creating new state constitutions

Following the Battle of Bunker Hill in June 1775, the Patriots had control of Massachusetts outside the Boston city limits; the Loyalists suddenly found themselves on the defensive with no protection from the British army. In all 13 colonies, Patriots had overthrown their existing governments, closing courts and driving British officials away. They had elected conventions and "legislatures" that existed outside any legal framework; new constitutions were drawn up in each state to supersede royal charters. They declared that they were states now, not colonies.

On January 5, 1776, New Hampshire ratified the first state constitution. 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 charters and deleted all references to the crown. The new states were all committed to republicanism, with no inherited offices. They decided not only what form of government to create, and also how to select those who would craft the constitutions and how the resulting document would be ratified. But there would be no universal suffrage and real power, including the right to elect the future President would still lay in the hands of a few selected elites for many years. On 26 May 1776 John Adams wrote James Sullivan from Philadelphia;

"Depend upon it, sir, it is dangerous to open so fruitful a source of controversy and altercation, as would be opened by attempting to alter the qualifications of voters. There will be no end of it. New claims will arise. Women will demand a vote. Lads from twelve to twenty one will think their rights not enough attended to, and every man, who has not a farthing, will demand an equal voice with any other in all acts of state. It tends to confound and destroy all distinctions, and prostrate all ranks, to one common level".

In states where the wealthy exerted firm control over the process, such as Maryland, Virginia, Delaware, New York and Massachusetts â€" the last-mentioned of these state's constitutions still being in force in the 21st century, continuously since its ratification on June 15, 1780 â€" 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);
• 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.

In states where the less affluent had organized sufficiently to have significant powerâ€"especially Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New Hampshireâ€"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;

The radical provisions of Pennsylvania's constitution lasted only 14 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.

Military hostilities begin

Massachusetts was declared in a state of rebellion in February 1775 and the British garrison received orders to disarm the rebels and arrest their leaders, leading to the Battles of Lexington and Concord on 19 April 1775. The Patriots set siege to Boston, expelled royal officials from all the colonies, and took control through the establishment of Provincial Congresses. 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. First ostensibly loyal to the king and desiring to govern themselves while remaining in the empire, 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 the members of Congress were traitors.

In the winter of 1775, the Americans invaded Canada. General Richard Montgomery captured Montreal but a joint attack on Quebec was a total failure; many Americans were captured or died of smallpox.

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.

Prisoners

In August 1775, George III declared Americans in arms against royal authority to be traitors to the Crown. Following their surrender at the Battles of Saratoga in October 1777, there were thousands of British and Hessian soldiers in American hands. Although Lord Germain took a hard line, the British generals on the scene never held treason trials; they treated captured enemy soldiers as prisoners of war. The dilemma was that tens of thousands of Loyalists were under American control and American retaliation would have been easy. The British built much of their strategy around using these Loyalists. Therefore, no Americans were put on trial for treason. The British maltreated the prisoners they held, resulting in more deaths to American sailors and soldiers than from combat operations. At the end of the war, both sides released their surviving prisoners.

Independence and Union

In April 1776 the North Carolina Provincial Congress issued the Halifax Resolves, explicitly authorizing its delegates to vote for independence. In May Congress called on all the states to write constitutions, and eliminate the last remnants of royal rule.

By June nine colonies were ready for independence; one by one the last fourâ€"Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and New Yorkâ€"fell into line. Richard Henry Lee was instructed by the Virginia legislature to propose independence, and he did so on June 7, 1776. On the 11th a committee was created to draft a document explaining the justifications for separation from Britain. After securing enough votes for passage, independence was voted for on July 2. The Declaration of Independence, drafted largely by Thomas Jefferson and presented by the committee, was slightly revised and unanimously adopted by the entire Congress on July 4, marking the formation of a new sovereign nation, which called itself the United States of America.

The Second Continental Congress approved a new constitution, the "Articles of Confederation," for ratification by the states on November 15, 1777, and immediately began operating under their terms. The Articles were formally ratified 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 presiding officer.

Defending the Revolution

British return: 1776â€"1777

According to British historian Jeremy Black, the British had significant advantages including a highly trained army, the world's largest navy and a highly efficient system of public finance that could easily fund the war. However, the British were seriously handicapped by their misunderstanding of the depth of support for the Patriot position. Ignoring the advice of General Gage, they misinterpreted the situation as merely a large-scale riot. London decided that by sending a large military and naval force they could overawe the Americans and force them to be loyal again:

Convinced that the Revolution was the work of a full few miscreants who had rallied an armed rabble to their cause, they expected that the revolutionaries would be intimidated…. Then the vast majority of Americans, who were loyal but cowed by the terroristic tactics… would rise up, kick out the rebels, and restore loyal government in each colony.

After Washington forced the British out of Boston in the spring of 1776, neither the British nor the Loyalists controlled any significant areas. The British, however, were massing forces at their naval base at Halifax, Nova Scotia. They returned in force in July 1776, landing in New York and defeating Washington's Continental Army at the Battle of Brooklyn in August. After winning the Battle of Brooklyn, the British requested a meeting with representatives from Congress to negotiate an end to hostilities.

A delegation including John Adams and Benjamin Franklin met Howe on Staten Island in New York Harbor on September 11, in what became known as the Staten Island Peace Conference. Howe demanded a retraction of the Declaration of Independence, which was refused, and negotiations ended. The British then quickly seized New York City and nearly captured Washington's army. They made New York their main political and military base of operations in North America, holding it until November 1783. The city became the destination for Loyalist refugees, and a focal point of Washington's intelligence network.

The British also took New Jersey, pushing the Continental Army into Pennsylvania. 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 control of most of New Jersey. The victories gave an important boost to Patriots 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 in northern New York state. It surrendered after the Battle of Saratoga in October 1777. From early October 1777 until November 15 a pivotal siege at Fort 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.

American alliances after 1778

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. On February 6, 1778, a Treaty of Amity and Commerce and a Treaty of Alliance were signed between the United States and France. 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 Britain's international rival and enemy.

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. The British were forced to withdraw troops from continental America to reinforce the valuable sugar-producing Caribbean colonies, which were considered more important.

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.

The British move South, 1778â€"1783

The British strategy in America now concentrated on a campaign in the southern states. 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.

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.

Yorktown 1781

The British army under Cornwallis marched to Yorktown, Virginia where they expected to be rescued by a British fleet. The fleet showed up but so did a larger French fleet, so the British fleet after the Battle of the Chesapeake returned to New York for reinforcements, leaving Cornwallis trapped. In October 1781 under a combined siege by the French and Continental armies under Washington, the British surrendered their second invading army of the war.

The end of the war

Historians continue to debate whether the odds for American victory were long or short. John E. Ferling says the odds were so long that the American victory was "Almost A Miracle." On the other hand, Joseph Ellis says the odds favored the Americans, and asks whether there ever was any realistic chance for the British to win. He argues that this opportunity came only once, in the summer of 1776 and the British failed that test. Admiral Howe and his brother General Howe, "missed several opportunities to destroy the Continental Army....Chance, luck, and even the vagaries of the weather played crucial roles." Ellis's point is that the strategic and tactical decisions of the Howes were fatally flawed because they underestimated the challenges posed by the Patriots. Ellis concludes that once the Howe brothers failed, the opportunity for a British victory "would never come again."

Support for the conflict had never been strong in Britain, where many sympathized with the rebels, but now it reached a new low. 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 Theater.

Washington could not know that after Yorktown the British would not reopen hostilities. They still had 26,000 troops occupying New York City, Charleston and Savannah, together with a powerful fleet. The French army and navy departed, so the Americans were on their own in 1782â€"83. The treasury was empty, and the unpaid soldiers were growing restive, almost to the point of mutiny or possible coup d'état. The unrest among officers of the Newburgh Conspiracy was personally dispelled by Washington in 1783, and Congress subsequently created the promise of a five years bonus for all officers.

Peace treaty

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 British abandoned the Indian allies living in this region; they 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. Since the blockade was lifted and the old imperial restrictions were gone, American merchants were free to trade with any nation anywhere in the world, and their businesses flourished.

Impact on Britain

Losing the war and the 13 colonies was a shock to Britain. The war revealed the limitations of Britain's fiscal-military state when it discovered it suddenly faced powerful enemies, with no allies, and dependent on extended and vulnerable transatlantic lines of communication. 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, 1776â€"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 the Fox-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. Britain turned towards Asia, the Pacific and later Africa with subsequent exploration leading to the rise of the Second British Empire.

Finance

Britain's war against the Americans, French and Spanish cost about £100 million. The Treasury borrowed 40% of the money it needed. Heavy spending brought France to the verge of bankruptcy and revolution, while the British had relatively little difficulty financing their war, keeping their suppliers and soldiers paid, and hiring tens of thousands of German soldiers.

Britain had a sophisticated financial system based on the wealth of thousands of landowners, who supported the government, together with banks and financiers in London. The efficient British tax system collected about 12 percent of the GDP in taxes during the 1770s.

In sharp contrast, Congress and the American states had no end of difficulty financing the war. In 1775 there was at most 12 million dollars in gold in the colonies, not nearly enough to cover current transactions, let alone finance a major war. The British made the situation much worse by imposing a tight blockade on every American port, which cut off almost all imports and exports. One partial solution was to rely on volunteer support from militiamen, and donations from patriotic citizens.

Another was to delay actual payments, pay soldiers and suppliers in depreciated currency, and promise it would be made good after the war. Indeed, in 1783 the soldiers and officers were given land grants to cover the wages they had earned but had not been paid during the war. Not until 1781, when Robert Morris was named Superintendent of Finance of the United States, did the national government have a strong leader in financial matters.

Morris used a French loan in 1782 to set up the private Bank of North America to finance the war. Seeking greater efficiency, Morris reduced the civil list, saved money by using competitive bidding for contracts, tightened accounting procedures, and demanded the national government's full share of money and supplies from the confederated states.

Congress used four main methods to cover the cost of the war, which cost about 66 million dollars in specie (gold and silver). Congress made two issues of paper money, in 1775â€"1780, and in 1780â€"81. The first issue amounted to 242 million dollars. This paper money would supposedly be redeemed for state taxes, but the holders were eventually paid off in 1791 at the rate of one cent on the dollar. By 1780, the paper money was "not worth a Continental", as people said.

The skyrocketing inflation was a hardship on the few people who had fixed incomesâ€"but 90 percent of the people were farmers, and were not directly affected by that inflation. Debtors benefited by paying off their debts with depreciated paper.The greatest burden was borne by the soldiers of the Continental Army, whose wagesâ€"usually in arrearsâ€"declined in value every month, weakening their morale and adding to the hardships suffered by their families.

Beginning in 1777, Congress repeatedly asked the states to provide money. But the states had no system of taxation either, and were little help. By 1780 Congress was making requisitions for specific supplies of corn, beef, pork and other necessitiesâ€"an inefficient system that kept the army barely alive.

Starting in 1776, the Congress sought to raise money by loans from wealthy individuals, promising to redeem the bonds after the war. The bonds were in fact redeemed in 1791 at face value, but the scheme raised little money because Americans had little specie, and many of the rich merchants were supporters of the Crown. Starting in 1776, the French secretly supplied the Americans with money, gunpowder, and munitions in order to weaken its arch enemy, Great Britain. When France officially entered the war in 1778, the subsidies continued, and the French government, as well as bankers in Paris and Amsterdam loaned large sums to the American war effort. These loans were repaid in full in the 1790s.

Concluding the Revolution

Creating a "more perfect union" and guaranteeing rights

After the war finally ended in 1783, there was a period of prosperity. The national government, still operating under the Articles of Confederation, was able to settle the issue of the western territories, which were ceded by the states to Congress. American settlers moved rapidly into those areas, with Vermont, Kentucky and Tennessee becoming states in the 1790s.

However, the national government had no money to pay either the war debts owed to European nations and the private banks, or to pay Americans who had been given millions of dollars of promissory notes for supplies during the war. Nationalists, led by Washington, Alexander Hamilton and other veterans, feared that the new nation was too fragile to withstand an international war, or even internal revolts such as the Shays' Rebellion of 1786 in Massachusetts.

Calling themselves "Federalists," the nationalists convinced Congress to call the Philadelphia Convention in 1787. It adopted a new Constitution that provided for a much stronger federal government, including an effective executive in a check-and-balance system with the judiciary and legislature. After a fierce debate in the states over the nature of the proposed new government, the Constitution was ratified in 1788. The new government under President George Washington took office in New York in March 1789. As assurances to those who were cautious about federal power, amendments to the Constitution guaranteeing many of the inalienable rights that formed a foundation for the revolution were spearheaded in Congress by James Madison, and later ratified by the states in 1791.

National debt

The national debt after the American Revolution fell into three categories. The first was the $12 million owed to foreignersâ€"mostly money borrowed from France. There was general agreement to pay the foreign debts at full value. The national government owed $40 million and state governments owed $25 million to Americans who had sold food, horses, and supplies to the revolutionary forces. 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 million compared to $37 million by the central government. 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.

Ideology and factions

The population of the 13 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.

Ideology behind the Revolution

The ideological movement known as the American Enlightenment was a critical precursor to the American Revolution. Chief among the ideas of the American Enlightenment were the concepts of liberalism, republicanism and fear of corruption. Collectively, the acceptance of these concepts by a growing number of American colonists began to foster an intellectual environment which would lead to a new sense of political and social identity.

Natural rights and republicanism

John Locke's (1632â€"1704) ideas on liberty greatly influenced the political thinking behind the revolution, especially through his indirect influence on English writers such as John Trenchard, Thomas Gordon, and Benjamin Hoadly, whose political ideas in turn had a strong influence on the American revolutionaries. Locke is often referred to as "the philosopher of the American Revolution", and is credited with leading Americans to the critical concepts of social contract, natural rights, and "born free and equal." Locke's Two Treatises of Government, published in 1689, was especially influential; Locke in turn was influenced by Protestant theology. He argued that, as all humans were created equally free, governments needed the "consent of the governed." Both Lockean concepts were central to the United States Declaration of Independence, which deduced human equality, "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" from the biblical belief in creation: "All men are created equal, ... they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights." In late eighteenth-century America, belief in "equality by creation" and "rights by creation" was still widespread.

The Declaration also referred to the "Laws of Nature and of Nature's God" as justification for the Americans' separation from the British monarchy. Most eighteenth-century Americans believed that nature, the entire universe, was God's creation. Therefore he was "Nature's God." Everything, including man, was part of the "universal order of things", which began with God and was pervaded and directed by his providence. Accordingly, the signers of the Declaration professed their "firm reliance on the Protection of divine Providence." And they appealed to "the Supreme Judge [God] for the rectitude of [their] intentions." Like most of his countrymen, George Washington was firmly convinced that he was an instrument of providence, to the benefit not only of the American people but of all of humanity.

The theory of the "social contract" influenced the belief among many of the Founders that among the "natural rights" of man was the right of the people to overthrow their leaders, should those leaders betray the historic rights of Englishmen. In terms of writing state and national constitutions, the Americans heavily used Montesquieu's analysis of the wisdom of the "balanced" British Constitution (mixed government).

A motivating force behind the revolution was the American embrace of a political ideology called "republicanism", which was dominant in the colonies by 1775, but of minor importance back in Great Britain. The republicanism was inspired by the "country party" in Great Britain, whose critique of British government emphasized that corruption was a terrible reality in Great Britain. 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. The greatest threat to liberty was depicted as corruptionâ€"not just in London but at home as well. The colonists associated it with luxury and, especially, inherited aristocracy, which they condemned.

The Founding Fathers were strong advocates of republican values, particularly Samuel Adams, Patrick Henry, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, George Washington, James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, 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.

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

Fusing republicanism and liberalism

While some republics had emerged throughout history, such as the Roman Republic of the ancient world, one based on liberal principles had never existed. Thomas 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 together, bolstering enthusiasm for separation from Great 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.

Impact of Great Awakening

Dissenting (i.e. Protestant, non-Church of England) churches of the day were the "school of democracy." 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 ministers (Congregationalist, Baptist, and Presbyterian) preached Revolutionary themes in their sermons, while most Church of England clergymen preached loyalty to the King. Religious motivation for fighting tyranny reached across socioeconomic lines to encompass rich and poor, men and women, frontiersmen and townsmen, farmers and merchants.

Historian Bernard Bailyn argues that the evangelicalism of the era challenged traditional notions of natural hierarchy by preaching that the Bible taught all men are equal, so that the true value of a man lies in his moral behavior, not his class. Kidd argues that religious disestablishment, belief in a God as the source of human rights, and shared convictions about sin, virtue, and divine providence worked together to unite rationalists and evangelicals and thus encouraged American defiance of the Empire, whereas Bailyn denied that religion played such a critical role. Alan Heimert argued, however, that New Light antiauthoritarianism was essential to the further democratization of colonial American society, and set the stage for a confrontation with British monarchical and aristocratic rule.

Class and psychology of the factions

Looking back, John Adams concluded in 1818:

The Revolution was effected before the war commenced. The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people ... This radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people was the real American Revolution.

In terms of class, Loyalists tended to have longstanding social and economic connections to British merchants and government; for instance, prominent merchants in major port cities such as New York, Boston and Charleston tended to be Loyalists, as did men involved with the fur trade along the northern frontier. In addition, officials of colonial government and their staffs, those who had established positions and status to maintain, favored maintaining relations with Great Britain. They often were linked to British families in England by marriage as well.

By contrast, Patriots by number tended to be yeomen farmers, especially in the frontier areas of New York and the backcountry of Pennsylvania, Virginia and down the Appalachian mountains. They were craftsmen and small merchants. Leaders of both the Patriots and the Loyalists were men of educated, propertied classes. The Patriots included many prominent men of the planter class from Virginia and South Carolina, for instance, who became leaders during the Revolution, and formed the new government at the national and state levels.

To understand the opposing groups, historians have assessed evidence of their hearts and minds. In the mid-20th century, historian Leonard Woods Labaree identified eight characteristics of the Loyalists that made them essentially conservative; traits to those characteristic of the Patriots. Older and better established men, Loyalists tended to resist innovation. They thought resistance to the Crownâ€"which they insisted was the only legitimate governmentâ€"was morally wrong, while the Patriots thought morality was on their side.

Loyalists were alienated when the Patriots resorted to violence, such as burning houses and tarring and feathering. Loyalists wanted to take a centrist position and resisted the Patriots' demand to declare their opposition to the Crown. Many Loyalists, especially merchants in the port cities, had maintained strong and long-standing relations with Britain (often with business and family links to other parts of the British Empire).

Many Loyalists realized that independence was bound to come eventually, but they were fearful that revolution might lead to anarchy, tyranny or mob rule. In contrast, the prevailing attitude among Patriots, who made systematic efforts to use mob violence in a controlled manner, was a desire to seize the initiative. Labaree also wrote that Loyalists were pessimists who lacked the confidence in the future displayed by the Patriots.

Historians in the early 20th century, such as J. Franklin Jameson, examined the class composition of the Patriot cause, looking for evidence of 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. 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 to gain freedom from British oppression and taxation and, above all, to reassert what they considered to be their rights as English subjects. Most yeomen farmers, craftsmen, and small merchants joined the Patriot cause to demand more political equality. They were especially successful in Pennsylvania but less so in New England, where John Adams attacked Thomas Paine's Common Sense for the "absurd democratical notions" it proposed.

King George III

The war became a personal issue for the king, fueled by his growing belief that British leniency would be taken as weakness by the Americans. The king also sincerely believed he was defending Britain's constitution against usurpers, rather than opposing patriots fighting for their natural rights.

Patriots

At the time, revolutionaries were called "Patriots", "Whigs", "Congress-men", or "Americans". They included a full range of social and economic classes, but were unanimous regarding the need to defend the rights of Americans and uphold the principles of republicanism in terms of rejecting monarchy and aristocracy, while emphasizing civic virtue on the part of the citizens. Newspapers were strongholds of patriotism (although there were a few Loyalist papers), and printed many pamphlets, announcements, patriotic letters and pronouncements.

According to historian Robert Calhoon, the consensus of historians is that 40â€"45% of the white population in the Thirteen Colonies supported the Patriots' cause, 15â€"20% supported the Loyalists, and the remainder were neutral or kept a low profile. Mark Lender explores why ordinary folk became insurgents against the British even though they were unfamiliar with the ideological rationales being offered. They held very strongly a sense of "rights" that they felt the British were violating â€" rights that stressed local autonomy, fair dealing, and government by consent. They were highly sensitive to the issue of tyranny, which they saw manifested in the British response to the Boston Tea Party. The arrival in Boston of the British Army heightened their sense of violated rights, leading to rage and demands for revenge. They had faith that God was on their side.

Loyalists

The consensus of scholars is that about 15â€"20% of the white population remained loyal to the British Crown. Those who actively supported the king were known at the time as "Loyalists", "Tories", or "King's men". The Loyalists never controlled territory unless the British Army occupied it. Loyalists were typically older, less willing to break with old loyalties, often connected to the Church of England, and included many established merchants with strong business connections across the Empire, as well as royal officials such as Thomas Hutchinson of Boston. There were 500 to 1000 black loyalists who were held as slaves by patriots, escaped to British lines and joined the British army. Most died of disease but Britain took the survivors to Canada as free men.

The revolution could divide families. The most dramatic example was when William Franklin, son of Benjamin Franklin and royal governor of the Province of New Jersey, remained loyal to the Crown throughout the war; they never spoke 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.

After the war, the great majority of the 450,000â€"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). The exiles represented approximately 2% of the total population of the colonies. Nearly all black loyalists left for Nova Scotia, Florida, or England, where they could remain free. When Loyalists left the South in 1783, they took thousands of their slaves with them to be slaves in the British West Indies.

Neutrals

A minority of uncertain size tried to stay neutral in the war. Most kept a low profile, but the Quakers, especially in Pennsylvania, were the most important group to speak out 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.

Role of women

Women contributed to the American Revolution in many ways, and were involved on both sides. 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. Also, Mercy Otis Warren held meetings in her house and cleverly attacked Loyalists with her creative plays and histories. Above all, they continued the agricultural work at home to feed their families and the armies. They maintained their families during their husbands' absences and sometimes after their deaths.

American women were integral to the success of the boycott of British goods, as the boycotted items were largely household items such as tea and cloth. Women had to return to knitting goods, and to spinning and weaving their own cloth â€" 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.

A crisis of political loyalties could 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.

Other participants

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. American rebels obtained some munitions through the Dutch Republic as well as French and Spanish ports in the West Indies.

Spain

Spain did not officially recognize the U.S. but became an informal ally when it declared war on Britain on June 21, 1779. Bernardo de Gálvez y Madrid, general of the Spanish forces in New Spain, also served as governor of Louisiana. He led an expedition of colonial troops to force the British out of Florida and keep open a vital conduit for supplies.

Native Americans

Most Native Americans rejected pleas that they remain neutral and supported the British Crown, both because of trading relationships and Britain's effort to establish an Indian reserve and prohibit colonial settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains. The great majority of the 200,000 Native Americans east of the Mississippi distrusted the colonists and supported the British cause, hoping to forestall continued colonial encroachment on their territories. Those tribes that were more closely involved in colonial trade tended to side with the revolutionaries, although political factors were important as well.

Except for warriors and bands associated with four of the Iroquois nations in New York and Pennsylvania, which allied with the British, most Native Americans did not participate directly in the war. The British did have other allies especially in the upper Midwest. They provided Indians with funding and weapons to attack American outposts. Some Indians tried to remain neutral, seeing little value in joining a European conflict and fearing reprisals from whichever side they opposed. The Oneida and Tuscarora, among the Iroquois of central and western New York, supported the American cause.

The British provided arms to Indians, who were led by Loyalists in war parties to raid frontier settlements from the Carolinas to New York. They killed many settlers on the frontier, especially in Pennsylvania and New York's Mohawk Valley.

In 1776 Cherokee war parties attacked American colonists all along the southern frontier of the uplands through Tennessee and Kentucky. While the Cherokee launched raids numbering a couple hundred warriors, as seen in the Chickamauga Wars, they could not mobilize enough forces to fight a major invasion of colonial areas without the help of allies, most often the Creek.

Joseph Brant of the powerful Mohawk nation, part of the Iroquois Confederacy based in New York, was the most prominent Native American leader against the rebel forces. In 1778 and 1780, he led 300 Iroquois warriors and 100 white Loyalists in multiple attacks on small frontier settlements in New York and Pennsylvania, killing many settlers and destroying villages, crops and stores. The Seneca, Onondaga and Cayuga of the Iroquois Confederacy also allied with the British against the Americans.

In 1779 the Continentals retaliated with an American army under John Sullivan, which raided and destroyed 40 empty Iroquois villages in central and western New York. Sullivan's forces systematically burned the villages and destroyed about 160,000 bushels of corn that comprised the winter food supply. Facing starvation and homeless for the winter, the Iroquois fled to the Niagara Falls area and to Canada, mostly to what became Ontario. The British resettled them there after the war, providing land grants as compensation for some of their losses.

At the peace conference following the war, the British ceded lands which they did not really control, and did not consult their Indian allies. They "transferred" control to the United States of all the land east of the Mississippi and north of Florida. The historian 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.

The British did not give up their forts in the West (what is now the Ohio to Wisconsin) until 1796; they kept alive the dream of forming a satellite Indian nation there, which they called a Neutral Indian Zone. That goal was one of the causes of the War of 1812.

African Americans

Free blacks in the North and South fought on both sides of the Revolution, but most fought for the patriots. Gary Nash reports that recent research concludes there were about 9000 black Patriot soldiers, counting the Continental Army and Navy, and state militia units, as well as privateers, wagoneers in the Army, servants to officers, and spies. Ray Raphael notes that while thousands did join the Loyalist cause, "A far larger number, free as well as slave, tried to further their interests by siding with the patriots." Crispus Attucks, who was shot dead by British soldiers in the Boston Massacre in 1770, is an iconic martyr to Patriots. Both sides offered freedom and re-settlement to slaves who were willing to fight for them, recruiting slaves whose owners supported the opposing cause.

Many African-American slaves sided with the Loyalists. Tens of thousands in the South used the turmoil of war to escape, and the southern plantation economies of South Carolina and Georgia especially were disrupted. During the Revolution, the British tried to turn slavery against the Americans.

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.

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". The colonists accused the British of encouraging slave revolts.

American advocates of independence were commonly lampooned in Britain for what was termed their hypocritical calls for freedom, at the same time that many of their leaders were planters who held hundreds of slaves. Samuel Johnson snapped, "how is it we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the [slave] drivers of the Negroes?" Benjamin Franklin countered by criticizing the British self-congratulation about "the freeing of one Negro" (Somersett) while they continued to permit the Slave Trade.

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.

During the war, slaves escaped from across New England and the mid-Atlantic area to British-occupied cities, such as New York. The effects of the war were more dramatic in the South. In Virginia the royal governor Lord Dunmore recruited black men into the British forces with the promise of freedom, protection for their families, and land grants. Tens of thousands of slaves escaped to British lines throughout the South, causing dramatic losses to slaveholders and disrupting cultivation and harvesting of crops. For instance, South Carolina was estimated to lose about 25,000 slaves, or one third of its slave population, to flight, migration or death. From 1770 to 1790, the black proportion of the population (mostly slaves) in South Carolina dropped from 60.5 percent to 43.8 percent; and in Georgia from 45.2 percent to 36.1 percent.

When the British evacuated its forces from Savannah and Charleston, it also gave transportation to 10,000 slaves, carrying through on its commitment to them. They evacuated and resettled more than 3,000 "Black Loyalists" from New York to Nova Scotia, Upper and Lower Canada. Others sailed with the British to England or were resettled as freedmen in the West Indies of the Caribbean. But slaves who were carried to the Caribbean under control of Loyalist masters generally remained slaves until British abolition in its colonies in 1834. More than 1200 of the Black Loyalists of Nova Scotia later resettled in the British colony of Sierra Leone, where they became leaders of the Krio ethnic group of Freetown and the later national government. Many of their descendants still live in Sierra Leone, as well as other African countries.

Effects of the Revolution

Loyalist expatriation

About 60,000 to 70,000 Loyalists left the newly founded republic; some migrated to Britain. The remainder, known as United Empire Loyalists, received land and subsidies for resettlement in British colonies in North America, especially Quebec (concentrating in the Eastern Townships), Prince Edward Island, and Nova Scotia. The new colonies of Upper Canada (now Ontario) and New Brunswick were expressly created by Britain for their benefit, where the Crown awarded land to Loyalists as compensation for losses in the United States. Britain wanted to develop the frontier of Upper Canada on a British colonial model. But about 80% of the Loyalists stayed in the United States and became full, loyal citizens; some of the exiles later returned to the U.S.

Interpretations

Interpretations about the effect of the Revolution vary. Contemporary participants referred to the events as "the revolution." Greene argues that the events were not "revolutionary," as the relationships and property rights of colonial society were not transformed: a distant government was simply replaced with a local one; the Revolution is still known outside the United States as the American War of Independence.

Historians such as Bernard Bailyn, Gordon Wood, and Edmund Morgan accept the contemporary view of the participants that the American Revolution was a unique and radical event that produced deep changes and had a profound effect on world affairs, based â€" building on debates in the seventeenth-century English Civil War and subsequently â€" 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. However, what was then considered "the people" was still mostly restricted to free white males who were able to pass a property-qualification. Such a restriction made a significant gain of the revolution irrelevant to women, African Americans and slaves, poor white men, youth, and Native Americans. Only with the development of the American system over the following centuries would "a government by the people," promised by the revolution, be won for a greater proportion of the population.

Morgan has argued that in terms of long-term impact on American society and values:

The Revolution did revolutionize social relations. It did displace the deference, the patronage, the social divisions that had determined the way people viewed one another for centuries and still view one another in much of the world. It did give to ordinary people a pride and power, not to say an arrogance, that have continued to shock visitors from less favored lands. It may have left standing a host of inequalities that have troubled us ever since. But it generated the egalitarian view of human society that makes them troubling and makes our world so different from the own in which the revolutionists had grown up.

Inspiring all colonies

After the Revolution, genuinely democratic politics became possible in the former colonies. The rights of the people were incorporated into state constitutions. Concepts of liberty, individual rights, equality among men and hostility toward corruption became incorporated as core values of liberal republicanism. 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.

The Dutch Republic, also at war with Britain, was the next country to sign a treaty with the United States, on October 8, 1782. On April 3, 1783, Ambassador Extraordinary Gustaf Philip Creutz, representing King Gustav III of Sweden, and Benjamin Franklin, signed a Treaty of Amity and Commerce with the U.S.

The American Revolution was the first wave of the Atlantic Revolutions: the French Revolution, the Haitian Revolution, and the Latin American wars of independence. Aftershocks reached Ireland in the Irish Rebellion of 1798, in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and in the Netherlands.

The Revolution had a strong, immediate influence in Great Britain, Ireland, the Netherlands, and France. Many British and Irish Whigs spoke in favor of the American cause. In Ireland, there was a profound impact; the Protestants who controlled Ireland were demanding more and more self-rule. Under the leadership of Henry Grattan, the so-called "Patriots" forced the reversal of mercantilist prohibitions against trade with other British colonies. The King and his cabinet in London could not risk another rebellion on the American model, and made a series of concessions to the Patriot faction in Dublin. Armed Protestant volunteer units were set up to protect against an invasion from France. As in America, so too in Ireland the King no longer had a monopoly of lethal force.

The Revolution, along with the Dutch Revolt (end of the 16th century) and the 17th century English Civil War, was among the examples of 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 influenced the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen of 1789. 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 1804â€"long before the British Parliament acted in 1833 to abolish slavery in its colonies. States such as New Jersey and New York adopted gradual emancipation, which kept some people as slaves for more than two decades longer.

Status of American women

The democratic ideals of the Revolution inspired changes in the roles of women.

The concept of republican motherhood was inspired by this period and reflects the importance of Republicanism as the dominant American ideology. It assumed that a successful republic rested upon the virtue of its citizens. Women were considered to have the essential role of instilling their children with values conducive to a healthy republic. During this period, the wife's relationship with her husband also became more liberal, as love and affection instead of obedience and subservience began to characterize the ideal marital relationship. In addition, many women contributed to the war effort through fundraising and running family businesses in the absence of husbands.

The traditional constraints gave way to more liberal conditions for women. Patriarchy faded as an ideal; young people had more freedom to choose their spouses and more often used birth control to regulate the size of their families. Society emphasized the role of mothers in child rearing, especially the patriotic goal of raising republican children rather than those locked into aristocratic value systems. There was more permissiveness in child-rearing. Patriot women married to Loyalists who left the state could get a divorce and obtain control of the ex-husband's property. Whatever gains they had made, however, women still found themselves subordinated, legally and socially, to their husbands, disfranchised and usually with only the role of mother open to them. But, some women earned livelihoods as midwives and in other roles in the community, which were not originally recognized as significant by men.

Abigail Adams expressed to her husband, the president, the desire of women to have a place in the new republic:

I desire you would remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favourable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the Husbands.

Zagarri in 2007 argued that the American Revolution created a continuing debate on the rights of woman and an environment favorable to women's participation in U.S. politics. She asserts that for a brief decade, a "comprehensive transformation in women's rights, roles, and responsibilities seemed not only possible but perhaps inevitable." But, the changes also engendered a backlash that set back the cause of women's rights and led to a greater rigidity that marginalized women from political life.

Status of African Americans

In the first two decades after the American Revolution, state legislatures and individuals took actions to free numerous slaves, in part based on revolutionary ideals. Northern states passed new constitutions that contained language about equal rights or specifically abolished slavery; some states, such as New York and New Jersey, where slavery was more widespread, passed laws by the end of the 18th century to abolish slavery by a gradual method; in New York, the last slaves were freed in 1827.

While no southern state abolished slavery, for a period individual owners could free their slaves by personal decision, often providing for manumission in wills but sometimes filing deeds or court papers to free individuals. Numerous slaveholders who freed their slaves cited revolutionary ideals in their documents; others freed slaves as a reward for service. Records also suggest that some slaveholders were freeing their own mixed-race children, born into slavery to slave mothers.

Memory

The American Revolution has a central place in the American memory. As the founding story, it is covered in the schools, memorialized by a national holiday, and commemorated in innumerable monuments. Thus Independence Day (the "Fourth of July") is a major national holiday celebrated annually. Besides local sites such as Bunker Hill, one of the first national pilgrimages for memorial tourists was Mount Vernon, George Washington's estate (near Washington City), which attracted ten thousand visitors a year by the 1850s.

Crider points out that in the 1850s, editors and orators both North and South claimed their region was the true custodian of the legacy of 1776, as they used the Revolution symbolically in their rhetoric. Ryan, noting that the Bicentennial was celebrated a year after the United States' humiliating 1975 withdrawal from Vietnam, says the Ford administration stressed the themes of renewal and rebirth based on a restoration of traditional values, and presented a nostalgic approach to 1776 that made it seem eternally young and fresh.

Albanese argues that the Revolution became the main source of the non-denominational "American civil religion" that has shaped patriotism, and the memory and meaning of the nation's birth ever since. She says that specific battles are not central (as they are for the Civil War) but rather certain events and people have been celebrated as icons of certain virtues (or vices). Thus she points out the Revolution produced a Moses-like leader (George Washington), prophets (Thomas Jefferson, Tom Paine), disciples (Alexander Hamilton, James Madison) and martyrs (Boston Massacre, Nathan Hale), as well as devils (Benedict Arnold), sacred places (Valley Forge, Bunker Hill), rituals (Boston Tea Party), emblems (the new flag), sacred holidays (Independence Day), and a holy scripture whose every sentence is carefully studied and applied in current law cases (The Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights).

See also

• Bibliography of the American Revolutionary War
• Timeline of the American Revolution
• Diplomacy in the American Revolutionary War
• Founding Fathers of the United States
• List of plays and films about the American Revolution
• Second American Revolution

Notes

References

Bibliography

Reference works

• Barnes, Ian, and Charles Royster. The Historical Atlas of the American Revolution (2000), maps and commentary excerpt and text search
• Blanco, Richard L.; Sanborn, Paul J. (1993). The American Revolution, 1775â€"1783: An Encyclopedia. New York: Garland Publishing Inc. ISBN 978-0-8240-5623-0. 
• Boatner, Mark Mayo III (1974). Encyclopedia of the American Revolution (2 ed.). New York: Charles Scribners and Sons. ISBN 978-0-684-31513-3. 
• Cappon, Lester J. Atlas of Early American History: The Revolutionary Era, 1760â€"1790 (1976)
• 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
• Gray, Edward G., and Jane Kamensky, eds. The Oxford Handbook of the American Revolution (2013) 672 pp; 33 essays by scholars
• 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
• Kennedy, Frances H. The American Revolution: A Historical Guidebook (2014) A guide to 150 famous historical sites.
• 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
• Symonds, Craig L. and William J. Clipson. A Battlefield Atlas of the American Revolution (1986) new diagrams of each battle

Surveys of the era

• Allison, Robert. The American Revolution: A Concise History (2011) 128pp excerpt and text search
• 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. (1854â€"78), vol 4â€"10 online edition, classic 19th century narrative; highly detailed
• Black, Jeremy. War for America: The Fight for Independence 1775â€"1783 (2001) 266pp; by leading British scholar
• Brown, Richard D., and Thomas Paterson, eds. Major Problems in the Era of the American Revolution, 1760â€"1791: Documents and Essays (2nd ed. 1999)
• Christie, Ian R. and Benjamin W. Labaree. Empire or Independence: 1760-1776 (1976)
• Cogliano, Francis D. Revolutionary America, 1763â€"1815; A Political History (2nd ed. 2008), British textbook
• Ellis, Joseph J. American Creation: Triumphs and Tragedies in the Founding of the Republic (2008) excerpt and text search
• Higginbotham, Don. The War of American Independence: Military Attitudes, Policies, and Practice, 1763â€"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 1763â€"1776. (2004)
• Knollenberg, Bernhard. Growth of the American Revolution: 1766â€"1775 (2003)
• Lecky, William Edward Hartpole. The American Revolution, 1763â€"1783 (1898), older British perspective online edition
• Mackesy, Piers. The War for America: 1775â€"1783 (1992), British military study online edition
• Middlekauff, Robert. The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763â€"1789 (Oxford History of the United States, 2005). online edition
• Miller, John C. Triumph of Freedom, 1775â€"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 1775â€"83 (2005) excerpt and text search, popular
• Wood, Gordon S. Revolutionary Characters: What Made the Founders Different (2007)
• Wrong, George M. Washington and His Comrades in Arms: A Chronicle of the War of Independence (1921) online short survey by Canadian scholar online

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, famous classic
• Becker, Frank: The American Revolution as a European Media Event, European History Online, Mainz: Institute of European History, 2011, retrieved: October 25, 2011.
• Berkin, Carol.Revolutionary Mothers: Women in the Struggle for America's Independence (2006)
• Bonomi, Patricia U., Under the Cope of Heaven: Religion, Society, and Politics in Colonial America (2003)
• 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 1774â€"76 including loosely organized militants took control before elected safety committees emerged.
• Brunsman, Denver, and David J Silverman, eds. The American Revolution Reader (Routledge Readers in History, 2013) 472pp; essays by leading scholars
• Chernow, Ron. Washington: A Life (2010) detailed biography; Pulitzer Prize
• Crow, Jeffrey J. and Larry E. Tise, eds. The Southern Experience in the American Revolution (1978)
• Fischer, David Hackett. Paul Revere's Ride (1995), Minutemen in 1775
• Fischer, David Hackett. Washington's Crossing (2004). 1776 campaigns; Pulitzer prize. ISBN 0-19-517034-2
• Freeman, Douglas Southall. Washington (1968) Pulitzer Prize; abridged version of 7 vol biography
• Horne, Gerald. The Counter-Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance and the Origins of the United States of America. (New York University Press, 2014). ISBN 1479893404
• Kerber, Linda K. Women of the Republic: Intellect and Ideology in Revolutionary America (1979)
• Kidd, Thomas S. God of Liberty: A Religious History of the American Revolution (2010)
• McCullough, David. 1776 (2005). ISBN 0-7432-2671-2; popular narrative of the year 1776
• Maier, Pauline. American Scripture: Making the Declaration of Independence (1998) excerpt and text search
• 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, 1775â€"1789 1927. online edition
• Norton, Mary Beth. Liberty's Daughters: The Revolutionary Experience of American Women, 1750â€"1800 (1980)
• O'Shaughnessy Andrew Jackson. The Men Who Lost America: British Leadership, the American Revolution, and the Fate of the Empire (Yale University Press; 2013) 466 pages; on top British leaders
• Palmer, Robert R. The Age of the Democratic Revolution: A Political History of Europe and America, 1760â€"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, 1760â€"1775 and Volume IV: The Revolutionary War, 1775â€"1784. ISBN 0-945466-26-9, libertarian perspective
• 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. American Revolution (2005) [excerpt and text search] 208pp excerpt and text search
• 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 a leading scholar

Historiography

• Breen, Timothy H. "Ideology and nationalism on the eve of the American Revolution: Revisions once more in need of revising." Journal of American History (1997): 13-39. in JSTOR
• Schocket, Andrew M. Fighting over the Founders: How We Remember the American Revolution (2014), how politicians, screenwriters, activists, biographers, museum professionals, and reenactors portray the American Revolution.
• Shalhope, Robert E. "Toward a republican synthesis: the emergence of an understanding of republicanism in American historiography." William and Mary Quarterly (1972): 49-80. in JSTOR
• Waldstreicher, David. "The Revolutions of Revolution Historiography: Cold War Contradance, Neo-Imperial Waltz, or Jazz Standard?." Reviews in American History 42.1 (2014): 23-35. online
• Wood, Gordon S. "Rhetoric and Reality in the American Revolution." William and Mary Quarterly (1966): 4-32. in JSTOR

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 accounts excerpt and text search
• Jensen, Merill, ed. Tracts of the American Revolution, 1763â€"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, 1764â€"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. Government Printing Office. (1927). 1124 pages online version
• Martin Kallich and Andrew MacLeish, eds. The American Revolution through British eyes (1962) primary documents

Contemporary sources: Annual Register

• Annual Register 1773, British compendium of speeches and reports
• 1774
• 1775
• 1776
• 1777
• 1778
• 1779
• 1780
• 1781
• 1782
• 1783

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
• Revolution! The Atlantic World Reborn, Revolution! explores the enormous transformations in the world's politics that took place from 1763-1815, with particular attention to three globally influential revolutions in America, France, and Haiti. Linking the attack on monarchism and aristocracy to the struggle against slavery, Revolution!shows how freedom, equality, and the sovereignty of the people became universal goals.New-York Historical Society
• PBS Television Series
• Chickasaws Conflicted by the American Revolution - Chickasaw.TV
• Smithsonian study unit on Revolutionary Money
• The American Revolution: Lighting Freedom's Flame, US National Park Service website
• Honored Places: The National Park Service Teacher's Guide to the American Revolution
• Haldimand Collection Letters regarding the war to important generals. Fully indexed
• "Military History of Revolution" 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
• American Revolution study guide and teacher resources
• AmericanRevolution.Org Resource for pre collegiate historical educational institutions
• The American Revolution, the History Channel (US cable television) website
• Gayle Olson-Ramer, "Half a Revolution", 16-page teaching guide for high school students, Zinn Education Project/Rethinking Schools
• "Counter-Revolution of 1776": Was U.S. Independence War a Conservative Revolt in Favor of Slavery? Democracy Now! June 27, 2014.