Not all historians agree that the American Revolution was an essentially conservative movement, one that effected little fundamental social change. On the contrary, some argue that the Revolution had radical consequences, dramatically transforming not only government but society. True, unlike later revolutions in France and Russia, the American Revolution did not involve the violent overthrow of a ruling class by a nonruling class. Even so, these scholars believe that the birth of republican government not only created a more egalitarian culture in the new United States than existed anywhere else in the world but also spurred the rise of a liberal, democratic, and capitalist society.

The real radicalism of the American Revolution, in this view, lay in its challenging the age-old belief that gentlemen and common men were two separate kinds of human beings. For many previous centuries, most people of every social rank in both the Old World and the New had accepted as a simple truth the notion that gentlefolk were innately superior because of their high birth, classical learning, polite refinements, and leisured existences. Ordinary people were held to be naturally ignorant and narrow-minded, driven by the basest desires and needs, and so dulled by lives of hard work that they were incapable of elevated thought or noble behavior. But the republicanism of American revolutionaries shattered that hierarchical way of thinking by celebrating the common sense of the common man and asserting that all human beings are naturally equal in their moral capacity to judge right from wrong. Indeed, revolutionaries went even further, endowing ordinary people and their labor with dignity by elevating the importance of productive work and by depicting industrious farmers and artisans as more virtuous citizens than the idle rich.

In short, historians contending for the radicalism of the American Revolution believe that to emphasize the inequalities of race and gender that persisted in the new United States is to overlook the very real change that republicanism achieved. It accorded common white men unprecedented respect and power at the same time that it created a government dedicated to promoting their liberty, security, and prosperity.

1			Read this essay that debates whether the American Revolution was actually a revolution. How do the scholars to whom this author refers define a revolution? Do these definitions make sense to you? Why or why not? Do you agree with her conclusion? Why or why not? http://odur.let.rug.nl/~usa/E/revolution/revoxx.htm At the end of this article, she argues that how radical the American Revolution actually was remains an open question. One way to consider this issue is to examine how far American leaders did or did not travel ideologically over the course of this period, which many historians would argue concludes with the ratification of the Constitution rather than the surrender at Yorktown. We can do that in part by comparing the text of the Articles of Confederation with that of the Constitution. How different were these two documents in their language? How different were the governments they created for the United States? Based on these changes, would you characterize the American Revolution as radical? Why or why not? http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/artconf.htm http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/usconst.htm