American And French Revolution

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

The American Revolution began in 1775 as an open conflict between the thirteen colonies and Great Britain. The main cause that led to the revolution was the issues of tax, after the war that occurred in France and India. Britain needed money so they imposed taxes on the American colonies since the war had being fought partly to defend the colony. The British followed a general policy of statutory neglect and the British laws were poorly enforced.

In 1763 the parliament brought an end to the statutory neglect by bringing in more controlling attitude towards the colonies by forcing the Americans to follow the mercantilist law. The first tax law was the stamp act in 1766, the British colonies were forcing the Americans’ to pay for the tax stamps, the printed materials of which most of the Americans refused to pay for because there was no taxation without representation. When the British noticed that the Stamp Act law did not succeed, they decided to enforce another law called the Townshend Act in 1767.

This was a tax on imported goods. The British got an impression that the Americans had rejected the Stamp Act because it was a direct tax so the colonist will accept indirect taxes instead. The first Townshend act was the Revenue Act of 1767 which was placed on goods like: tea, paint, paper, glass, etc. which were not produced in North America. The Americans did not accept it because they believed that any law passed by parliament for the main aim of generating revenue was unconstitutional, as a result of the American’s protest the British removed all taxes except for the tax on tea. The Tea Act reduced the tax on imported British tea because they were the only company authorized to sell tea to the colonist which gave British merchants an edge over merchants from all over the world. Ships from England entered the Boston harbor containing lots of tea but because of the law placed on tea, many American’s did not want to buy the tea, they wanted the tea taking back to England in protest to the way they were exploited.

A group of colonist led by Samuel Adams entered the ships holding the tea and threw a large amount of tea off a British ship; this even was known as the Boston Tea Party. In reaction to the Boston Tea Party, the parliament passed a law known as the Intolerable Acts to serve as a punishment to the Boston people. The port of Boston was closed until they were able to pay for the tea they destroyed. The Intolerable Act had both the negative and the positive effect, the negative effect was that the closing of the port affected businesses depending on trade so it rendered most people jobless while the positive effect was that it forced the American colonists to take sides, this only led to violence by the people and restrictions by England. In response to the intolerable act the American’s represented 12 colonies; they also chose to stop dealing with Britain until the intolerable act was abolished. The colonies then set- up the central congress on September 5 and British troops worked together in other to capture military weapons and supplies that would be effectively used against the American’s.

In March 1775 Patrick Henry made a speech saying "I know not what cause others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" which meant war was inevitable.

The philosophies behind the American Revolution were that the Americans were tired of being exploited and treated like slaves, they wanted their rights back, like voting rights, slavery, religion, and women’s right. They believed that all humans are equal, man or woman they should all be treated equally. John Locke philosophy of government, freedom, and natural justice challenged the power of England’s monarchy over the colonies in America.

John Locke wrote that" The natural liberty of man is to be free from any superior power on earth, and not to be under the will or legislative authority of man, but to have only the law of nature for his rule. The liberty of man in society is to be under no other legislative power but that established by consent in the commonwealth, nor under the dominion of any will, or restraint of any law, but what that legislative shall enact according to the trust put in it." (Locke John [online], http://oII.libertyfund.org. volume 4).

The issue of religion was a big problem, the Americans argued for the division of church and state. Almost all the thirteen colonies supported a recognized religion, called the established church, but the great awakening and the enlightenment destroyed the interest in established religions. Thomas Jefferson described the limit between religious belief and the right to participate in government.

Saying " our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, any more than our opinions in physics or geometry…; All men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinion in matters of religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish, enlarge, or affect their civil capacities."(Jefferson,

These philosophies encouraged the American’s to fight for independence, which led to the revolution in 1775.

While in the case of the French Revolution was a period of political and social commotion in the political history of France, it started in 1789, the main causes of the revolution were. The first one was the general problem of finances in France, a lot of state debts which were caused by former kings and wars, accompanied by a tax exempt aristocracy and continuous spending put the economy in a huge financial debt, the taxes were only paid by the farmers, wage earners and the professional and business classes, the groups were also denied most of the positions of power in the regime which caused unrest and also tax was not paid by everyone, the king of France did not know how to tax the people equally.

The second problem was the political and theoretical environment of Europe, the ideas of the enlightenment and Rousseau made the people believe there was no wrong or right and that man was perfectly good.

The third problem was the French King Louis was a man who had no respect for anyone, having proved economically incapable. Lastly, was the problem of food shortage, food was limited and the price of bread was highly increased which made the people to spend their money on food instead of other aspects of the economy. The system of the economy was feudal and there was distinct rift between the lower class and the rich. The French were used to the mentality and life involving the monarchy and so they thought change was not necessary until a nearly destructive economic depression showed them the lack strength of their absolute monarchy. The problem in France became worse when King Louis XVI called for an estate general. In this estate general Louis’ aim was to solve France’s present economic situation, and brought together a parliament made up of each representatives from all the France’s social classes. The meeting was an issue because each class received one vote each and this was not easy at resolving issues, the third estate wanted all the estates to come together as one and the voting would proceed on an individual basis not per class, when the king rejected, the third estate which represented the working class decided to set- up its own assembly and declare itself the national assembly and the true representatives of the people. The king decided to send army’s to Versailles to tear apart the assembly, the people saw this as an intentional act to anger them and so the poor workers of Paris attacked the bastille which lead to the opening of bastille prison on July 14, 1789 which up till today is celebrated as the Bastille Day, this lead to the execution of their king and the aim to overthrow the monarchy.

The philosophes behind the French revolution was that the French people realized that the monarchial system that ruled the country was oppressive and irresponsible and so they wanted national freedom with the interests of their own estates. They wanted the power to be shared between the legislative and the crown. Locke philosophy tells us "the people are born without innate ideas and anything they become is influenced by those around them, their environment and developing history".

The French people also wanted to be treated equally, they did not like the fact that only the commoners were taxed and they also wanted the right to life, liberty and property, so this motivated them to overthrow the monarchy which led to the revolution that lasted from the year 1789- 1791.

RFERENCES

Wirt, William. Sketches of the life and character of Patrick henry. (Philadelphia) 1836, as reproduced in the world’s great speeches, Lewis Copeland and Lawrence w. lamm, eds., (New York) 1973.

John Locke. Second treatise of civil government [online]. Http: // www. Constitution.org|ji|2nd tr04.htm [accessed 19th November, 2012]. Chapter 4

John Locke. [Online]. Http:// www.apstudynotes. Org |us. History| topics| philosophy of American Revolution.

Jefferson: the vagina of establishing religious freedom. [Online], (http:// academic. Brooklyn. Cuny. Edu| history| dfg| amru| VA. Re189. Htm).