American History

The American Revolution might be considered one that was inhabited by three categories of thought . It was a religious , a philosophical , and a political revolution . The makers of the revolution ranged from those who attempted the first split with England - the Puritans , to the American Forefathers who signed the Declaration of Independence . The push toward revolution was preceded by such cries as separation of church and state ' freedom ' and no taxation without representation ' These all had their voices represented in the different groups that led the actions toward the break with England

. The American Revolution therefore , rather than being a concerted effort , was an incidental unification of differing grievances against one opponent : the state of England

The Puritans , Quakers , and other Protestant groups that had split with the Roman Catholic Church now made a further break with the Church of England , which it considered to be still too Catholic . These groups especially the Puritans , sought to separate themselves from the evils of the English Church and to effect this , their removal from the country was also necessary . In founding the Massachusetts colony , John Winthrop became governor , and found himself mediator between England and America In this role , Winthrop dealt with the idea of democracy and the extent to which laws were to be made and kept . This idea was one of the germinal ideas of the American Revolution because it had much to do with the formation of laws by the citizens of the colony rather than the law-makers in Britain . Eventually , though Winthrop was (in his own eyes foremost a servant of God and only secondarily a servant of the state he came to the conclusion that he must support the American colonies against other states and even against the English , just like how in the fight against a greater evil , sometimes a lesser one must (at least in practice though not at heart ) be embraced

The American Revolution was also a revolution of thought . In the age of Enlightenment , when philosophical ideas were flowing in Europe , the revolutionaries sought to put those ideas to the test in the United States . Most notable are the Lockean ideas of the natural rights and freedoms of man , the right to revolution , equality , government by the consent of the people , and the right to property . These were measures fought for and advocated in the Declaration of Independence which document declared to be endowed with inalienable rights ' The political system of checks and balances advocated in theory by philosophers Baron de Montesquieu and John Locke were embraced by many in America who sought to discourage the usurpation of power (by any one arm of the new American government , as exampled in the monarchy of England ) that would lead to the tyranny that England had long perpetrated upon its colonies

The political movement toward Revolution was prompted by several facts The English rule was precarious as the legislators were free to make and annul laws at their own convenience . They were also able to...