the ideological origins of the american revolution

By mid-century, colonists believed that they held a special place in the empire, which justified Britain’s hands-off policy. That success had made them increasingly important to the economy of the mother country and the empire as a whole. Their success, they believed, was partly a result of Britain’s hands-off approach to the colonies.

They saw themselves as British subjects “entitled to all the natural, essential, inherent, and inseparable rights of our fellow subjects in Great-Britain.” Throughout the first half of the eighteenth century, the colonies had experienced significant economic and demographic growth. The colonies developed their own notions of their place in the empire. The debate between the two sides raged throughout the eighteenth century, and the lack of consensus prevented coherent reform. Instead of an authoritarian empire, “patriot Whigs” argued that the colonies should have an equal status with that of the mother country. They argued that economic growth, not raising taxes, would solve the national debt. The radical (or Patriot) Whigs’ based their imperial vision on trade and manufacturing instead of land and resources. They sought to eliminate the national debt by raising taxes and cutting spending on the colonies.

Old Whigs and their Tory supporters envisioned an authoritarian empire, based on conquering territory and extracting resources. Second, competing visions of empire divided British officials. Constant war was politically and economically expensive. First, Britain was engaged in costly wars from the War of the Spanish Succession at the start of the century through the Seven Years’ War in 1763. Two factors contributed to these failures. In this section, we will look broadly at some of the long-term political, intellectual, cultural, and economic developments in eighteenth century that set the context for the crisis of the 1760s and 1770s.īritain failed to define the colonies’ relationship to the empire and institute a coherent program of imperial reform. The American Revolution had both long-term origins and short-term causes.

The ideological origins of the american revolution