Bekhit 1 Chloe Bekhit Dr. Greene American History I 17 November 2022 The Evolution of Freedom and Liberty in the American Revolution Throughout Eric Foner’s Voices of Freedom and Give Me Liberty! the common themes are freedom and liberty, specifically what the American beliefs on these topics are. In Foner’s prefaces to the books he states that The Declaration of Independence defines liberty as mankind’s inalienable rights, while The Constitution declares that its purpose is to protect these rights. Foner mentions that although the ideas of freedom and liberty have been around since the beginning of American history, the specific definitions of these terms are not fixed, but rather have been changed countless times throughout America’s journey as a nation. Foner says that America’s “a story of debates, disagreements, and struggles over freedom”. For Voices of Freedom, Foner picked specific historical documents that he believed clearly showcased the debates over freedom from each specific time period. For my comparative/integrative book review, I will focus on chapter five from both Foner textbooks. Chapter five of each of the books focuses on the American revolution. For these chapters, Foner uses specific documents and events that display the colonists’ thoughts on how the British monarchy was treating them. He is able to explain to the reader just what pushed the colonists towards their fight for freedom. In the very beginning of both chapter fives in each Foner textbook he talks about the Stamp Act. Foner states that this was the first inspiration for the division between the colonists and Great Britain. Before the Stamp Act, there were no direct taxes being taken from the colonists for the British. Up until then, Great Britain was making money off of the colonists by Bekhit 2 trade regulations. Parliament had passed the Stamp Act without the authority of local elites, which were ready to defend their authority for liberty. In Voices of Freedom, Foner uses Virginia Resolutions on the Stamp Act (1765) to demonstrate truly how the colonists felt they were being taxed without any representation in the parliament, considering that they had not been consulted on this act. This was the start of the division between the ideas of British freedom and American freedom, considering Foner mentioned that freedom was not fixed but rather continuously evolutionary. The idea of British freedom seemed to be that British citizens had to follow a certain set of rules and regulations while obeying the king. As colonists continued to fight against the believed-to-be unfair act, their ideas of freedom shifted from the British idea. They started to believe that they should be able to determine what they believed to be fair and not, rather than just listening to what their authorities had to say. I believe that through Virginia Resolutions on the Stamp Act (1765) and his explanation of the Stamp Act in Give Me Liberty! Foner cements his thesis that freedom and liberty are ever changing based on how people can perceive these ideas. Foner does a great job explaining why the shift of the colonists started to begin because of this act. Foner also writes about Common Sense (1776) by Thomas Paine, which demonstrates one of the many thinkers and rallies of the American revolution. Rather than beginning with a list of grievances that the colonists had endured, Paine immediately starts to attack the British Monarchy. He states that the monarchy was being ruled by “the royal brute of England”. He starts with an attack on the monarchy, considering this is what he was trying to gain support of a revolt against. Paine then turns to the colonists’ experiences in order to get his point across. He writes that having a tiny island far away govern the politics, money, experience, etc. of a continent is insane. Paine also adds how America gaining its independence will have historical Bekhit 3 significance. He says that this new nation will be a home of freedom for many. Once again, Paine is able to establish Foner’s statement that the ideas of freedom and liberty are not stable. Although America’s idea of freedom has yet to be completely established yet, Paine and many others were starting to fantasize and plan for the future, hoping that their individual beliefs of what freedom and liberty should be will come true. Paine ends Common Sense with a call to other countries/nations and how they preserve freedom, proving how freedom and liberty are different according to people. He states that Asia and Africa have expelled her, England is about to depart her, and so forth. Every nation has its own beliefs on what freedom and liberty should be and is. Although almost every colonist Foner has mentioned has been in support of America’s independence, Foner still includes Samuel Seabury. Samuel Seabury was a colonist against the idea of the American revolution against Great Britain for its independence. Despite the fact that Seabury is against the idea of the colonists revolting, he still has his own ideas of freedom and liberty. He believes that everyone shares a common right to happiness, but he believes that should be practiced while remaining under the rule of the British monarchy. Seabury believed that by trying to gain independence from the monarchy, the colonies would actually just cause more issues for themselves and others rather than help. He believed that the colonists were entitled to their freedom and liberty, but in the bounds of what the British monarchy regulated. As mentioned, Foner states that freedom and liberty are changing and not fixed, but this is not the case just for specific time periods. This is the case from person to person as well, Samuel Seabury being a great example of this. Seabury shows how Foner’s idea is correct. Despite the fact that the majority was for America’s independence, there were still people that believed it Bekhit 4 would be best to continue under the rule of Britain. They believed that their rights to freedom and liberty were still being protected under the monarchy. In his preface to his textbooks, Foner states: “I hope that students will gain an appreciation of how the idea of freedom has expanded over time, and how it has been extended into more and more areas of Americans’ lives” and as a student, I can confidently say that Foner did allow me to gain an appreciation for how the idea of freedom has expanded over time. Through his use of multiple documents in chapter five, Foner was able to give me a much better understanding about why the start of the American idea of freedom and liberty came to be. Chapter five gave an insight into why the colonists wanted to push for their ideas of freedom and liberty and how there were people that still went against the majority belief. Foner was able to use the documents alongside his explanations to give a better understanding to me, along with my classmates and other students in the states. I enjoyed seeing how even during this time period there were multiple ideas of freedom and liberty. I genuinely never thought of freedom and liberty as an evolutionary thing, but now that Foner has opened my eyes to it, I do. I look forward to seeing how these ideas continue to change. Bekhit 5 Works Cited Foner, Eric. Give Me Liberty!: An American History. 5th ed., vol. 1, W.W. Norton & Company, 2017. Foner, Eric. Give Me Liberty!: An American History. 5th ed., vol. 1, W.W. Norton & Company, 2020.
