American Revolution

[PMLF]

Why the Americans insist to use the name "American Revolution" to refer to their independence?

It wasn't a revolution. The economical and social structure didn't suffer any big change.

 

[UnionBuster]

It was a political revolution, to say the least.

 

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After the revolution, people were group according to class, which meant that if a person could make enough money, they could move up in society. Before that, citizens were proscribed into groups according to privledge. A citizen of the mean sort was considered rabble, while a citizen of the meddling or yeoman sort was considered a gentleman. Before the Rev., people of the lower sort were expected to bow when approached by a gentleman.

Politically, the U.S. had the first modern system of its sort, there was not a parliamentry system, nor was there direct democracy as described by Plato.

 

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Forgive me, but I've found that the Americans refer to the event as the "War of Independence". It's the British who refer to it as the "American Revolution".

 

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Just to further muddy the waters, I would say that it was something like a Civil War. The Americans started out thinking of themselves as British citizens, and many of the people fighting on both sides where from the Colonies. It was really a little bit of all of the above. A Polical Revolution, a Civil War, and an international war with the French fighting the English.

 

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Originally posted by Romojo
Forgive me, but I've found that the Americans refer to the event as the "War of Independence". It's the British who refer to it as the "American Revolution".

When I was in college, an English friend of mine referred to it as "The Revolt of the American Colonies"

 

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It's true that it's largely the Brits who referred to it as the American Revolution. And the idea of it being a civil war is not wide of the mark, as modern reckoning is that over 40% of the colonists favoured staying wih Britain. Incidentally, most of the worst atrocities of the war were committed by patriots/rebels/what you will towards loyalist civilians.

 

[Gunthar]

Originally posted by Top Cat
It's true that it's largely the Brits who referred to it as the American Revolution. And the idea of it being a civil war is not wide of the mark, as modern reckoning is that over 40% of the colonists favoured staying wih Britain. Incidentally, most of the worst atrocities of the war were committed by patriots/rebels/what you will towards loyalist civilians.

Quite true, the "Sons of Liberty" were quite fond of tar and feathering loyalists and then burning their houses down.

 

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Originally posted by Gunthar


Quite true, the "Sons of Liberty" were quite fond of tar and feathering loyalists and then burning their houses down.

All Civil Wars have this sort of violence. The side that has the majority in the countryside usually commits more violence against the other side (because it can). Since a majority of the Colonials with either pro-indepedance or neutral, they had more opportunity to commit these sorts of crimes.

In areas with a Loyalist majority (New Jersey for example), most of the violence went the other way.

As Civil Wars go, this was a pretty well behaved one. Look at the violence that took place in Russia, France (the Revolution was also a very violent civil war) and even the English Civil War and the American Revolution doesn't look too bad.

Not that I'm excusing the attrocities that did happen.

 

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Originally posted by BRYCON316
After the revolution, people were group according to class, which meant that if a person could make enough money, they could move up in society. Before that, citizens were proscribed into groups according to privledge. A citizen of the mean sort was considered rabble, while a citizen of the meddling or yeoman sort was considered a gentleman. Before the Rev., people of the lower sort were expected to bow when approached by a gentleman.

Politically, the U.S. had the first modern system of its sort, there was not a parliamentry system, nor was there direct democracy as described by Plato.

Absolutely excelent post BRYCON316. These two points cannot be stressed enough.

Just two add something for myself.

The adverage rebel/soldier for the continental army probably wasn't bleeding and freezing for themselves. The money at this time was to be made as a privateer. They probably weren't doing it because they were upset about the tea taxes or stamp act either. I think that they were mostly upset over the vestages of feudalism following them into the new world.

 

[Pwyll]

Originally posted by Camper


All Civil Wars have this sort of violence. The side that has the majority in the countryside usually commits more violence against the other side (because it can). Since a majority of the Colonials with either pro-indepedance or neutral, they had more opportunity to commit these sorts of crimes.

In areas with a Loyalist majority (New Jersey for example), most of the violence went the other way.

As Civil Wars go, this was a pretty well behaved one. Look at the violence that took place in Russia, France (the Revolution was also a very violent civil war) and even the English Civil War and the American Revolution doesn't look too bad.

Not that I'm excusing the attrocities that did happen.

I've read that there were a lot of massacares....one comes to mind that 800 Scots that had sworn fealty to the King were wiped out.
The natives were involved too and we all know how violent those meetings usually turned out.

 

[Keynes]

Originally posted by PMLF
Why the Americans insist to use the name "American Revolution" to refer to their independence?

It wasn't a revolution. The economical and social structure didn't suffer any big change.

Try Gordon Wood's "The Radicalism of the American Revolution." It was considered somewhat revisionist at the time; now its probably mainstream.

There is still a lot of back and forth on this but Wood and others have done a lot of excellent work documenting the complex hierarchies of deference that governed colonial America and how the Revolution aimed at undermining these hierarchies and eventually succeeded in doing so to a significant extent.

 

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Originally posted by Pwyll


I've read that there were a lot of massacares....one comes to mind that 800 Scots that had sworn fealty to the King were wiped out.
The natives were involved too and we all know how violent those meetings usually turned out.

Sure, there were pleny of massacres. A couple hundred here, and Indian tribe there, the burning of a village, etc.

What I'm saying is that compared to the massacres during other Civil Wars, they were relatively limited. Compare the deaths in the American vs. the French revolution, for instance.

 

[Pwyll]

Originally posted by Camper


Sure, there were pleny of massacres. A couple hundred here, and Indian tribe there, the burning of a village, etc.

What I'm saying is that compared to the massacres during other Civil Wars, they were relatively limited. Compare the deaths in the American vs. the French revolution, for instance.

you want to compare the 3.5 million American colonists to the 18.5 million French revolutionists. why??

There was alot more hatred in the French Revolution I'll grant that because it was basically a class revolution where as America's revolution was Economicly oriented.

If you read though you'll find out that the Revolution in America was fairly bloody on both sides...Hessian Troopers have been blamed for alot of the massacres on the English side. All this fighting forced 50,000 Americans to flee north to Canada to avoid what would have been at the least imprisonment and loss of property and at the worst, death.

I would agree though that until Nappy took over in France...the French Revolution was definately the most barbaric, and despotic and is very close to the Russian Revolution in many respects this way.