How Revolutionary was the American Revolution?: Readings
For each of these
readings prepare a short explanation (3-5 sentences) of how this document could
be used to argue your case effectively.
If the document argues against your side of the debate, think about how
you would refute (argue against) it. You
are encouraged to use
additional research in this debate to support your case.
Reading A: National Leaders
The following is excerpted
from Patrick Henry's famous speech to the
...Sir, we have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned, we have remonstrated, we have supplicated, we have prostrated ourselves, before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne. In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation? There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free, if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending, if we mean not barely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained, we must fight!...
Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!
_Eyewitnesses
and Others:
Reading B: Loyalists
Charles Inglis
was an Anglican clergyman. He had come
to live in
By a reconciliation with
- Charles Inglis,
The True Interest of
The following passage is
excerpted from a letter written by Abigail Adams to John Adams in 1776.
...I long to hear that you have declared an independence -- and by the way in the new Code of Laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make I desire you would Remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the Husbands. Remember all Men would be tyrants if they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the Ladies we are determined to foment a Rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any Laws in which we have no voice, or Representation.
That your Sex are Naturally Tyrannical is a Truth so thoroughly established as to admit of no dispute, but such of you as wish to be happy willingly give up the harsh title of Master for the more tender and endearing one of Friend. Why then, not put it out of the power of the vicious and the Lawless to use us with cruelty and indignity with impunity. Men of Sense in all Ages abhor those customs which treat us only as the vassals of your Sex. Regard us then as Beings placed by providence under your protection and in imitation of the Supreme Being make use of that power only for our happiness.
Diane Ravitch, ed., The American Reader:
Words That Moved A Nation (New York: Harper Collins Publishers. 1990), p. 31.
The following excerpts are
from Thomas Paine’s Common Sense (1776).
I have heard it asserted by some, that as
I challenge the warmest advocate
for reconciliation to show a single advantage that this continent can reap, by
being connected with
Diane Ravitch, ed., The American Reader:
Words That Moved A Nation, (New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1990), pp.
25-27.
Reading
E: Slaves
The following contains
excerpts from a petition presented in 1777 to the
The petition of a great number of blacks detained in a state of slavery in the bowels of a free and Christian country humbly shows that your petitioners apprehend that they have in common with all other men a natural and unalienable right to that freedom which the Great Parent of the universe has bestowed equally on all mankind and which they have never forfeited by any compact or agreement whatever. But they were unjustly dragged by the hand of cruel power from their dearest friends and some of them even torn from the embraces of their tender parents, from a populous, pleasant, and plentiful country and in violation of laws of nature and of nations and in defiance of all the tender feeling of humanity, brought here either to be sold like beasts of burden and, like them, condemned to slavery for life -- among a people professing the mild religion of Jesus; a people not insensible of the secrets of rational being, nor without spirit to resent the unjust endeavors. They therefore humbly beseech Your Honors to give this petition its due weight and consideration, and cause an act of legislation to be passed whereby they may be restored to the enjoyments of that which is the natural right of all men, and that their children, who were born in this land of liberty, may not be held as slaves after they arrive at the age of twenty-one years. So may the inhabitants of this state, no longer chargeable with the inconsistency of acting themselves the part which they condemn and oppose in others, be prospered in their present glorious struggle for liberty an d have those blessings for themselves.
"Negro
Voices Raised For Freedom," The Annals of
Reading
F: Iroquois
The
following is the response of a Seneca warrior to British warnings against the
Americans.
We have now lived in Peace with
them a long time and we resolve to continue to do so as long as we can - when
they hurt us it is time enough to strike them. It is true they have encroach'd on our Lands, but of this we shall speak to
them. If you are so strong Brother, and they but as a weak Boy, why ask our
assistance. It is true I am tall and strong but I will reserve my strength to
strike those who injure me. If you have so great plenty of Warriors, Powder,
Lead and Goods, and they are so few and little of either, be strong and make
good use of them. You say their Powder is rotten - We have found it good. You
say they are all mad, foolish, wicked, and deceitful - I say you are so and
they are wise for you want us to destroy ourselves in your War and they advise
us to live in Peace. Their advice we intend to follow.
Barbara Graymont, "The Iroquois in the American
Revolution" (Syracuse, New York, 1972), pp. 48-50. in
Wilcomb E. Washburn,“Indians
and the American Revolution,” (americanrevolution.org)
The following excerpts share
two historians' views of the significance of the American Revolution.
John Richard Allen:
The successful rebellion of the
patriots profoundly affected the course of the future, not only for the
Americans, but for all other peoples. The American Revolution brought the first
break in the European colonial system. It inspired and continues to inspire
colonials of all colors to seek freedom from European domination. It also
brought into existence for the first time in modern history a republican system
of government in a large nation. The example of republicanism successful over
the vast territory of the
John
Richard Alden, The American Revolution: 1775-1783 (New York: Harper & Row,
1954), p. 268.
However radical the principles of the Revolution may have seemed to the rest of the world, in the minds of the colonists they were thoroughly preservative and respectful of the past . . . . The world - at least the American corner of it - had already been made over as thoroughly as any sensible man could imagine. Americans had never known or had long since begun to abandon feudal tenures, religious intolerance, and hereditary stratification. Their goal therefore was simply to consolidate, then expand by cautious stages, the large measure of liberty and prosperity that was part of their established way of life.