Birth_of_the_Republic

Authors Point of View The book that I am analyzing in this report is The Birth of the Republic, by Edmund S. Morgan. This book was written to explain the events that led to the American Revolution, and ultimately the signing of the Constitution. The author spends a great amount of time emphasizing detail. He starts the book by describing the state of the colonies as a "quarrelsome, litigious, divisive lot" . This is important to understand, because it describes how the colonies are already restless and how the first tax imposed on them began their anger towards the British. The author then explains how, after many taxes and laws passed by Britain, the colonies start the revolution at Lexington Green . This books strongest quality is again, it's great amount of detail. The author then goes on to explain the Revolutionary war in its entirety, all the way to the end with the signing of peace in Paris in 1781. He continues on to then describe the constitional convention, and finally the ratification of the constitution to the United States of America. All of this is important to understand, because it created our country, and was the foundation for many other important world events. An example of the authors detail is when he describes the choices of the colonists, for either their rights or their king . He describes King George III as "playing the only role a responsible monarch could play" , describing The king after he had declared the colonies in rebellion. Based on how the author has approached the perspective of the War, I believe he has written this book to inform people on the history of The American Revolution from a pro-revolutionist's point of view. The way he writes in very descriptive detail, and his descriptions of multiple causes of the Revolution shows me that he wants to make it clear on how and why the Revolution started. I found a clear indicator of this in the way he described the nullification of the stamp act , how the Americans felt most strongly the danger to their liberties from Parliamentary taxation , excreta. All together these combine to tell the story of the Birth of our country. New Incites Reading this book I was surprised to find out how much there was to the American Revolution. One of the first things that I have learned from this book, is how the colonies felt about each other. In the very beginning of the book, it tells about how East Connecticut disliked West Connecticut , Newport Rhode Island was at odds with Providence , while the rest of New England looked upon Rohde Island with undisguised contempt . I also learned that there was a civil war in 1771 between western and eastern North Carolina . It was also observed by James Otis in 1765 that "were these colonies left to themselves tomorrow, America would be in a shambles of blood and confusion" I found this very startling that in 20 years the colonies were able to pull themselves together, unify, and fight a war for Independence together. I learned that in 1772, the British navy sent a schooner called the "Gaspee" to patrol the shores of Narragansett Bay in Rhode Island. It was harassing small row boats and supply ships, and the crew was sent ashore to raid colonists farms. This set Rhode Island to a low boiling point and when the ship ran ashore one night, a merchant named John Brown lead men from the nearby town and burned the ship on the water's edge . I learned that money and supplies came from not only France but also from Spain. Spain, also entered the war against Britain in the month of June 1779 . Although they sympathized with the colonies, Spain decided to enter the war as an ally to France so her colonies wouldn't think about rebelling. After the war, I read that a few people in the colonial elite thought everything was over and that they would just rebuild schools, business companies, law courts, churches, and towns . When it came down to come up with a constitution, many colonist liked the British constitution .Other general concerns and ideas of some colonists was to have a written constitution as the first line of defense against a tyrant, which had a bill of rights to guarantee certain liberties. It was also an element of importance for the people to directly or indirectly elect a leader, and not have any kind of hereditary right, king, and no house of lords. The time in which the country was run by the Articles of Confederation was called "The Critical Period" . In 1786 the first Constitutional Convention was held in Annapolis Maryland. Not much is known about what went on, but it was made known that many delegates there wanted to overhaul the Articles of Confederation. This was not accomplished because delegates from only 5 states showed up. It was decided to sent invitations to every state for a more formal convention in Philadelphia in May of 1787 , which is known as the second constitutional congress. It took over a year for a compromise to be worked out, and the constitution was finally ready by 1788. Literary Criticism Vocabulary- Personally I found the vocabulary in this book to be very easy. I was surprised that it didn't contain an excessive amount of language written in the vernacular of the time. There were however a few words that had native American names that were hard to figure out as well as a few foreign French names seemed impossible to read. Length- This book was of moderate length. This worked to its advantage because if it was any shorter then it wouldn't be as descriptive and informative. If the book was any longer, it would have been too boring and to detailed. Style- The style this book was written in was very descriptive. It was informative and contained many details. These details were pretty interesting, once or twice they even contain a line or two of humor. But, the book was a little boring and could have been spiced up with more detail on battles or something exciting. Prejudiced- This book was written with a slight prejudice. It was mainly written looking at the Revolution through the eyes of a colonist so it made Britain look like the bad guy. I don't think that this influenced the story all too much because it was based mainly on details.