Quote Originally Posted by cajunscot View Post
I don't know if I'd say all Americans were "in love" with the Declaration; whilst I certainly respect and admire the sentiment behind it, I also look at it from a historian's perspective that things were not as bad as we were taught in the more traditional "patriot myth" of American history. For example, for all the talk of taxes paid by colonials, what is not told was that Britons were paying twice as much as the American colonies were, and the taxes were needed to pay for the recent French & Indian War, which the American colonists benefited the most because the end of the threat of New France.

As I tell my students, the word "Revolution" is a bit of a misnomer, as it was in fact, America's first Civil War. Many Americans saw no reason to rebel against their rightful government and actively fought against the rebels in provincial units. Whilst these people are still vilified today as "Tories", a deeper study shows that they, like their opponents on the other side, were fighting for a cause they believed to be right.

To many of my students, the events of 1776 are just an ancient as 1320 -- but really, so are the events of 1917, 1941 and 1968.

T.
Todd I can't find the clapping hands smiley or it would be here. Your lesson on the "Revolution" is as it is seen in Scotland: a bit more about the greed of one side, perhaps, but essentially as you are teaching.

Rex (too)