Book Categories
|
The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution |
Buy The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution here, one of 750 American Revolution books offered for sale at discount prices here in the history books section at R bookshop. There are currently 64319 history books in our history books section, and over 1,000,000 books listed in our book store. We greatly appreciate your patronage at R bookshop and look forward to offering you a large selection of great books at discount prices now and in the future. Thank you for shopping at R Bookshop!
|
You Are Here: Home > History Books > American Revolution > Item 4
 |
The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution
|
by Bernard Bailyn
Sales Rank: 20421
|
List Price: $22.50
$20.25
At Amazon
on 4-14-2008.
|
|
|
|
Features
Cover Type: Paperback with 416 pages
Published by: Belknap Press; Enl Sub edition March 1, 1992
Written in: English
ISBN 10 Number: 0674443020
ISBN 13 Number: 978-0674443020
Book Dimensions:
7.9 x 5.5 x 1.2 inches
Weighs: 13.4 ounces
Product Review
The leaders of the American Revolution, writes the distinguished historian Bernard Bailyn, were radicals. But their concern was not to correct inequalities of class or income, not to remake the social order, but to "purify a corrupt constitution and fight off the apparent growth of prerogative power." They wished, in other words, to mend a broken system and improve upon it. In doing so they drew on many traditions of political and social thought, ranging from English conservative philosophers to exponents of the continental Enlightenment, from backward-looking interpretations of ancient Roman civilization to forward-looking views of a new American people. Bailyn carefully looks at these sources of sometimes conflicting ideas and considers how the framers of the Constitution resolved them in their inventive doctrine of federalism.
Product Review
American Quarterly : With this reading of the American Revolutionary Experience, Mr. Bailyn has substantially and profoundly altered the nature and direction of the inquiry on the American Revolution. In the process he has also erected a new framework for interpreting the entire first half-century of American national historyA landmark in American historiography.
Saturday Review : Tightly written and politically sophisticatedIn the field of American Revolutionary Studies Bailyn's book must henceforth occupy a position of first rank.
History : The most brilliant study of the meaning of the Revolution to appear in a generation.
New York Times Book Review : One cannot claim to understand the Revolution without having read this book.
New York Review of Books : A distinguished achievement. Mr. Bailyn writes with the authority and integrity that derive from a thorough extreme proficiency of the material. His meticulous scholarship is matched with perceptive analysis.
Reader Reviews
When published in the 1960s, this book had a revolutionary effect on our understanding of the American Revolution. Its impact is undiminished by the passage of the last forty years. Bailyn's scholarship and exposition remains as exciting as it must have been at the time of initial publication. Bailyn attempted to take a fresh look at the thinking of the individuals who made the Revolution. His work was based on an extensive survey and analysis of the large number of political pamphlets published in the years leading up to the revolution. His work benefited as well greatly from a number of other significant works of scholarship, such as Caroline Robbins' book on the Commonwealth tradition in 18th century thought. More than anything else, Bailyn succeeded in determining what key terms like 'power', 'liberty', and republicanism meant to the Revolutionary generations. In doing so, he was able to strip away anachronistic accretions from these terms and ideas and recover the actual thinking of the Revolutionaries and their opponents. Bailyn's achievement is manifold. He was able to show that dominant intellectual influence on the Revolutionaries was a compound of classical models, Common Law legal tradition, Enlightenment ideology, covenant theology, and a strong tradition of British intellectual and political dissent that had its roots in the Commonwealth period of the 17th century. The latter tradition was especially important and acted as the binding matrix for other traditions and interpretative lens through which other received ideas were focused. Bailyn shows how these ideas were articulated in the specifically American context and how they led inevitably to confrontation with the expanding imperial authority of Britain. This conflict led to new expansions of the basic ideology, some of which would represent completely novel ideas. The traditional ideas of representation and consent, constitutional basis of society, and sovereignty were overthrown and replaced to a very large extent by the concepts we still uphold. The development of these new ideas and the necessity to give them practical scope would lead to what Bailyn artfully termed "The Contagion of Liberty"; the expansion of concepts of rights and freedom well beyond the original categories of thought received by the Revolutionary generations. These would include attacks on slavery, the questioning of establishment of religion, speculation about democracy as a legitimate and potentially stable form of government, and an increasing emphasis on social equality generated from the realization of political equality. As Bailyn remarks, the thinking and writing on these topics provides the bridge between the world of the 18th century intellectuals and what would become the world of Madison and de Toqueville. Bailyn's analysis and scholarship are superb. The organization and quality of writing in this book are outstanding. Just as important, Bailyn is very good at supporting his analysis with well chosen excerpts from contemporary political pamphlets. His judicious choice of quotations not only serves to support his conclusions but gives a fine idea of the words and thoughts of the Revolutionaries and their opponents. This is a fundamental book for understanding the American past.
Comment | Permalink |
(Report this)
Back To Top
|
The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution
Available from Amazon
Price: $20.25
Updated on 4-14-2008.
|
NOTICE: All prices, availability, and specifications
are subject to verification by their respective retailers.
| We offer The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution and other related American Revolution Books here at Rbookshop.com. To view more books about American Revolution please use the previous and next buttons near the top of this page.
|
|
|
Search for books at
