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John Adams "rule of thirds" is a misreading of a letter to Massachusetts Senator James Lloyd. When he wrote, “I should say that full one third were averse to the revolution…." He is talking about the French Revolution. It's easy to get the context wrong due to the way it's buried in a long letter in the 8th paragraph and the following paragraph makes it clear which revolution he is speaking about since he is talking about the current difficulties with France. https://founders.archives.gov/docume.../99-02-02-6401
The "urban legend" lives on because it was likely close to accurate.
The 13 colonies' share would have been similarly minuscule.
That's rather woke, but what did those other people really do in the way of leadership or building the economy?
The issue with describing Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States is that it was published in 1980, thirty years before "woke" was a thing.
As for what other people did - there's more to history than recounting the actions of leaders or the barons of the economy.
According to your link (which I posted previously) only about 20,000 convicts were transported to Virginia between 1700 and 1776.
20,000 laborers over a period of 75 years could not have been essential to the success of the colony. Just think of it, that averages 267 per year over a period of 75 years, and none for more than fourteen years of bound labor. The population of Virginia at the start of the Revolution was about 500,000.
In fact, the colonial legislature opposed the transportation of convicts to its shores. Why would they have tried to keep out something that was essential to its prosperity?
The whole subject of convicts being transported to America has been absurdly overblown
The "urban legend" lives on because it was likely close to accurate.
That is hard to say. Robert Calhoon's estimate that up to 45% supported the American Revolution seems to be the current thinking; by his reckoning, the remaining were evenly divided between loyalists and those who just kept their heads down.
I think there are a lot of misconceptions regarding the US War of Independence, the first being that America was getting a raw deal, which was simply not the case, indeed British citizen who resided in Britain paid 26 shillings per year in taxes compared to only 1 shilling per year in New England, even though the living standard of the colonists was arguably higher than that of the British.
It's been said that in 1750 there were no freer nor economically comfortable people in their contemporary world than the British colonists of North America. Large tracts of fertile land, high levels of land ownership across the entire populace, low taxes, de facto self rule, and a tradition of English rights.
Yes, they paid very little in taxes to the British government, but then the British government didn't really expend all of that much on the colonies except in time of war. Even then, the colonial legislatures contributed as much as the British Parliament to the various war efforts on the North American continent through raising militias, supplying them, and raising taxes on their own citizenry to pay for said militias.
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Furthermore the US demand for representation did have a lot of sympathy in the British parliament, which at the time was still divided between parliamentarians and the traditional aristocracy, and had been since the end of the bloody English Civil War.
Yes, the division between the British political parties of the time, the Tories (the traditionalist aristocrats) and the Whigs (the parliamentarians). The Tories wanted to rule an empire and had no issue employing the stick to enforce their rule. The Whigs wanted a gentler hand, but at first still maintained Parliament's prerogative of issuing direct taxes on far-away colonies. By the time that the Tory government fell in 1782 after having ruled since 1770, the Whig government was content to let the North American colonies go their own way - their armed resistance and European allies had made them simply too expensive to keep.
The interesting take-away was that the French wanted to keep the new American states excluded from the lands past the Appalachian Mountains to keep them weak and dependent upon France for protection, but the British granted the United States lands all the way to the Mississippi in order to make them strong enough to walk away from their European allies.
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Britain was not some mighty land power, it was a Naval power which generally kept an Army half the size of it's European rivals such as France, Germany and Russia, but kept a navy at least twice the size of our nearest rivals.
It didn't have to be a mighty land power. The British Empire was one of the first modern maritime empires; it's mastery of the oceans made it the premier power of its time. Their home islands had a veritable wooden wall of ships of the line, called into action during times of war, and laid up in British harbors during times of peace. Their sugar colonies in the Caribbean were protected by the British Navy and the North American colonies could call up their own militias to fight European troops.
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Even in terms of Empire it often relied on the goodwill of the ruling classes, who often had their own Armies and police, and who were made wealthy via trade with Britain and it's Empire.
Due to the mercantilist economy of the British Empire, the colonies in North America were not as wealthy as they could have been. Transatlantic trade in the 18th Century put colonists at the mercy of British merchants and British taxes.
Colonists were forced to ship their goods only to merchants in Britain or in British colonies, paying taxes for the privilege of sending their goods overseas. British merchants would then resell the cargos from North American colonies to the rest of the world, and at a tidy mark-up. In most cases, the colonists simply had to accept the prices offered by British merchants for the colonials raw materials.
On the return trip, colonists could only purchase goods from merchants in the British Empire, again paying taxes for the items they imported. Again, the British merchants marked up the prices of the goods the colonists purchased. At times, colonial customers were certain that they were also receiving shoddy or second hand items at inflated prices.
It's been pointed out that merchants in the British American colonies took to smuggling during this time. The reason for such action was colonial dissatisfaction with an economy meant to enrich the mother country at the expense of her colonies.
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In India for instance, there were never more than 70,000 British troops, in a country of 400 million, whilst in terms of the US Revolutionary War, around a third of British forces were hired German Hessian mercenaries.
The British colonies in North America had almost no British troops stationed there except during times of war. And even during those times, the colonial militias were about the same size as the British troops employed. The British Empire simply didn't need to station troops in North America during peace time. It was only after the Seven Years War that the British began stationing troops in the American colonies. At first, it was because the British Army wasn't demobilized after the war. There were many, many aristocratic second sons serving as officers in the army and cutting back on the army meant throwing these aristocrats out of work and back onto their families for financial support. Far easier to simply keep them employed, and send the tax bill to pay for them to the American colonists. When the colonists balked at paying for an occupying force, the troops came in handy for enforcing imperial policy.
As for the hired German Hessian mercenaries - think about that action. The British government hired foreign troops to enforce British authority upon their own citizens in North America. Can anyone think of any time that an English or British government maintained its power in England/Britain? Also consider that while regular British troops believed that they were maintaining order among fellow citizens and offered the citizenry respect, Hessian troops that were fresh from various European wars had no such views about the citizenry. In Europe, it was customary for mercenary troops to loot, pillage, and rape the locals after military victories - it was expected compensation for hired soldiers.
According to your link (which I posted previously) only about 20,000 convicts were transported to Virginia between 1700 and 1776.
20,000 laborers over a period of 75 years could not have been essential to the success of the colony. Just think of it, that averages 267 per year over a period of 75 years, and none for more than fourteen years of bound labor. The population of Virginia at the start of the Revolution was about 500,000.
In fact, the colonial legislature opposed the transportation of convicts to its shores. Why would they have tried to keep out something that was essential to its prosperity?
The whole subject of convicts being transported to America has been absurdly overblown
Thank you, while it might be overblown, yet it was an important feature both in the colonies and Great Britain. This is one of the best available analysis I can find that is easily assessable. Between native Americans, free men, women, slaves, convicts transported, indentured servants, VA society was complex. https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/235406507.pdf
Very informative. The article on the Anglo-French War used the term "chimera of Loyalists" on which Britain had to rely in the 13 colonies. You'll see that term a lot in my posts. Most of them just wanted life to go on as before but were unwilling to commit their youth or themselves. to fighting or even acts of sabotage to support the "cause."
Both articles highlighted what the problem with Europe (more the Continent than the Isles) was; they were more into wars than domesticity. Maybe because Europe was built up there was less place for new universities, a Monticello here and there, etc.
It's not really a matter of 'good' and 'bad' guys. There were arguments for and against both sides. But if you look at what happened to the British Empire in the century following American independence it really just shows you the inevitability of it all. There was no way Britain could manage these vast territories with settler societies just from Westminster.
There ain't no "good guys", there ain't no "bad guys". There's only you and me and we just disagree.
Trouble is we weren't there and there was no reliable media then. "Media" consisted of pamphlets, usually of anonymous authorship. There were no polls. Then as now, there was a limited class of "political junkies." They cared, probably few else did, about whether Parliament in London or the Continental Congress ruled.
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