It's late and I'm running out of steam, but I thought maybe if I blogged a book tonight, it would keep me going. So unless you are a big history buff, or a glutton for punishment, don't feel obligated to read further.

A couple points to start with--unless you have studied with me in the past, you may not know this, but I have these wooksheets that I made up for myself that I always use to take notes on the books as I study, and I'm going to follow the same format here that I've laid out in my standard worksheet. If you are a budding historian like myself, I recommend developing a set of questions to ask about all your books to keep yourself focused on what's important.

I'll update this gradually as I work, so if there's a gap, it will be filled in eventually. Also, Obviously this is not one of the books I listed for tonight. I didn't end up studying in the library, so I had to work from books I already had on hand.

So without further ado....

Citation: Pauline Maier, From Resistence to Revolution: Colonial Radicals and the Development of American Opposition to Britain, 1765-1776 (NY: Norton, 1972).

Thesis: The movement against Britain was decentralized (xviii), but the American radicals had a deep concern for order--they organized resistence partly to contain disorder. Thus, this type of resistence produced not only a break from Britain, but also a foundation for republican government based on popular self-rule mediated by social compacts (xxi).  

Theoretical Framework: American resistence was shaped by "Real Whig" ideology, which was widely known and recognized at all levels of the social and economic spectrum.

Methodology:

Sources: Personal papers, public statements, newspapers and pamphlets,

What Engine Drives the Book: Maier is driven to reframe the Revolution as a product of a "rational and compelling" interpretation of English social and political tradition, and debunk the theory that the Revolution was somehow an opportunistic rejection of contemporary ideology.

Place in Historiography: Maier was a Student of Bernard Bailyn at a time when Bailyn was developing a rebuttal to the "Progressive" interpretation of the Revolution: that the rhetoric of the era was nothing more than a tool for waging a class-based power-struggle between wealthy conservatives and poor radicals (see Charles Beard and others). Maier wants to show more consensus amoung the Americans, which she attributes to shared cultural and political values based on an English tradition of Whig ideology.

Key Points:

Strengths:

Weaknesses:

Chapter Summaries: