New** Final Exam Study Questions #1-3

History 351 Final Questions 1. To what extent did pamphlets?and ideas?drive the American Revolution? -they were convinient, held from 5,000 to 25,000 words, the best thought of the day expressed itself, through pamphlets -basic elements of American Political thought -John Adams quotes "How did they drive the American Revolution" -Enlightment -Stamp Act -John Locke talks about the idea that if a government doesn't do its job then there is right to overthrow it. -Ideas were the driving force behind the revolution, it happened in minds of the people, not the actual war -troops were the final straws -Thomas Payne Common Sense in pamphlet. -Pamphlets aim to persuade peopele -Anti Federalists and Federalists help shape one another -Dont have to have a divine right king, -they saw that there could be a better in there. -All the arguing about the pamphlets and the ideas they expressed got to come into action after the war 2. Why does Bernard Bailyn pay so little attention to non-elites? What are the implications of that decision to the persuasiveness of his thesis? -British Hierarchal -the higher elites are the one that are involved in this and they are the ones that write the pamphlets -elites have more liesure time and more time to deal with this -british society had a hierarchy, the people underneath were assumed to not have a say, had a system of patronage -there is next to any writings about common people so we dont know much about them -deference and patronage assumed common men didnt write, appritence, -deference and system of plebians, (Wood Book). -thesis is, the ideas drove the revolution, leaves out the people that drive the revolutoin, the people that fight the war -including eqaulity in the pamphlets, but yet not including them in the story -Breen talks about the economics was the whole driving force, but really ideas have to be there for that to happen -classlines of society became blurred, by leaving them out your not thinking of any other reason than for the revolution besides elites 3. How did the ?contagion of liberty? spread throughout American society, transcending elite debates over government and the political break with Great Britain? -after the revolutoin they had the oppertunity to exercise what they wrote about in the pamphlets -realized if they did this at a certian point it goes to far, like freeing slaves -it also spread because people who have never had power grabbed onto the ideas and used it -Establishemnt of religion, people see that the ideas of the revolution are tough to make happen in reality