THE FIRST FOUNDING: INTERESTS AND CONFLICTS

British Actions and Colonial Interests

The first British action to cause an uproar in the colonies was the Proclamation of 1763. This edict withdrew the right of colonists to settle lands west of the Allegheny Mountains, preserving them for Native American populations. The British government hoped to reduce hostilities between colonists and Native Americans and thus the cost of garrisoning the frontier. The British government feared, moreover, that as settlement crept toward the west, southern planters would find ways to use the Mississippi and Gulf of Mexico to trade with nations other than England. The southern planters had, indeed, been planning to expand their enterprises and, with them, the institution of slavery to the trans-Allegheny region and saw this British action as a severe threat to their economic interests. Their now-obvious vulnerability to decisions made in far-off London, where by coincidence agitation against the slave trade was growing, made the planters alert to the potential advantages of independence and self-government when Britain subsequently levied new taxes on the colonies.

Beginning in the 1750s, debts and other financial problems forced the British government to search for new revenue sources. This search led to the taxation of the Crown’s North American colonies, which up until then had paid remarkably little in taxes to the mother country—especially considering that they accounted for a sizable portion of Britain’s debt, owing to (1) the Crown’s defense of the colonies during the war for global dominance against France (known in the colonies as the French and Indian War); (2) its continuing protection of the colonists from Native American attacks; and (3) the protection that the British navy provided for colonial shipping. Thus, the British government thought it was quite reasonable to impose new taxes on the colonists, particularly because, even with the new taxes, the colonists would still pay far less in taxes than residents of Britain itself.

Like most governments of the period, the British regime had only limited ways to collect revenue. The income tax (which in the twentieth century became the most important source of government revenue) had not yet been developed. In the mid-eighteenth century, governments generally relied on tariffs, duties, and other taxes on commerce, and it was to such taxes, including the Stamp Act, that the British turned during the 1760s. British interests (revenue) and institutions (Parliament and colonial administration) combined to produce a plausible solution to an existing problem, as suggested by the policy principle.⁴

The colonists, accustomed to managing their own affairs, resented this British meddling. Moreover, the Stamp Act and other taxes on commerce, such as the Sugar Act of 1764, mainly affected the two groups whose commercial interests were most extensive: the New England merchants and the southern planters. Because their interests coincided, these two groups engaged in collective action to organize opposition to the new taxes under the famous slogan “no taxation without representation.” They broke with their royalist allies and turned to their former adversaries—the shopkeepers, small farmers, laborers, and artisans, all of whom had their own grievances against the established colonial government—for help in organizing demonstrations and boycotts of British goods. These actions ultimately forced theCrown to rescind most of its new taxes. Colonial women played a leading role in this effort. In colonial society, women generally managed the household and made purchasing decisions. Many colonial women denounced the purchase of British goods and purchased only locally made materials for their homes. Colonial women also organized and led the “homespun movement,” choosing to boycott British textiles and producing cloth goods for their families and for the colonial army. The homespun movement may have been the first women’s movement in American history, but it would not be the last.

For the merchants and planters, the British government’s decision to eliminate most of the hated taxes meant a victorious end to their struggle with the mother country. The more radical groups, however, were not satisfied. It was in the context of this unrest that a confrontation arose between colonists and British soldiers in front of the Boston custom house on the night of March 5, 1770, resulting in what came to be known as the Boston Massacre. Nervous British soldiers opened fire on the mob surrounding them, killing five colonists and wounding eight others. News of the event quickly spread throughout the colonies and served to fan anti-British sentiment.

Eager to end the unrest they had helped arouse, the merchants and planters supported the British government’s efforts to restore order. Indeed, most respectable Bostonians supported the actions of the British soldiers involved in the Boston Massacre. In their subsequent trial, the soldiers were defended by John Adams, a pillar of Boston society and a future president of the United States. Adams asserted that the soldiers’ actions were entirely justified. All but two of the soldiers were acquitted.⁵

Despite the efforts of the British government and the colonial elite, it proved difficult to end the political strife. The more radical forces continued to agitate for political and social change. Generally representing the middle classes, who often had some education and a respectable trade or skill but little political influence, the radicals believed that people like themselves were just as fit to govern as members of the colonial elite. Led by individuals such as Samuel Adams, a cousin of John Adams, the radicals asserted that British power supported an unjust political and social structure within the colonies, and they began to advocate an end to British rule.⁶

Britain’s revenue-raising policies backfired so dramatically because British leadership greatly underestimated colonial resistance. Indeed, the Stamp Act cost more to enforce than it produced in revenue. The rationality principle, though, requires only that people do the best they can at the time they act. Unanticipated factors are bound to arise and necessitate subsequent adaptation. The revenue-raising policies seemed sensible to the British before they were issued, and when the policies later appeared mistaken, they were rescinded. So Britain’s attempts to raise revenue and then adapt because of the resulting unrest were rational, but it proved difficult to undo the damage caused by issuing the taxes in the first place.

Organizing resistance to the British authorities required widespread support. Collective action may emerge spontaneously in certain circumstances, but the colonists’ campaign against Britain required strategic planning, coalition building, bargaining, persuading, compromising, and coordinating—all elements of the give-and-take of politics. Cooperation would thus need cultivation and encouragement, and leadership would be a necessary ingredient. The colonial legislatures, which by now possessed decades of political experience, provided this leadership.

Political Strife and the Radicalizing of the Colonists

The political strife sparked by the Stamp Act provided the background for the events of 1773–74. With the Tea Act of 1773, the British government granted the politically powerful East India Company a monopoly on the export of tea from Britain, eliminating a lucrative trade for colonial merchants. Worse, the East India Company sought to sell the tea directly in the colonies instead of working through colonial merchants. Because tea was an important commodity in the 1770s, the act posed a mortal threat to the New England merchants—who once again called on their radical adversaries for support. The most dramatic result was the Boston Tea Party of 1773, led by Samuel Adams and carried out by protesters, mostly radicals, who hoped to undermine the British government’s authority.

The Boston Tea Party was decisive in American history. While the merchants had wanted to force the British government to rescind the Tea Act, they certainly did not seek independence from Britain. Samuel Adams and the other radicals, however, hoped to provoke the British government into taking actions that would alienate its colonial supporters and pave the way for a rebellion. By dumping the East India Company’s tea into Boston Harbor, Adams and his followers goaded the British into enacting harsh reprisals: a series of acts that closed the port of Boston to commerce, took away the right of Massachusetts to govern itself, provided for the removal of accused persons to Britain for trial, and added new restrictions on western movement from the southern colonies—further alienating the southern planters who depended on access to new lands. These acts of retaliation helped radicalize Americans and move them toward collective resistance to British rule.⁷

This course of action by British politicians is puzzling in retrospect, but at the time a show of force appeared reasonable. Those who prevailed in Parliament felt that if they tolerated lawlessness and made concessions, it would only prompt the more radical colonists to take additional liberties and demand further concessions. The British, in effect, drew a line in the sand. Their repressive response became a clear point around which dissatisfied colonists could rally. Radicals had been agitating for the use of more violent measures to deal with Britain, but ultimately they needed Britain’s political reprisals to create widespread support for independence.⁸

Thus, the Boston Tea Party sparked a cycle of disputes that ultimately led to the First Continental Congress in 1774, with delegates attending from across the colonies. The Congress called for a total boycott of British goods and, under the radicals’ prodding, began to consider independence from British rule. The eventual result was the Declaration of Independence.

The Declaration of Independence

In 1776, the Second Continental Congress appointed a committee consisting of Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, John Adams of Massachusetts, and Robert Livingston of New York to draft a statement of American independence from British rule. The Declaration of Independence was written by Jefferson, drawing on the ideas of British philosopher John Locke, whose work was widely read in the colonies. Adopted by the Second Continental Congress, the Declaration is an extraordinary document in both philosophical and political terms. Philosophically, the Declaration is remarkable for its assertion (derived from Locke) that certain “unalienable” rights—including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—cannot be abridged by governments. In the world of 1776, in which some kings still claimed to rule by divine right, this was a dramatic statement. Politically, the Declaration is remarkable because, despite the colonists’ widely differing interests, it focused on grievances, aspirations, and principles that might unify the various colonial groups. The Declaration attempted to articulate a history and a set of principles that might help forge national unity.⁹

The Declaration of Independence, however, was not a blueprint for governance. Often, scholars call the Declaration a more radical or even libertarian document and the Constitution a more conservative text. The two documents, however, share common philosophical underpinnings: both apply Locke’s idea that the purpose of government is the protection of life, liberty, and property. The Declaration uses these ideas to justify overthrowing a tyrannical government. The Constitution, in contrast, seeks to create a government that will, in fact, defend these rights for its citizens. Thus America’s founding documents share philosophical roots but apply them to different purposes.

We must also observe that the unalienable rights annunciated by the Declaration might be seen as having a rather hollow ring against the backdrop of a society in which nearly half a million persons were enslaved, in which Native Americans were systematically robbed of their land, and in which women possessed few rights. According to some accounts, although Thomas Jefferson wrote about unalienable rights, he was attended by an enslaved Black teenager. And yet, once the principles set forward by Jefferson were articulated, they became powerful symbols. If the rights were unalienable, how could anyone be deprived of them? Great principles can take on lives of their own, whatever the intentions behind them.

The Revolutionary War

In 1775, even before formally declaring their independence, the colonies began to fight the British. The Revolutionary War commenced in Massachusetts with the Battles of Lexington and Concord, in which colonial militias acquitted themselves well against trained British soldiers. Nevertheless, the task of defeating Britain, then the world’s premier military power, seemed impossible. To maintain their hold on the colonies, the British deployed a huge expeditionary force, comprising British regulars and German mercenaries along with artillery and equipment. To face this force, the colonists relied on inexperienced and lightly armed militias. To make matters worse, the colonists were hardly united in their opposition to British rule. Many colonists saw themselves as loyal British subjects and refused to take up arms against the king. Thousands, indeed, took up arms for the king and joined pro-British militia forces.

The war was brutal and bloody; the colonists, British troops, and Native Americans who fought on both sides suffered tens of thousands of casualties, in total. Eventually the Revolutionary armies prevailed, mainly because the cost of fighting a war thousands of miles from home became too great for Britain to bear. Colonial militias prevented British forces from acquiring enough food and supplies locally, so they had to be brought from Europe at enormous expense. The colonial forces did not have to defeat the British—they needed only to prevent the British from defeating them until Britain’s will and ability to fight waned. Thus, with the eventual help of Britain’s enemy, France, the colonists fought until Britain had enough. The war ended in 1783 with the signing of the Treaty of Paris, which officially granted the 13 American colonies their independence.

The Articles of Confederation

Having declared their independence, the colonies needed to establish a governmental structure—a set of institutions through which to govern. In November 1777, the Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union—the United States’ first written constitution. Although it was not ratified by all the states until 1781, it was the country’s operative constitution for almost 12 years, until March 1789. When the Articles were drafted, each of the 13 original colonies was, in effect, an independent nation. While each saw the advantages of cooperating with the others, none of the 13 new governments—now calling themselves “states” to underscore their nationhood—gave much thought to the idea of surrendering their independence. Accordingly, the Articles of Confederation established a central government of defined and strictly limited power, with most actual governmental authority left in the hands of the individual states.

The central government, such as it was, was based entirely in the Congress of the Confederacy. Because the government was not intended to be powerful, it was given no executive branch or judiciary. Execution and interpretation of its laws were left to the individual states. The Congress, moreover, had little power. Its members were not much more than messengers from the state legislatures; they were chosen by the state legislatures, paid out of the state treasuries, and subject to immediate recall by state authorities. In addition, each state, regardless of size, had only a single vote. Furthermore, amendments to the Articles required the unanimous agreement of the 13 states.

Congress was given the power to declare war and make peace, to make treaties and alliances, to coin and borrow money, and to regulate trade with Native Americans. It could also appoint the senior officers of the United States Army. However, it could not levy taxes or regulate commerce among the states. Moreover, the army officers it appointed had no army to serve in because the nation’s armed forces were composed of state militias. An especially dysfunctional aspect of the Articles of Confederation was that the central government could not regulate commerce between the individual states and foreign nations.

In brief, the relationship between Congress and the states under the Articles of Confederation was much like the contemporary relationship between the United Nations and its member states, a relationship in which the states retain virtually all governmental powers. It was properly called a confederation because, as provided under Article II, “each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.” Not only was there no executive, but there was also no judicial authority or other means of enforcing Congress’s will. Any enforcement would be done by the states.¹⁰ In essence, each state was an independent nation-state. All told, the Articles of Confederation was an inadequate institutional basis for collective action.