The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763-1789 (2 page)

The title that I have given this book may be understood in this day -when all is suspect -- as irony. I do not intend that it should be. The Americans, the "common people," as well as soldiers and great leaders, who made the Revolution against Britain believed that their cause was glorious -- and so do I. But their cause, however glorious, had its inglorious sides, and the Americans' manner of advancing it was sometimes false to the great principles they espoused. And therefore, while I have tried to convey a sense of the achievements of the Revolution, I have also pointed to its failures, and tried to understand both achievements and failures and their peculiar relationship.

This book is largely a narrative. To be sure, several chapters and sections within chapters analyze events with the intention of extracting meanings beyond those narration reveals. But in the main, I have chosen to tell the story of the Revolution in the belief that the process of reconstructing what happened may be made to provide an explanation of events and their importance. The narrative form, I believe, allows one to recover much that is central to an understanding of the Revolution and to revive at least a part of the passions and commitments of the people who struggled and fought. A narrative, moreover, can recapture some of the movement of the years of conflict, movement which saw the cause grow into something considered glorious by a people who came to recognize themselves as set apart from others by Providence.

Some readers will note that I have not given a full discussion of foreign affairs and the American West. These subjects will be treated further in the volume following this one in the Oxford History of the United States. I have concentrated on questions of governance, politics, constitutionalism, and on the war. Historians who emphasize these matters often argue that the Americans' desire to preserve rights was preeminent, and hence their Revolution was conservative. In my account the Americans may appear especially conservative because I have tied their convictions about rights and politics to their Protestant past. The appearance does not correspond to reality. The Americans did wish to preserve much from their past, but their struggle was not conservative, for it was shot through with hope for the future. This hope was in part a millennial hope, born of a conception of the world that was religious in origin. Nor was the rejection of monarchy a conservative -or safe -- act. To conceive of a republic and to fight for it in a world dominated by monarchy took daring and imagination.

In the years that I have been engaged in writing this book I have incurred many debts. I owe much to C. Vann Woodward, general editor of the Oxford History of the United States. He has read my work and given me perceptive criticism and thoughtful suggestions. Sheldon Meyer, Vice President of the Oxford University Press, has been a supportive critic, and Leona Capeless, Managing Editor, has improved what I have written by superb editing.

Early in my research I had the help of Michael Hindus and Lucy Kerman; later on, Chuck Cohen, Wayne Carp, Michael Meranze, and Greg Schultz gave me aid of several sorts. I am especially grateful to Charles Royster, my former student and colleague, for a variety of suggestions about sources and for his careful reading of much of what I have written. Paula Shields has helped in several ways, and she and Kathleen Kook made the index. Kathleen Kook and Miss Shields read much of the galley and page proofs.

Several colleagues at Berkeley -- William J. Bouwsma, Winthrop Jordan, James Kettner, Nicholas Riasanovsky, Irwin Scheiner, and Thomas Smith -- also read all or part of this book in manuscript and suggested ways of improving it. Riasanovsky gave me especially detailed comments. James Kettner saved me from a number of mistakes and gave both the final draft and all the proofs extraordinarily close readings. I owe more than I can say to Kettner for this assistance and for his thoughtful comments on my work.

Librarians at the University of California, Berkeley, and the Henry E. Huntington Library and Art Gallery gave me much assistance. The Huntington Library provided a marvelous setting for the writing of a part of this book. I appreciate the kindness and support given me at the Huntington by its Director, James Thorpe, and by the Senior Research Associate, Martin Ridge. Ray Billington, whose recent death deprived the Library and American historiography of a wonderful figure, helped me in many ways. It was at his and Mr. Thorpe's suggestion that I gave a paper at a Huntington Research Seminar in August 1977 based on the first section of Chapter 20. The
Huntington Library Quarterly
published that paper as "Why Men Fought in the American Revolution" ( Spring 1980). I am grateful to the editors for permission to use it in slightly altered form in this book. At several other places in this book, I have quoted from the rich collections found at the Huntington. The late Claude Simpson first suggested that I might enjoy working at the Library. Simpson, Thorpe, and Billington awarded me a Huntington Faculty Fellowship ( March-September 1977) funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities. My debt to the Endowment is great: in 1973-74 I enjoyed a Senior Faculty Fellowship it provided. I have also received support from the Humanities Institute and the Committee on Research at the University of California. A part of the manuscript was typed at the Institute of International Studies at Berkeley. Early drafts of my manuscript were typed by two members of my family, mentioned below, and by Katherine Klein, Dorothy Shannon, and Louise Sullivan, who also did a skillful job on the final draft. Mrs. Shannon read proofs and helped in other ways with unfailing good humor. Two men, Mick Pont and Nate Norman, helped keep me going at a particularly difficult time, and though I will never be able to repay them for their help, I do want to thank them.

Besides typing and reading what I wrote, Beverly and Holly Middlekauff -- my wife and daughter -- occasionally asked me when I was going to finish this book. At no time did they ever imply that they thought I would not finish; and they successfully concealed what must have been appalled surprise when they saw its length. For their discretion, and for much else, I am grateful to them.

Berkeley

R. M.

September 1981

Some periods of historical scholarship, like some periods of history, are more crowded with developments and surprises than others. The findings, revisions, and innovations of the latest generation of historians have been singularly rich in changes and surprises. Some of them are superficial and ephemeral, but there remain numerous insights and revisions characterized by critical sophistication, subtlety, and depth that have banished many old simplicities and reshaped and deepened our understanding of the past. The parts that have proved durable have been mainly the contributions of specialists -- often local historians or trained statisticians -- whose works, methods, and analytical techniques are not readily available to the non-specialist. Yet they are sometimes essential to an understanding of American history by the modern citizen, who would otherwise confront the present and the future with outdated misconceptions of the past. To incorporate the new insights and revisions in a general history that is available to the unspecialized reader, neither the specialized monograph nor the generalized textbook would suffice, nor would dozens of books dividing history into narrow segments of time or subject.

The most satisfactory solution for the
Oxford History of the United States
seemed to be a series of ample volumes covering the large periods and aspects of the nation's history. The continuities and changes as well as the basic narrative and the contributions of recent scholarship can best be presented in this manner. One volume is assigned for each of the nine major periods of American history from the colonial period down to the present time, with two additional volumes, one on economic history and the other on diplomatic history. Each volume in the series

is, finally, the responsibility of the individual author, free of any expectation of conformity in interpretation or point of view. Each author will strive for a readable text that will be readily accessible to the educated general public, and at the same time he will provide students at various levels an interpretative synthesis of the findings of recent scholarship as well as the essentials of narrative history in the period or subject being treated.

It comes as no surprise that all the historic developments of a period do not fit conveniently into chronological limits and that there are inevitable overlappings between volumes. One such instance is apparent in the present book. Although it deals with major events in the late 1780s, certain developments such as the settlement of the West and foreign relations in that decade are not covered in detail here. They will be treated fully in the volume dealing with the next stage of the nation's development, the early national period ( 1789-1815), and in the volume on diplomatic history. Overlaps do not present serious difficulties.