The Radicalism of the American Revolution

"Gordon Wood was a student of Professor Bailyn’s at Harvard. He’s a terrific writer. In this book he maps out the movement from a pre-revolutionary society focused on monarchy, hierarchy and privilege to a revolutionary society. He explains how the Americans gradually found themselves championing republicanism. Republicanism can mean a secular government, where there is no king, or republicanism can mean a system in which all people have a say. It’s a masterly book about how Americans moved from a monarchical society to a republican society, that documents each stage of this change clearly and carefully. I want to remind your readers that when most of the Americans in Gordon Wood’s book were talking about equality, they were talking about equality for white men. That’s also what Thomas Jefferson meant when he talked about equality in the Declaration of Independence. There was never any sense that African Americans or Indians would be involved. I have different views, but I think Gordon would say that during the war and in the period leading up to the Constitutional Convention in 1787, leading Americans believed in a republican society in which leaders would be virtuous, not engaged in grubby money-making. He describes the men we call the founding fathers as almost philosophic figures. Nevertheless, he explains, it wasn’t until after the 1790s and into the 19th century that Americans decided that equality really meant something. In the early republic, some Americans decided that everybody should have a voice and that even the little guy on the street should be heard by his government. This led to what he calls the breakdown of classical republican society into the more liberal and open world of the 19th century. So, as Wood has it, we moved from monarchical to republican to liberal. Wood has this tri-part way of looking at politics."

"I wanted to stress that the Revolution’s emphasis on equality had consequences that went further than a simple colonial rebellion. In the decade or so following the Declaration of Independence, the former colonies became much more egalitarian. The declaration made the life, liberty and pursuit of happiness for ordinary people the goal of the new nation. The United States became a much more democratic, much more middle-class society. In that sense, the Revolution was much more radical than earlier analyses acknowledged. Abraham Lincoln made the declaration into the principal document in American history . In his Gettysburg address, he invoked the declaration’s appeal to equality. “All men are created equal” was, for Lincoln, the central point of the document. He used those words to mobilize the North to continue fighting for the Union, despite the heavy casualties. Since then, the declaration’s appeal to equality has been a powerful touchstone. The Civil Rights Movement and the gay rights movement both invoked the declaration. Lincoln made the declaration into the rallying call for equality that it remains today."