Not Revolutionary Enough Essay -- American History, The American Revol

For years, tensions between the colonies and England had been escalating. New taxes, unkept promises, and a more prominent presence of British soldiers set tempers rising within the colonies. Rebel groups such as the Sons of Liberty began appearing throughout the troubled colonies. While looking back at this time, historians can predict the Revolution several decades before it happened. When it was all said and done, a new country was born with a brand new institution of government. However, this so-called revolutionary war as more of a social uprising than an actual revolution. A revolution is a social construct that not only creates something brand new, but also eradicates the old system. A revolution must take the old society’s rules throw them out a window and start from scratch with ideas no one has ever thought of before. Moreover, revolutions do not tend to be organized, and even the better-organized ones fail because of corrupt leadership or just the inefficiency of the system. One aspect in society being changed is not a revolution. In addition, these changes cannot be toddler-sized steps; they have to be over the edge steps. For decades before the America’s have been slowly evolving. The idea of actual representation as opposed to virtual representation was beginning to take hold, and after the Revolution, the newly founded country turned to this new idea of actual representation (Van Lanen, 9/26). Therefore, the new form of government the United Stated founded was actually an improvement on their colonial governments. Radical change did not happen in American, however a progressive change that took time to take hold happened which is well outside the ideas of a revolution. An example of a real revolution would be ... ...volution that did not extend the hand of liberty to all inhabitants living within their borders. The American Revolution did create a new system of government that the world had never seen before. The ideas of unalienable rights, and property requirements for voting were groundbreaking for the era. However, almost every ideal the Americans introduced were modified versions of another system. Notions, such as actual representation, democracy, and compassionate marriages, all stemmed from another source. The Enlightened thinkers influenced the writers of the Constitution and Declaration, thus their ideals are found within the documents. Indeed, the Revolution changed the societal and political lives of its citizens, but the change was not enough. Other examples from history show much more radical revolutions, in which the American Revolution just does not compare.