Crafting America’s Birth Certificate 250

I love that article! Some of the founding fathers and what they went through to create a document that would allow all 13 colonies to coalesce into the very beginnings of the United States of America.

Sadly, very few people truly know the history of the United States. The Declaration of Independence was also one of the greatest documents ever written. It addressed the very basics of human Rights.

The American Revolution was not entirely unprecedented, nor were the rights demanded. Our resident Brit should feel free to correct or add details, but England (was it the UK yet?) has had two revolutions, and the Petition of Right and English Bill of Rights, which were at the core of the revolutions have some ideas and rights very familiar to America.

Setting up for the first revolution, James I had tried to some degree to rule as an absolute monarch. His son, Charles I, was similarly minded, but he was not strong and was coerced into agreeing to comply with the rights enumerated in the Petition of Right (IIRC). He soon went back on this agreement and came into conflict with Parliament. An actual civil war was fought in the mid 1640s, and the outcome was Charles lost his head, rule by Parliament and a “Lord Protector” was tried. Oliver Cromwell was reasonably capable, but his successor, his son, was not.

Charles I’s son was brought back as King Charles II, with him agreeing to observe rights and work with Parliament. Charles II died peaceably, and his son James II became king … and a problem arose. James II was a Catholic, which disqualified him from being king, by English law. That may seem odd now to Americans, but Bloody Mary’s bloody but failed attempt to restore Catholicism and the Spanish Armada, whose purpose was to invade England and impose Catholicism (and Spanish rule?) were just a century or so before. Memories of both were strong.

James II was deposed in what is called the Glorious Revolution, and his sister(?) (Aunt?), Mary, wife of William of Orange, was brought in. William and Mary were co-regents. As part of their becoming king and queen, they agreed to observe the English Bill of Rights. They died without an heir, causing another dynastic change, George I (a cousin who was a Protestant), George II, and George III, the Hannoverian dynasty (Hannover, as in Germany; George I didn’t speak English).

The key point, is that all of this, up to William and Mary (sound like a good name for a university?) was “seen” by English colonists in North America. They believed that they were fully English citizens, with all the rights entailed in being citizens.

Some in English government saw otherwise. Also, there was the matter of paying for what we call the French and Indian War. The English wanted to impose the same taxes as were imposed on British people, but: 1. The colonists’ contribution to their own defense was minimized or dismissed; 2. The colonists had no representation in Parliament, i.e. no vote on the taxes; 3. The French and Indian War was a relatively small part of the much larger Seven Years’ War, i.e. their taxes would be paid toward much more than just their own defense. George III and his PMs were inclined to think of the colonists as less than citizens. George III was not one of England’s wiser kings, and the end of his reign was complicated by mental problems.

George III was not going to back down, and the colonists viewed his violation of their English citizens’ rights as literal tyranny (rule contrary to established law).