Analysis of Declaration of Independence The author, Thomas Jefferson claims that the British colonies in America should be independent. The article opens by explaining why they have this formal declaration, overthrowing government and their wanting an independent nation. According to Jefferson, “All men are created equal” and “they are endowed with certain unalienable rights that governments should never violate. These rights include the right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. These are the reasons that government is instituted.
Duggan 1 Paul Duggan APUSH-3 10-20-10 American Revolution DBQ During the period from 1775 to 1800, American’s views toward Britain began to change. British policies between 1763 and 1776 intensified the colonial’s resistance to Britain and commitment to their new Enlightenment ideals. The policies involved many taxes which the colonists’ resisted due to their belief that such taxes without representation abused their rights. Americans began to look for political, economic, and social freedoms that Britain continued to deny them. They felt that the king was abusing his power as a monarch and therefore their rebellion was for a just cause of declaring the independence they wanted.
Although historians generally regard the Articles of Confederation as a complete failure, they were actually a necessary step in the formation of the Constitution which laid out a balanced government in accordance with the ideals of the American Revolution. Adopted by the Second Continental Congress at the height of the Revolution in 1777, the Articles of Confederation reflected the fears of American citizens, in particular, the fear of tyrannical rule. When the Articles failed, a stronger and more stable government replaced it, the government America has today, defined by the Constitution. Errors made under the weak Articles of Confederation were the catalyst for the ratification of the Constitution. The Articles played an important role by proving a strong central government was not to be feared, it was a necessity.
Paine believed in American secession from the British and an independent country of their own. Thomas Paine encourages breaking away from Great Britain to start colonial independence. He uses examples in many different categories such as taxes, religion, and the cons of the British government to support his thesis. Thomas Paine’s main argument in Common Sense is that every man is created equal and should be given
Locke’s text describes how every man has the same rights to one another. If one man can have control over something or someone else, then, by the law of nature, every other man should have the same rights of power. According to Locke, men should not feel powerless under the legislative law. In understanding this, a man, whether under law or not, should not feel like they are under someone else’s will. One of the most important topics Locke wanted to encourage, was that people have control over the government, setting limited power for a temporary time, and in having this, the people can demolish the form of government if the government does not comply to the people’s needs “the people have a right to act as supreme, and continue the legislative in themselves” (Locke).
The colonist had adhered to the laws that had been set forth for them under the impression that they were equals to their “mother” country. They willingly and consciously “submitted” themselves to this oppression of the largest empire of the world; under the idea that they were going to be granted the same exclusive rights of the British and all else being equal, little did the American Colonist know that it was quite the opposite of their original expectations. The American Colonist began to realize the underlying intent of the British Parliament and how it began to express a hovering dictatorship over the American Colonies. Jefferson’s first subject to be address was the restriction that had imposed by the British of free trade. “The exercise of a free trade with all parts of the world, possessed by the American colonist, as a natural right, and which no law of their
What were the shortcomings of the first national government under the Article of Confederation? Describe the limitations on the powers of the congress, especially as they applied in the case of “Shays’s Rebellion”. The principles which are defined in the Article of Confederation were recognized as the Second Continental Congress’s first attempt at forming a central government in 1777. In the middle of a struggle against England’s distance and apparently too-powerful central government simply hope to create a system of government that would reproduce civilians’ ideas considering the British government system of rules and regulations. The main concept for the Article of Confederation came from the England because at that time British excessive pride was strong and powerful colonies and the same concept came for the central government system.
But Americans had become used to having control over their local government. They objected to the new laws and protested being taxed without their consent. In 1775, Britain's Parliament declared Massachusetts, the center of most of the protests, to be in rebellion. British troops were placed in Boston to take swift action against the rebels. Shortly afterwards, war broke out.
The American Revolution did not satisfy the colonial goals for civil, political, social, and economic rights; however the Constitution did. All the American Revolution did was drive the British out of America. With the British gone the Americans had the ability to strive for civil, political, social, and economic rights, but the Articles of Confederation became an obstacle in their path to their rightful goals. During the American Revolution the American people wrote a lot about what they wanted to accomplish and attain. In Document A, the Declaration of the Causes and Necessities of Taking Up Arms, it is written that the American people feel they have been wronged by England because their rights are restricted and wish for these basic rights to happiness and such.
It also led to a number of changes in English policy, which sparked multiple conflicts with the American colonists and contributed to an increasingly hostile change in the economy. This dynamic eventually sparked the American Revolution twelve years later. This Revolution also positively affected the colonies socially, economically, and politically. These were the three characteristics that were used to help define the American society and can also be used when trying to determine exactly how revolutionary the American Revolution was. When analyzing the social structure of the American society during and after the Revolution it was clear that the American Revolution was very revolutionary.