DBWI: First American Revolution successful

Now, we know of the first American Revolution and how the British was able to put it down after a few years But later during the Napoleonic wars in the 1800's they was the second Revolution and the Americans kick the English out of the colonies.

Now, what if the first was was successful?
 
Now, we know of the first American Revolution and how the British was able to put it down after a few years But later during the Napoleonic wars in the 1800's they was the second Revolution and the Americans kick the English out of the colonies.

Now, what if the first was was successful?

How, precisely, do you propose that the British North American revolutionaries will succeed without the help of a mutiny and revolution by the British revolutionaries in Britain? Without the Napoleonic wars the Tory state had a perfect competence to raise money and men and fight and win. It took a trans-oceanic revolution to topple Torydom in the British dominions.

For further help, look at the ideology of the "American" revolutionaries: no charter of the rights of man, no position against enclosure, pro-slavery, pro-sugar, pro-rum. Most of them were Tory Grandees in miniature and displeased by their poor standing vis-a-vis the London.

For further details, look at the role of the Boston Mob in the first revolution in North America, about the only truly democratic institution before the charter of the rights of man and the charter against enclosure.

yours,
Sam R.
 
How, precisely, do you propose that the British North American revolutionaries will succeed without the help of a mutiny and revolution by the British revolutionaries in Britain? Without the Napoleonic wars the Tory state had a perfect competence to raise money and men and fight and win. It took a trans-oceanic revolution to topple Torydom in the British dominions.

For further help, look at the ideology of the "American" revolutionaries: no charter of the rights of man, no position against enclosure, pro-slavery, pro-sugar, pro-rum. Most of them were Tory Grandees in miniature and displeased by their poor standing vis-a-vis the London.

For further details, look at the role of the Boston Mob in the first revolution in North America, about the only truly democratic institution before the charter of the rights of man and the charter against enclosure.

yours,
Sam R.

OOC: Erm, what? I'm sorry, but this must be a different Revolution than OTL, if even half of this were true ITTL.....Very few, if any, of the OTL founders of America were pro-slavery, for one. And, two, the very idea of universal rights was very much an ideal of the Revolutionaries(whereas the Charter of the Rights of Man was rather strongly opposed by a good number of Loyalists, because it ensured voting rights for blacks and Natives who were willing to assimilate, for one).

IC: I'm not sure what you've been reading, but I'm afraid you've gotten a lot of things wrong in regards to the First Revolution. If anything at all, it was actually a good chunk of the Deep South planters who were pro-British, especially after Lord Dunmore personally promised them that Britain wouldn't try to pull the rug out from under them(and they never did). Why do you think the Calhouns, for example, became so influential in inland South Carolina in it's early days? A huge part of that is because many of the Loyalists(or at least those due south of New Jersey and Penn., anyway) were willing to support enclosure if it meant stopping the Revolution dead in it's tracks. Most of the Patriots, on the other hand, supported restrictions on enclosure, even to the point of eliminating it altogether.

If France and/or Spain had joined in, then maybe.

It would have been possible even without their assistance, or allowance of such, though the royalists in both countries really wanted nothing to do with the Patriots, and at least Louis would have tried to restrict them from doing it. Perhaps if we had some more men like Pulaski and Kosciusko helping them out, it would have been easier.
 
If France and/or Spain had joined in, then maybe.

This. The rebels in the first rebellion needed cash, needed arms, and mostly needed help, in the form of soldiers and ships. They didn't get any of that, they failed. The second rebellion had the enormous distraction of Napoleon and France, and the rebels this time didn't need so much extra help, although Napoleon's largesse certainly helped. Not to mention the secret Louisiana treaty that proved to be so handy after the war.

Of course, there might not have been a second rebellion if Britain had shown a little common sense in the 40 years between the wars, and acted even a little magnanimously...
 
OOC: Erm, what? I'm sorry, but this must be a different Revolution than OTL, if even half of this were true ITTL.....Very few, if any, of the OTL founders of America were pro-slavery, for one. And, two, the very idea of universal rights was very much an ideal of the Revolutionaries(whereas the Charter of the Rights of Man was rather strongly opposed by a good number of Loyalists, because it ensured voting rights for blacks and Natives who were willing to assimilate, for one).

OOC: From the perspective of a pan Atlantic anti-Tory revolution that mobilised Boston Mob/London Mob/King Ludd/proto-Chartist sentiment the first revolution is going to look much more pro-slavery. The historical delay in the "first revolution" in incorporating a Bill of Rights means that it probably doesn't happen, and that a second, pan-Atlantic revolution is going to be much more critical of the first on this rights issue. Particularly if the concept of Rights involves a strong faction more interested in equity rights than egalite rights. I'm strongly remembering that the American revolution was still working out nativist white populism into the 1820s, for example, which was confusing for the Whiggish mentality of many of the historical revolutionary elite.

yours,
Sam R.
 
This. The rebels in the first rebellion needed cash, needed arms, and mostly needed help, in the form of soldiers and ships. They didn't get any of that, they failed. The second rebellion had the enormous distraction of Napoleon and France, and the rebels this time didn't need so much extra help, although Napoleon's largesse certainly helped. Not to mention the secret Louisiana treaty that proved to be so handy after the war.

Of course, there might not have been a second rebellion if Britain had shown a little common sense in the 40 years between the wars, and acted even a little magnanimously...

This may be true, but with George III as king until 1814, I'm afraid it was kind of a given that Britain was going to continue screwing up. We may need to find some way to kill off G3 earlier, if we want to save the dominions.
 

birdboy2000

Banned
How, precisely, do you propose that the British North American revolutionaries will succeed without the help of a mutiny and revolution by the British revolutionaries in Britain? Without the Napoleonic wars the Tory state had a perfect competence to raise money and men and fight and win. It took a trans-oceanic revolution to topple Torydom in the British dominions.

For further help, look at the ideology of the "American" revolutionaries: no charter of the rights of man, no position against enclosure, pro-slavery, pro-sugar, pro-rum. Most of them were Tory Grandees in miniature and displeased by their poor standing vis-a-vis the London.

For further details, look at the role of the Boston Mob in the first revolution in North America, about the only truly democratic institution before the charter of the rights of man and the charter against enclosure.

yours,
Sam R.

I think you're underestimating the American revolutionaries.

Enclosure frankly wasn't an American issue in 1775 - there was still enough unsettled land that trying to force workers into cities wasn't even mooted by the American aristocracy of the time. And many of the revolutionary "constitutions" incorporated human rights provisions - if there wasn't one for the whole of the rebellion it's because they didn't have a prayer of agreeing on what rights to include, for fear of implicitly excluding others. This was the age of the American Enlightenment, and a lot of the ideas flowing then inspired the second.

Slaves were freed in much of the colonies - manumission took a huge upswing in the period, and some rebel groups in New England mooted outright abolition, although it's true that the need to keep the south on board forestalled any truly radical measures. And that's where you have a point - New England, Nova Scotia, the Mid-Atlantic, and the South (including the Bahamas, but not Jamaica) all wanted independence, but had too disparate interests to stay united long past that point, and I shudder to think of the sort of polity the slave owners would set up once they get their independence, or the sort of deals needed to win their loyalty to a continental federation.
 
I think you're underestimating the American revolutionaries.

OOC: Great post. The IC section below is not a reflection on your quality contribution, but rather an expression of how the 2nd revolution would change the popular imaginary of the 1st revolution. And it is written from a popular, polemic, unscholarly position. I certainly don't believe revolutions can be judged as failures, or even judged but...


IC:

And you're trying to judge it like the first British revolution in the 17th century, like it was some kind of pre-modern revolution where we ought to have waited for a liberal[!!] aristocracy to save us from ourselves. Their ideas of the rights of man were more like the rights of the church, or rather, the rights of a nobility of ensure the king has a religion of their choice. 1774 was so damn close to being the first modern revolution that we ought to be judging its failures against modernity, not against freedom of aristocrats to ensure their own religion against The Crown's religion. The only innovation of 1774 was to realise that The Crown wasn't the person of the King but the constitutional function.

In every other way 1814 is vastly superior: it solved the Charlestown and Barbados problem. It ensured the British freedoms for ordinary people, instead of making a New British Crown in America to abuse the Americans Americanly. I know there's a habit of talking about the states over there as if they're American, but they're British, they're just differently British to the states over here. More glorious than the excesses of the French.

yours,
Sam R.
 
Well, I assume the British would be able to lend a lot more assistance to the continental powers trying to take down Napoleon.

And the French expedition that managed to land in Sussex would have been even less successful than IOTL. I mean, burning a few farm buildings before being pushed back into the sea isn't exactly a smashing victory, but without so much of the RN trying to suppress the Colonial Rebellion, Bonaparte's fleet would never have even set eyes on English coastline.
 
It's been argued that the resulting nation would have had a weak, by design, federal government with very limited powers. It would have been totally dependent upon the states for taxation among other things. It's also been suggested that it would have been a government of, by and for wealthy land owners. How long before such a system would require a complete revamp? What would prevent the individual states from turning on each other?

Then there is the question of slavery. With slave holders having their hands upon the levers of power and the Abolitionist movement happening along the lines of OTL the result could be a real bloodbath.
 
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