Episode 152: Origins of the American Revolution

by Liz CovartSeptember 19, 2017

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What caused the American Revolution?

Was it the issue of ‘No Taxation without Representation?’ Was it conflict and change in the social order of colonial and British society? Or, was the Revolution about differences in ideas about governance and the roles government should play in society?

In this episode of the Doing History: To the Revolution series, we explore one set of ideas about the origins of the American Revolution with Bernard Bailyn, a Professor Emeritus at Harvard University and author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution.

About the Series

The mission of episodes in the Doing History: To the Revolution series is to ask not just “what is the history of the American Revolution?” but “what are the histories of the American Revolution?”

The Doing History series explores early American history and how historians work. It’s produced by the the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture.

Be sure to check out Doing History season 1, Doing History: How Historians Work.

About the Show

Ben Franklin’s World is a podcast about early American history.

It is a show for people who love history and for those who want to know more about the historical people and events that have impacted and shaped our present-day world.

Each episode features a conversation with a historian who helps us shed light on important people and events in early American history.

Episode Summary

Bernard Bailyn, the Adams University Professor Emeritus and James Duncan Phillips Professor of Early American History Emeritus at Harvard University and author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution, helps us explore one set of ideas about what caused the American Revolution.

During our exploration of the ideological origins of the American Revolution, Professor Bailyn reveals how people understood the causes of the American Revolution prior to 1967; Why he believes colonial Americans’ ideas about governance and the powers governments should exercise caused the American Revolution; And, the logic that drove Americans to rebel against and seek their independence from Great Britain.

What You’ll Discover

How people understood the causes of the American Revolution prior to 1967
Why the ideological origins and not the economic or social origins of the Revolution
Pamphlets about the American Revolution
Pamphlet circulation
How Americans viewed their place within the British Empire and world after 1763
The role of the Enlightenment in shaping the ideology of the American Revolution
British oppositional literature from the English Civil War and its impact on American ideology
Eighteenth-century American ideas about government power
Colonial Americans’ obsession with power
The Americans’ logic for rebellion
Thomas Hutchinson