The Real Story of the   American Revolution

FAQs = Frequently-Asked Questions

Real? | One Story? | American? | Revolution? | Why Liberty?

Note: The "we" below refers to the editorial board and not to any sponsoring organization.

Q: Why call it a "real" story when it is not an eyewitness account?  Answer: The American Revolution was a complex series of inter-twined events, so no single eyewitness could capture many of the details or guess the long-term significance of the immediate results. We use the word "real" in the RSAR title to indicate that our goal is to help contemporary readers understand the complexities and consequences by presenting material that is based on historical documents and is consistent with the considered opinions of modern scholars. Any attempt to summarize an event (rather than simply displaying all available historical documents on that event) produces an interpretation that may be biased due to the writer's personal interests and prejudices. We are not using the word "real" to imply that what is written here is free from personal bias. We recognize this as a potential problem, and we try to minimize it. Any effort to make sense and draw meaning from a complex series of activities will inevitably over-simplify it (leaving out what others may wish had been included) and identifying and emphasizing certain threads that differ from what others feel are more coherent and important. In spite of the risk of bias we are committed to presenting a multi-facted picture of the American Revolution, convinced that has important lessons that must be transmitted to youth and adults in the U.S. and abroad. We believe that the concepts of liberty, tolerance, and unity motivated the colonists. They did not extend these concepts beyond what was common in Great Britain, but the codification in law was in such general terms as to inspire originally-excluded groups to seek and to eventually acquire them. That, too, is documented and "real".

Q: Why imply that it is one "story" when it is made up of many stories?  Answer: The American Revolution is certainly composed of the hundreds of thousand of stories from the indviduals who participated in or were affected by it. While their individual experiences may be interesting, the focus of this site is on the revolution in governance that occurred as a result of their discussions, debates, deliberations, speeches, letters, broadsides, and declarations. This is the story of the American Revolution as an entity and we refer to it in the singular -- just as we would for a book about John Hancock, which some might say is really the story of the individual cells that make up his body.

Q: Why say "American" rather than United States?  Answer: The main reason is that this is the usual name for the event. The colonists originally hoped to include the colony of Canada in the American colonies that were seeking greater liberty (or independence), and although Canada was not represented in the Continental Congress several military units made up of Canadian residents participated on the side of independence.. The success of the Revolution in the United States encouraged many Caribbean, Central American, and South American colonies to seek liberty and independence, so the regional revolution ultimately became a multi-continental revolution, truly an American Revolution, with roots in the same desires for individual liberty, tolerance of ethnic differences, and unity in determination to achieve and protect these values.

Q: Why say "revolution" rather than rebellion?  Answer: The word "revolution" usually implies replacement of the original governmental structure with a new one, while "rebellion" usually implies a more limited goal of redressing grievance within the current system of governance, for example changing unpopular regulations or replacing government officials who have abused their authority. Those who support using the word "rebellion" note that many of the leaders of the American Revolution were senior members of their state legislatures prior to the Revolution and were members of the Continental Congress during and after the Revolution. Also, many elected officials at the town and state levels did not change from 1776 to 1783. Those who support using the word "revolution" note that while the revolution in the U.S. was not as drastic as that in France, the American Revolution created the first large-scale government with significant representative participation from a population of over a million people and gave hope of liberation to the tens of millions of people in Europe and the Americas.

Q: Why talk about liberty rather than independence?  Answer: This (RSAR) Web site focuses on liberty rather than independence because it was originally liberty, rather than independence, that the American colonists sought. Many immigrants had come to America in search of liberties that had been denied them in Europe. If the colonists had been granted the rights of British subjects living in England there might not have been an American Revolution. During the Revolution many of the colonies (later states) had written       (1) declarations of rights and       (2) constitutions to identify and to protect the liberties that were later preserved for citizens in all of the states through the Bill of Rights. After U.S. independence was won many national leaders recognized that the Articles of Confederation provided a structure that was inadequate for managing the relationships between states, dealing with armed uprisings, and providing a strong foreign policy. They met in a Constitutional Convention and developed the U.S. Consitution to define a new structure for governance. Neither the Articles of Confederation nor the proposed Constitution included provisions related to personal liberty, and several states threatened to vote against the proposed Constitution unless several fundamental personal liberties were guranteed in writing. Thus the writing and consideration of the first ten amendments, (now called the Bill of Rights), was a necessary condition for ratification of the U.S. Consitution. Thus, the colonists had originally sought to secure liberty, and they fought for independence only after trying a sequence of less drastic avenues to their goal and finding these avenues blocked. It was the colonists' unity in demanding, securing, and codifying their liberty from conformance to a single culture that provided the widespread individual support and perseverence required to win independence.

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