· Pioneer society (they have built everything on their own) /frontier; far away from their home town
· Hyper individualists
· 1636-1769 “Ivy League” Seven of the nine colonial colleges are part of the Ivy League athletic conference: Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Penn, Columbia, Brown, and Dartmouth. (The eighth member of the Ivy League,Cornell University, was founded in 1865.)
Social hierarchies, less rigid:
· Elite
· middle class -> urban craftsmen, small independent farmers
· Lower-class-> farm labourers; Slaves à south
· Patriarchal society (traditional male occupations) ->Married women were not allowed to work. Though the women had probably more power over the men than it was in England at that time
· Polity:
· King of GB: claimed ultimate authority over the colonies
· Colonies had to have their own government (they were too far away)
· But to protect power was difficult
· Meaning of geography: centre London geographically separated from the colonies
· Construction of American identity
· First: British subjects (ïîä÷èíèòü; ïîêîðèòü) then developed their own identity
· From the King’s view: British empire with all its colonies forms a total system à one economy (perception of economies self-interest)
· Mercantilism: wages, prices, = interest trades= controlled by the crown
· à balance of trade: not buying more than you can sell
· European Colonies = one economic unit to be controlled from London
· Navigation Act: integrate the colonies into the imperial system
· France - major England’s geopolitical rival. Gobal Conflict b/w Eng & France
· Force pushing the colonists into independence: identity, economic self-interests, France
· English Colonists saw the French as a threat
· 7-years war 1756-63: English and French – catalyst for independance
· 1760: French in North America defeated
· Debt: wars are expensive!!!
· GB->Huge amount of debts à needed to make more money à colonies = source of labor & waelth
· Extractive institution vs inclusive institution
· à more and more repressive economic laws on colonists
· 1764: Sugar Act (paying higher costs on imports/exports)
· 1765: Stamp Act (in their colonies every time you receive a stamp with an official letter you have to pay a tax)
· 1765: Quartering Act (colonists had to pay for British soldiers)
· Colonists have no representatives in the parliament ->“No taxation without representation”
· March 5, 1770s: protests against repressive economic decision à British troops were sent to Boston à fire on protestors à more protests à “Boston Massacre”
· Monopoly only company allowed to sell tea in North America
· Dec 16, 1773: Boston Tea Party, the Sons of Liberty
· Sep.1774 the First Continental Congress (to debate the relationship with the GB): Result: to boycott British goods + to prepare a military conflict with the British army
· Most people still saw themselves as British/with the Queen
· Goes back to 1688 “Glorious Revolution”
· à certain things that the King cannot do for the Collonies
àsome power got the government
· Colonists used the same arguments to support their resistance
· John Locke (1690) Two treatises (òðàêòàò)on Civil Government
natural (rights) theory(entitlemens)
à natural: the rights attached to you independent of any historical decision
à being born as a human
àyou have rights because of being a human à God: architect of nature à implanted rightsà
à Secure right;
· Basis of consensus ( åäèíîãëàñíîå ñîãëàñîâàíèå); government can’t exist without it.
· Government’s function: protect rights of humans
· Information Circulation ideas à get enough people to resist the British (newspapers, sermons (ïîó÷åíèå), pamphlets)
· Soldiers tried to control illegal newspapers à stop information (could visit private homes to check if there are arms or illigal papers)
· à circle of violence continues
· Single event that makes the revolution a war: April 1775: Bunker Hill: Gun fire: British troops against local colonists
· January 1776: Thomas Paine: Pamphlet “Common sense “à call for revolution à incredibly successful, most effective to unify people = movement for independence
· Continental congress: form a continental army; leader: George Washington (most military competent) +
+ Working in Declaration of Independence à July 4, 1776