Of course not because independence has to be earned by those willing to fight for it. If our campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan have proven, it doesn’t work to simply depose a leader without the consent, support and, most importantly, sacrifice of those governed. It was the very hardship imposed by years of war that galvanized the nation into more than a disparate collection of individual colonies. It gave the young nation an identity and common purpose, the knowledge that they defeated the most powerful nation in the world. George Washington, of all people, would’ve understood that.
I’m pretty sure. I provided you with two important reasons why the colonies decided on independence and you disagree that they were a just cause for war. There’s a whole list of complaints listed in the Declaration of Independence but you believe none of those add up to a justification for war. blindboyard thinks the colonists had representatives in the British Parliament? Which member of parliament were from the colonies? When did the colonies get to vote on who will represent them in parliament? If the colonists were represented in parliament why did they send Ben Franklin and others to petition the king and parliament on their behalf? There were certainly members of parliament sympathetic to colonial needs but that hardly constitutes representation.
I fail to see what difference that makes. Just because the situation in the colonies wasn’t as bad as, let’s say France, doesn’t mean the colonies weren’t justified in declaring their independence.
I think it’s a stretch to refer to merchants as a whole belonging to the “ruling elite.” Independence for the colonies was quite popular among the common colonist. The famous Sons of Liberty, the fine folks who brought us the Boston Tea Party, was made up of working class tradesmen and artisans in addition to merchants. Speaking of the Boston Tea Party, it’s true that the price of legally imported tea was actually lower in 1773 than it had been in previous years. However, the colonists were protesting the monopoly given to the East India Company to import tea to the colonies as well as the right that parliament had any right to tax the colonies to begin with.
Justified according to whom? As far as the Crown was concerned, they had no say in the matter. Justification was as simple this: They wanted it and were willing to fight for it. A majority of colonists, give or take, wanted an independent nation. Whether to stop oppression or because they didn’t like the color of the king’s coat, it doesn’t really matter. They made their intentions known, gave ample opportunity to be appeased and had the support and wherewithal to make it happen. They revolted for the purpose of forming their own government within their own borders. Their reasons were their own.
Justified to the colonists living at that time? Depends on whom you ask and how you define justification. Given that a hundred people would have a hundred different opinions, we’re forced to consider the general view of the majority. That majority, give or take, wanted to be free of the Crown. If they couldn’t get it by asking nicely, war was justified. If, for any reason, the majority of Americans today voted for a new government but the existing government refused to yield power, violent revolt would again be justified. Our very existence is built upon that ideal. Jefferson himself argued that every generation should have its own revolution. Few of those who fought back then would’ve predicted their experiment would still be going strong today.
The bigger question is: Was King George justified in denying the colonies their independence?
So the South was justified in the civil war because they wanted to be an independent nation and the North wouldn’t let them do so when they asked nicely?
Awhile back we had a thread where the OP asked posters to convince him to join the American Revolution.
2sense had a great response that really gets at the heart of the issue.
No because the South represented a clear minority of equal standing and would’ve torn apart a clearly defined nation.
If you read between the lines, the OP is basically saying that the American Revolution wasn’t justified because even today, people don’t have the rights that the colonials fought and died for, so we would have been better off under the (benevolent) rule of the British, and maybe we would have kinda sorta gotten our independence anyway, like most of the British Empire eventually did a couple of centuries later.
The argument that the present form of American culture, political organization, and society is sufficiently flawed that we would have all been better off had we remained good Englishmen is…questionable. Compare the experiences of 19th century America and those of lands such as India and Ireland which remained under the British thumb. There was a great deal of gratuitous exploitation and needless suffering imposed on subjects of the Empire (“wogs”). Yes, Parliament did pass the two Reform Acts, and England slowly became a civilized place, with an embryonic concept of human rights. There is no doubt that life in the American Colonies would have gradually improved, and oppression lessened. But how would that have been a better outcome than the establishment of a free and independent nation?
As to whether the bloodshed was worth the cost, I don’t think you can quantify it, but a postcolonial US in the year 2012 would have been a much weaker and probably far less populous (and much smaller) nation, so that could be seen as justification. Of course, the Indians might not agree.
Maybe you’re right and I’m just a Tory. I think war is a terrible, terrible thing, acceptable only as an absolute last resort. I wouldn’t kill innocent people over abstract issues of representation or taxes. If the English had been burning cities or killing civillians or if the population had been forced into abject poverty and servitude (as they were doing to Africans at the time) I would have fought, but I just wouldn’t have been willing to take up arms and see innocents butchered because of an unfavorable monopoly or a lack of direct representation or even local legislatures being disolved.
Justified to you, obviously. I’m asking for opinions, and from those in whose opinion it was justified, for the rational basis behind such opinion. Surely every war in history isn’t justified in your opinion just because the people who fought were willing to fight! If we want the oil in another country and are willing to fight, is it just? When the South wanted to rebel was it just? If you were alive at those times, which side would you have been on and why?
And no, the justification of King George in denying independence is not the larger question. I don’t think there is any justification for outlawing marijuana, but I’m not joining any California militias over Obama’s raids on dispensaries. Both sides can be wrong.
Those issues aren’t abstract when they’re affecting you. As I said, we’re not going to agree on this issue. You don’t see any justification for the American Revolution and I don’t believe there is anything I or anyone else can say that will change your mind.
I’m not sure what you’re getting at here. It has been pointed out that modern Americans have representation in the current U.S. government. The colonists had no representation in the British government. What amounted to a foreign government was taxing and passing laws that affected the colonies but the colonists had no way to participate in that government. This might be an abstract problem to you but to the colonists it was not.
You’ve mischaracterized my argument. It went well beyond willingness to fight. They represented a majority that was willing to fight for the purpose of forming its own government within its own lands (the Indian issue nothwithstanding.) They were a vassal territory without reasonable access too redress. As for the Southy, it did not represent a majority and were rebelling against a government they were already a part of. They joined a nation with the understanding of majority rule. They would have to fight an unjust war to break that bond. They lost.
That is a great post! It strikes me as a more compelling argument, both emotionally and rationally, than I’ve seen here. It doesn’t completely sell me, but I least I feel like I understand what the actual stakes were and why they mattered to people.
My biggest question to 2sense were he here would be, given the inevitability of independence that you suppose, why fight now? Why not wait until the sheer size of the American population makes the colonies ungovernable from afar and England loosens her grip of necessity? (The answer, I suppose, would be that the ignorant and profit-minded governance of the colonies in the meanwhile would result in our ever greater impoverishment and lesser freedom to the point where it would inevitably become a grave matter that obviously justified and required war, and that by acting now, we might avoid that intermediate suffering and the greater bloodshed that a later war might engender, with higher numbers of both American rebels and British soldiers. Hmm…maybe I am starting to be convinced…)
I wish you would answer your own question about what justifies a war in your opinion. I’m not asking you to change my mind, just to make a valid argument from whatever premises you hold. And the colonists DID have representation in the British government according to the political theories of the day. They had as much representation as parts of Britain proper that didn’t get to vote for anyone, and arguably more, since they got to report directly to the crown (the fact that the king didn’t always agree with what they told him notwithstanding). You could argue that Democrats living in Utah today don’t have any representation according to contemporary political theory, since contemporary political theory nearly everywhere except the US demands proportional representation, but that alone doesn’t justify rebellion. Again, you have yet to lay out any standard for just rebellion and show how the American Revolution met that standard, and when I spell out my standards you just say that I can’t possibly be convinced.
Cite that a majority in the colonies supported rebellion?
You’re looking at it from your own very modern viewpoint where all human life is sacrosanct and worth more than anything else, that wasn’t a widespread viewpoint at the time of the American revolution. I think you have to understand the common viewpoints at the time for it to make sense, hell into the 20th century there were entire countries in Europe EAGER for wars that were basically insane meat grinders over reasons that seem foolish to the modern mind.
In what sense were the revolutionaries not a “clear minority of equal standing”? What “clearly defined nation”? It had only been 50 years since the War of 1812 and 60 since the Louisiana Purchase.
Compare the experiences of Canada instead. Ireland and India both had sizeable religious minorities who campaigned against federalization or home rule on the grounds that they’d be slaughtered (or marginalized) by the majority. The 13 colonies and Canada didn’t have that problem.
You’re mistaken. According to the political theories of the people living in the colonies they did not have representation. Furthermore, they believed they had a right to representation in any government body which passed laws or taxes on their behalf.
I don’t see how this is relevant. Just because some people didn’t rebel doesn’t mean those that did weren’t justified in doing so. Even if the treatment of the colonists fit in with the standards of the day does not demonstrate that violent revolution was not justified.
Coming up with a standardized list is a fool’s errand as I don’t believe there’s a simple checklist one should use to determine whether or not a violent revolution is acceptable. Each revolution is a unique occurrence and should be examined within its own social, political and economic context. The colonists eloquently laid out their reasons for declaring independence from Britain.
The Colonists only sought independence after their attempts to gain the same freedoms that their brothers in Britain enjoyed failed. Right up to the Olive Branch Petition the Colonists heavily emphasised their identity as proud subjects of a British King. They weren’t seeking anything new; they wanted what they had been used to until recently, and that which they saw the British enjoyed.
Moreover in the previous few years the British Parliament had been taking liberties with stationing soldiers, dissolving legislatures and enacting unpopular laws (even if they were relatively lenient - the principle was at stake) without consent of the governed.
You might think that these oppressions were fairly mild, and you’re right, but from the perspective of a colonist in the 1770s, these were a steady progression of greater and deeper breaches of the Fundamental Laws of England, and they could only see these transgressions getting worse. If they had waited until they were as oppressed as a Frenchmen, it may have been too late for them to state effective resistance.
Nor did they believe they enjoyed the same representation as the British; firstly, there was a growing push in Britain to reform the Commons which would only achieve its first objectives in 1832. Secondly, the Colonists that mattered weren’t as concerned about full representation for every colonists as they were of representation of their own class - which were those capable of voting in Britain at the time.
Only when they found that Britain was unwilling to listen did they decide that they could only secure these freedoms through independence.
Fine. Anyone else?
Thanks! Any thoughts on when a revolution is justified?
I can’t help but think you’ve changed the original premise of this thread.
You started out asking why the American Revolution was justified and have now changed it to when a revolution is justified. How come?
I honestly don’t think it’s possible to explicitly define when a revolution is justified as it depends on all sorts of different contextual cues. In the case of the American Revolution it was essentially the absence of any peaceful means left to them to defend themselves (although I maintain that only a minority wanted outright separation from Britain in the beginning, but once violence had broken out the leaders had to make a choice).
As I said, a majority of the colonists, give or take. It’s impossible to know exactly how much over or under, but I contend it’s close enough.