Download Quick Lists American Revolution Canada

The Causes of the American Revolution:
 The American Revolution (1775-1783) resulted from the combination of
several trends in the thirteen British colonies in New England and the midAtlantic coast:
1. A growing sense of patriotism and national identity. In this sense, the
“Revolution” was less a revolution and more a war of independence.
2. Increased resentment of Great Britain’s economic mastery over the
colonies. In particular, the taxes Britain levied to pay for the army it
maintained in North America angered many colonists, especially in
light of the fact that they lacked representation in the British
Parliament.
3. The desire of the colonial merchant (middle) class to better itself.
Economic freedom from Britain would allow American merchants to
become wealthier, thanks to free trade and the new spirit of
capitalism.
4. The influence of Enlightenment philosophy. Most of the political and
military figures who carried out the American Revolution and shaped
the government afterward had read the works of Enlightenment
thinkers such as John Locke, Baron Charles de Montesquieu,
Voltaire, and others.
The American Revolution:
 The American Revolution broke out in 1775, with the twin battles of
Lexington and Concord.
 At first, the poorly trained and poorly armed American forces, led by George
Washington, struggled against the professional armies of Britain.
 By 1777, however, the tide was turning.
 Although some colonists, nicknamed “Tories,” remained loyal to the British,
popular support for the revolution was high.
 Another social factor that helped the Americans was that most members of
all classes – lower, middle, and upper – united behind the independence
movement.
 The Americans were fighting on their home territory.
 Not only did European freedom fighters with military experience arrive to
train American troops, the Americans also used unconventional tactics and
guerrilla warfare to counter the British soldiers’ training and experience.
 The British were fighting far from home, at the end of extremely long supply
lines.
 After America’s victory at Saratoga in late 1777, France, Britain’s mortal
enemy, began to lend military and naval assistance to the American colonists.
 The assistance of the French fleet against the Royal Navy, Britain’s chief
strength, was particularly useful to the Americans.
 By 1781, the British war effort was failing, and the commander-in-chief,
Lord Cornwallis, was trapped at Yorktown.
 When Cornwallis surrendered there, the war was effectively over, although
peace talks dragged on until 1783.
 The Americans were victorious – and had won themselves a new country.
The U.S. Constitution and the Formation of the American Government:
 Decisions about the structure of the new American government were decided
at the Constitutional Convention of 1787.
 By 1789, the United States Constitution had been written and accepted by all
thirteen states.
 The system that resulted was a democratic republic, in which a federal
government shared powers with governments in each state.
 To prevent a dictatorship, power at the federal level was shared among three
branches: executive (president), legislative (Congress), and judicial (Supreme
Court).
 State governments, as well as the president and members of Congress, were
to be elected.
 It should be noted, however, that “democracy” in this case – as in all cases
before the twentieth century – was by no means all-inclusive.
 Women and Native Americans could not vote.
 Men who failed to fulfill certain property requirements could not vote.
 Moreover, the U.S. Constitution did not outlaw slavery.
 Despite its initial flaws, the U.S. Constitution has remained one of the most
successful political documents in world history.
 It is also the product and cause of a great deal of intellectual and
philosophical exchange.
 Most of the Constitution’s general ideals, and many of the specific political
principles, came from England and France, thanks to the influence of Locke,
Voltaire, Montesquieu, Rousseau, and others.
 In turn, the Constitution (along with the Declaration of Independence that
the colonists wrote in 1776) had an enormous impact on the Atlantic
Revolutions that followed in the 1780s, 1790s, and early 1800s.
 France’s Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen drew heavily upon
America’s Declaration of Independence and Constitution.
 The failed Dutch rebellion of the 1780s did likewise.
 In the early nineteenth century, the revolutionaries of Latin America did
their best to adapt the Americans’ political methods and ideals.
 Therefore, the American Revolution, and the political documents at the heart
of it, had a tremendous impact on the rest of the world.
Developments in Canada:
 Canada, the other British colony in North America, underwent changes
during the 1800s.
 Although Canada remained loyal during the American Revolution, a desire
for greater autonomy made itself felt not long afterward.
 In 1840, Upper Canada (now Ontario) and Lower Canada (now Quebec),
along with other territories in the east, were joined together as the United
Provinces of Canada.
 The British North American Act in 1867 conferred upon Canada dominion
status which entitled Canada to its own constitution and parliament.
 In most respects, Canada was self-governing.
And Ut Pictura Poesis Is Her Name
By John Ashbery
You can’t say it that way any more.
Bothered about beauty you have to
Come out into the open, into a clearing,
And rest. Certainly whatever funny happens to you
Is OK. To demand more than this would be strange
Of you, you who have so many lovers,
People who look up to you and are willing
To do things for you, but you think
It’s not right, that if they really knew you . . .
So much for self-analysis. Now,
About what to put in your poem-painting:
Flowers are always nice, particularly delphinium.
Names of boys you once knew and their sleds,
Skyrockets are good – do they still exist?
There are a lot of other things of the same quality
As those I’ve mentioned. Now one must
Find a few important words, and a lot of low-keyed,
Dull-sounding ones. She approached me
About buying her desk. Suddenly the street was
Bananas and the clangor of Japanese instruments.
Humdrum testaments were scattered around. His head
Locked into mine. We were a seesaw. Something
Ought to be written about how this affects
You when you write poetry:
The extreme austerity of an almost empty mind
Colliding with the lush, Rousseau-like foliage of its desire to communicate
Something between breaths, if only for the sake
Of others and their desire to understand you and desert you
For other centers of communication, so that understanding
May begin, and in doing so be undone.