james otis (1725–1783) · i. background homework ask students to read handout a—james otis...

Founders and the Constitution: In Their Own Words—Volume 2

James Otis(1725–1783)

One of the most essential branches ofEnglish liberty is the freedom of one’shouse. A man’s house is his castle.

—James Otis, 1774

IntroductionHe was called the most important American of the 1760s by no less an authority than JohnAdams. A trained lawyer and master of argument, James Otis was a leader of the Patriotmovement in Boston in those years. Initially a prosecutor for the British authorities, Otischanged sides in 1761, when he argued against writs of assistance (broad search warrantsthat British officials employed to search the homes and businesses of colonists). During the1760s, Otis led the intellectual attack against British tyranny, composing ringing defenses ofliberty that won Americans to the revolutionary cause and helped to inspire the well-knownslogan, “No taxation without representation.”

Otis was also one of the first well-known Americans to defend the natural rights ofAfricans and to condemn slavery. In doing so, he demonstrated his intellectual honesty andconsistency, as well as his personal bravery. John Adams and many others were alarmed byhis arguments about race, though Adams knew that they could not be refuted.

Already an eccentric, high-strung and unsteady man, Otis suffered brain damage whena British official whom Otis had singled out for criticism in a newspaper essay attacked himin 1769. The assault incapacitated Otis and ended his public career. His contributions to theAmerican resistance movement were largely forgotten, not only by his contemporaries butalso by later generations.

Relevant Thematic Essay for James Otis• Liberty

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In His Own Words:James Otis

ON NATURAL RIGHTS

James Otis

Standards

CCE (9–12): IA1, IA3, IIA1, IIA2, IIIB1NCHS (5–12): Era III, Standards 3A, 3BNCSS: Strands 2, 5, 6, and 10

MaterialsStudent Handouts

• Handout A—James Otis(1725–1783)

• Handout B—Vocabulary andContext Questions

• Handout C—In His Own Words:James Otis on Natural Rights

• Handout D—Analysis: James Otisand John Locke’s Theory ofNatural Rights

Additional Teacher Resource

• Answer Key

Recommended Time

One 45-minute class period.Additional time as needed forhomework.

OverviewIn this lesson, students will learn about James Otis. Theyshould first read as homework Handout A—James Otis(1725–1783) and answer the Reading ComprehensionQuestions. After discussing the answers to those in class,the teacher should have students answer the CriticalThinking Questions as a class. Next, the teacher shouldintroduce the primary source activity, Handout C—InHis Own Words: James Otis on Natural Rights, inwhich Otis argues that all people are by nature freeborn.As a preface, there is Handout B—Vocabulary andContext Questions, which will help students understandthe document. Next, students will complete Handout D—Analysis: James Otis and John Locke’s Theory ofNatural Rights in which students analyze how Otis wasinfluenced by natural rights theory.

There are Follow-Up Homework Options that askstudents to write their own “Rights of Students Assertedand Proved” or to examine the ways Otis’s statementsforesaw the principle of the Tenth Amendment to theConstitution. Extensions asks students to compare Otis’sessay to Samuel Adams’s The Rights of the Colonists.

ObjectivesStudents will:

• explain the concept of inalienable rights.• explain colonists’ objections to writs of assistance.• understand James Otis’s opinion of slavery.• analyze statements of natural rights.• appreciate James Otis’s contributions to the

revolutionary period.


I. Background HomeworkAsk students to read Handout A—James Otis (1725–1783) and answer the ReadingComprehension Questions.

II. Warm-Up [10 minutes]A. Review answers to homework questions.B. Conduct a whole-class discussion to answer the Critical Thinking Questions.C. Ask a student to summarize the historical significance of James Otis.

James Otis was a Patriot leader in Boston. He argued against British use of writs ofassistance and wrote essays and pamphlets criticizing British tyranny. He also defendedthe natural rights of Africans and condemned slavery. His assault by a British customsofficial ended his public career.

III. Context [5 minutes]Explain to the students that the Founders were strongly influenced by the concept ofnatural rights. Natural rights theory was central to the United States model of limitedgovernment and individual liberty. Otis based many of the arguments in his essay, TheRights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved, 1764, on natural rights theory. Naturalrights theory holds that all humans are born free and independent, and that rights suchas life, liberty, and property are inalienable. John Locke, an English philosopher, explorednatural rights theory in his work Second Treatise of Civil Government.

IV. In His Own Words [20 minutes]A. Divide students into pairs and brainstorm a list of five rights they believe are

“inalienable,” or which can never rightfully be taken away by anyone without due process.

B. Ask pairs to share their lists of rights, and record answers on the board or overhead.

Students may cite rights to their own life, the right to express themselves, to controltheir possessions, to move about or travel freely, to worship freely, to choose and spendtime with their friends, or other similar rights.

C. Ask the class, “Where do these rights come from? Are you born with these rights?Does government give them to you?” Allow large group class discussion. Helpstudents understand the distinction between natural rights (which are not grantedby the government) and other political and social rights.

D. Ask student pairs to explain, in two or three sentences, whether they believe theyexchange some of their natural rights for the benefits of living in a society withothers. After everyone has explained their response, write an agreed upon summaryon the board or overhead.

Some students may say that living in a society means giving up some individualliberty or property for the common good; others may say that no free society requiresindividuals to give up their rights.

E. Distribute Handout B—Vocabulary and Context Questions and Handout C—InHis Own Words: James Otis on Natural Rights. Have students read Handout Cand complete Handout B with their partner.

LESSON PLAN



F. Distribute Handout D: Analysis—James Otis and John Locke’s Theory ofNatural Rights and have students read the excerpts from John Locke’s SecondTreatise of Civil Government and follow the directions.

G. When all have finished, ask one pair of students to share their response for the firstparagraphs, and write their sentences on the board or overhead. Continue forremaining paragraphs 2–4.

V. Wrap-Up Discussion [10 minutes]Ask students if they agree with Otis and Locke that people are born with inalienablerights. Conduct a large group discussion to answer the question: What happens whenone person’s rights conflict with someone else’s? Ask students to consider examplessuch as: bans on public smoking, school dress codes, or speed limits. Do citizens havean inalienable right to smoke? To dress any way they want? To speed? If so, shouldcitizens surrender these rights for the good of society?

Students may say that everyone can exercise their rights only as long as they do not infringe onanyone else’s rights. Society is challenged by balancing everyone’s right to liberty as evidenced bythe three examples: Some governments ban public smoking because of the health risk to others;students’ right to express themselves through dress cannot infringe on others’ rights to a goodlearning environment; people have the right to mobility but not to drive in an unsafe manner.

VI. Follow-Up Homework OptionsA. Have students write a four-paragraph essay entitled The Rights of Students Asserted

and Proved. Have them explain and justify their choice of four inalienable rightsof students at their school.

B. Have students examine the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution. In anotherdocument, Otis states, “A supreme legislative and supreme executive power, must beplaced somewhere in every commonwealth: Where there is no other positive provisionor compact to the contract, those powers remain in the whole body of the people.”How did this idea foresee the principle articulated in the Tenth Amendment?

VII. ExtensionsHave students write a one-page comparison of Otis’s essay The Rights of the BritishColonies Asserted and Proved (1764) to Samuel Adams’s The Rights of the Colonists(1772). Essays should answer the questions: Whose argument is more radical? How didOtis’s argument provide a foundation for Adams’s essay? In what ways did Adamsretreat from Otis’s arguments?

Sources:“The Rights of the Colonists: Samuel Adams.” Constitution Society.

<http://www.constitution.org/bcp/right_col.htm>.“The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved.” TeachingAmericanHistory.org.

<http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?documentprint=267>.

James Otis

LESSON PLAN


Resources

PrintGalvin, John R. Three Men of Boston. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Co., 1976.Kernstein, Daniel J. “James Otis and Writs of Assistance.” New York Law Journal, 1 Aug. 1984: 2.Maier, Pauline. From Resistance to Revolution: Colonial Radicals and the Development of American Opposition

to Britain, 1765–1776. New York: Random House, 1972.Smith, Maurice Henry. The Writs of Assistance Case. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978.Waters, John J. Jr. The Otis Family in Provincial and Revolutionary Massachusetts. Chapel Hill: University of

North Carolina Press, 1968.

Internet“James Otis, 1725–1783.” USHistory.com. <http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1204.html>.“James Otis. Against the Writs of Assistance.” The Constitution Society. <http://www.constitution.org/

bor/otis_against_writs.htm>.“James Otis, The Pre-Revolutionist.” World Wide School Library. <http://www.worldwideschool.org/

library/books/hst/biography/JamesOtisThePre-Revolutionist/toc.html>.“James Otis. The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved.” TeachingAmericanHistory.org.

<http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=267>.

Selected Works by James Otis• Against the Writs of Assistance (1761)• The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved (1764)• Considerations on Behalf of the Colonists (1765)

LESSON PLAN



I will to my dying day oppose, with all the powers and faculties God has given me, all such instruments of slavery on the one hand, and villainy on the other,

as this writ of assistance is.

—James Otis, 1761

James Otis strode confidently into the Boston coffee house on thisafternoon of 1769. An anti-British activist, Otis was a hero to manyAmericans in the city. He had won praise years before for hisdenunciation of writs of assistance (broad search warrants that Britishofficials used to search the homes and businesses of colonists). Otishad argued that the writs violated the natural and English rights ofAmericans. He continued to harshly criticize the British for acts oftyranny throughout the 1760s. But Otis’s bold speeches and cuttingessays had made him powerful enemies among the British officials of thecolony. Several such people were in the coffee house this day, and they eyedOtis angrily as he sat down at a table with several Patriot allies.

One of the British officials suddenly got up from a nearby table and approachedOtis, raising his cane in the air. Otis recognized him as a man he had attacked by namein a newspaper essay. Before he could react, the official brought the cane down uponOtis’s head, knocking him to the floor. Otis was struck several more times before hisfriends could react and restrain the enraged official. Mayhem ensued in the coffee house,as a fight broke out between Patriots and British officials. During the brawl, Otis layunconscious on the floor, blood spilling from his head. The attack would end not onlyOtis’s public career, but also his chance to be remembered among the foremost heroesof the American independence movement.

BackgroundJames Otis was born on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, on February 5, 1725. He was the firstof thirteen children. One of his sisters, Mercy, would become famous as a champion ofthe Patriot cause and as the author of a history of the American Revolution. Otis’s fatherwas a prominent Massachusetts politician. Young Otis attended Harvard College,graduating in 1743. He began the study of the law shortly afterward and was admittedto the bar in 1747.

In 1750, Otis moved to Boston, where he established a successful law practice. Sixyears later, the royal governor of Massachusetts appointed him an advocate general inthe Vice Admiralty Court. Decisions were rendered by appointed royal judges, not bycitizen juries. This generated resentment among Americans. Many cases heard by theadmiralty courts involved smuggling, a common activity among American merchantsseeking to skirt British taxes and restrictions.

In 1751, the British Parliament approved a new tool to aid customs officials in stoppingsmuggling: writs of assistance. Writs of assistance were search warrants that gave customsofficials broad authority to inspect ships, warehouses, and even private homes. Officialsdid not have to present evidence to a judge before a search was conducted. They also didnot have to specify what they were looking for. Writs of assistance soon became one ofthe chief complaints of the colonists against the British government.

James Otis

JAMES OTIS (1725–1783)

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The Writs of Assistance CaseOtis was troubled by the broad authority granted inspectors by the writs. When hisfather was passed over for the job of Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Superior Court,Otis decided to turn against the British authorities. In 1761, he resigned his post andallied himself with Boston merchants who were mounting a legal challenge to therenewal of the writs by the new king, George III.

In a five-hour-long speech to the court, Otis referred to traditional English rights incondemning the writs. “Now one of the most essential branches of English liberty is thefreedom of one’s house,” Otis told the court. “A man’s house is his castle; and whilst heis quiet, he is as well guarded as a prince in his castle. This writ, if it should be declaredlegal, would totally annihilate this privilege.”

Otis also made a more radical argument, citing natural law to condemn the writs.He asserted that every man possessed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and property,which could not rightfully be taken away by anyone without consent or due process.Taking this argument to its logical conclusion, Otis condemned slavery as a violation ofthe rights of the enslaved. John Adams, who observed the speech, would later claim thatOtis’s speech marked the start of the American Revolution.

The Rights of the British ColoniesOtis lost the case, and the writs of assistance were renewed. But Otis became a hero amongAmericans, who were emboldened to challenge the use of writs by customs officials. Otiswas elected to the Massachusetts legislature in 1762. The following year, the French andIndian War came to an end. The British government announced that it would attemptto raise revenues from the American colonies to help pay for their defense.

Otis took the lead in opposing British efforts to tax the colonies. He soon became anally of Samuel Adams and John Hancock, two of the leaders of the Patriot movement inBoston. Otis headed the Massachusetts Committee of Correspondence, which distributedinformation and criticized British policies toward colonists. He gave speeches and wroteessays in defense of American liberty.

In 1764, Otis published The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved. In thispamphlet, Otis argued that the British government had no right to tax the coloniesbecause they were not represented in Parliament. Otis argued that British taxation of theAmerican colonies “is absolutely irreconcilable with the rights of the colonists as Britishsubjects and as men.” Otis again championed the natural rights of Africans. “Thecolonists are by the law of nature freeborn,” he asserted, “as indeed all men are, white orblack.” Otis condemned slavery as “the most shocking violation of the law of nature” anddeclared that it “makes every dealer in it a tyrant.”

Madness and DeathOtis played a leading role in the Stamp Act Congress of 1765. In 1767, he and SamuelAdams wrote a circular letter to the other colonies, coordinating resistance to theTownshend Duties. Otis also continued to write newspaper essays about the tyranny ofBritish officials.

Otis’s boldness in asserting the rights of American colonists made him many enemies.When he was elected speaker of the Massachusetts General Court in 1766, the governorvetoed the decision. Three years later, Otis was physically attacked in a Boston coffee


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house by a customs official whom Otis had criticized in the Boston Gazette. The officialbeat Otis’s head with a cane, fracturing his skull and causing permanent brain damage.

For the remaining fourteen years of his life, Otis suffered from periodic insanity.He had always been an eccentric man, nervous and volatile. But he was now unfit toparticipate in public life on a regular basis. In his last years, Otis often wandered thestreets of Boston, talking to himself and ranting aloud to no one in particular. In May1783, he was struck and killed by lightning. A central American figure of the period1760–1770 faded into obscurity.

James Otis

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Reading Comprehension Questions

1. What were writs of assistance? What was their significance in the conflictbetween the British government and the American colonists?

2. What arguments did Otis use to defend the rights of Americans duringthe 1760s?

3. What was Otis’s opinion of slavery?

Critical Thinking Questions

4. John Adams called Otis “the most conspicuous, the most ardent, and influential”American in the period 1760–1766. How can Adams’s assessment be justified?

5. Discuss three ways James Otis acted courageously as a Patriot leader.


Excerpts from The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved, 1764

1. Vocabulary: Use context clues to determine the meaning or significance of each ofthese words and write their definitions:

a. tranquility

b. prosperity

c. brethren

d. body politic

e. inestimable

f. chapman

g. barter

h. renounced

2. Context: Answer the following questions.

a. Who wrote this document?

b. When was this document written?

c. What type of document is this?

d. Why was this document written?


VOCABULARY AND CONTEXT QUESTIONS

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Excerpts from The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved, 1764

Directions: Read the excerpts from Otis’s essay, and then follow the directions onHandout D.

1. The end of government being the good of mankind points out its great duties: it isabove all things to provide for the security, the quiet, and happy enjoyment of life,liberty, and property. There is no one act which a government can have a right tomake that does not tend to the advancement of the security, tranquility, andprosperity of the people. . . .

2. The colonists, being men, have a right to be considered as equally entitled to allthe rights of nature with the Europeans, and they are not to be restrained in theexercise of any of these rights but for the evident good of the whole community. . . .

3. The colonists are by the law of nature freeborn, as indeed all men are, white orblack. . . . Nothing better can be said in favor of [the slave] trade that is the mostshocking violation of the law of nature, has a direct tendency to diminish the ideaof the inestimable value of liberty, and makes every dealer in it a tyrant, from thedirector of an African company to the petty chapman in needles and pins on theunhappy coast. It is a clear truth that those who every day barter away other men’sliberty will soon care little for their own. . . .

4. By being or becoming members of society they have not renounced their naturalliberty in any greater degree than other good citizens, and if ’tis taken from themwithout their consent they are so far enslaved. . . . Now can there be any libertywhere property is taken away without consent? . . . There can be no prescriptionold enough to supersede the law of nature, and the grant of God almighty; whohas given to all men a natural right to be free. . . .

Source: “The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved.” The Founders’ Constitution.<http://presspubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/v1ch2s5.html>.

James Otis

IN HIS OWN WORDS: JAMES OTIS ON NATURAL RIGHTS

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Excerpts from John Locke’s Second Treatise of Civil Government (1690)

Directions: After reading the excerpts from James Otis’s The Rights of the British ColoniesAsserted and Proved (1764) on Handout C and excerpts from John Locke’s SecondTreatise of Civil Government (1690) below, write a sentence summarizing the main ideasof each paragraph. Then, write a sentence explaining how Otis was influenced by thenatural rights theory of John Locke.

1. Men [are] by nature all free, equal, and independent. No one can be put out of thisestate and subjected to the political power of another without his own consent,which is done by agreeing with other men, to join and unite into a community fortheir comfortable, safe, and peaceable living, one amongst another, in a secureenjoyment of their properties, and a greater security. . . .

2. But though men when they enter into society give up the equality, liberty, and . . .power they had in the state of Nature into the hands of the society . . . yet it [isfor] the better to preserve himself, his liberty and property. . . . And all this to bedirected to no other end but the peace, safety, and public good of the people.

3. [Men are in] a state . . . of equality . . . and there cannot be supposed any suchsubordination among us that may authorize us to destroy one another, as if wewere made for one another’s uses, as the inferior ranks of creatures are for ours.

4. [Men] join in society with others who are already united, or have a mind to unitefor the mutual preservation of their lives, liberties, and estates, which I call by thegeneral name—property. . . . The great and chief end, therefore, of men . . . puttingthemselves under government, is the preservation of their property.

Source: “Second Treatise of Civil Government.” The Constitution Society.<http://www.constitution.org/jl/2ndtreat.htm>.

Paragraphs 1:

Otis’s Main Idea:

Locke’s Main Idea:

How was Otis influenced by natural rights theory?


ANALYSIS: JAMES OTIS AND JOHN LOCKE’STHEORY OF NATURAL RIGHTS

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Paragraphs 2:

Otis’s Main Idea:



Paragraphs 3:

Otis’s Main Idea:



Paragraphs 4:

Otis’s Main Idea:



James Otis

ANALYSIS: JAMES OTIS AND JOHN LOCKE’STHEORY OF NATURAL RIGHTS

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Liberty was the central political principle of theAmerican Revolution. As Patrick Henry, one of itsstaunchest supporters, famously intoned, “Give meliberty or give me death.” Henry was not alone in his rhetorical fervor. Indeed, no ideal wasproclaimed more often in the eighteenth-centuryAnglo-American world than liberty.

The idea of liberty defendedby the American Founders camefrom several sources. The mostvenerable was English commonlaw. Beginning in the latemedieval period, writers in thecommon law tradition developedan understanding of libertywhich held that English subjectswere free because they livedunder a system of laws whicheven the Crown was bound torespect. Leading English juristsargued that these legal limits onroyal power protected thesubject’s liberty by limiting the arbitrary use ofpolitical power.

Under English common law, liberty alsoconsisted in the subject enjoying certain fundamentalrights to life, liberty and property. William Blackstone(1723–1780), the leading common lawyer of theeighteenth century, argued that these rights allowedan English subject to be the “entire master of hisown conduct, except in those points wherein thepublic good requires some direction or restraint . . .”For Blackstone, these English rights further protectedthe subjects’ liberty by making them secure in theirpersons from arbitrary search and seizure, and byensuring that their property could not be takenfrom them without due process of law.

In order to preserve these fundamental rights,the English common law allowed the subject theright to consent to the laws that bound him byelecting representatives to Parliament whose consentthe monarch had to obtain before acting.

Common lawyers in the seventeenth andeighteenth centuries did not view these rights andthe liberty they protected as the gift or grant of themonarch; rather, they believed that they were anEnglishmen’s “birthright,” something that inheredin each subject and that therefore could not betaken away by royal prerogative.

This common law understanding of libertywas central to the seventeenth-century strugglesagainst the Stuart monarchy. Prominent jurists andParliamentarians such as Edward Coke (1552–1634)took the lead in the attempt to limit what they sawas the illegal and arbitrary nature of the Stuarts’ rule.This struggle culminated in the Glorious Revolution

of 1689 and the triumph ofParliamentary authority over theCrown. For champions of Englishliberty, the result of this century-long struggle was the achievementof political liberty. They furtherargued that, as a result of thisstruggle, Britain in the eighteenthcentury had the freest constitutionin the world. According to theFrench writer Montesquieu(1689–1755), Britain was “theonly nation in the world, wherepolitical and civil liberty” was “thedirect end of the constitution.”

This seventeenth century struggle betweenroyal power and the subject’s liberties made a greatimpression on the American Founders. Theyabsorbed its lessons about the nature and importanceof liberty through their reading of English historyas well as through their instruction in English law.

A second and equally influential understandingof liberty was also forged in the constitutionalbattles of the seventeenth century: the idea thatliberty was a natural right pertaining to all. Theforemost exponent of this understanding of libertyin the English-speaking world was John Locke(1632–1704). Locke’s political ideas were part of awider European political and legal movement whichargued that there were certain rights that all menwere entitled to irrespective of social class or creed.

Like the common lawyers, Locke saw liberty ascentrally about the enjoyment of certain rights.However, he universalized the older Englishunderstanding of liberty, arguing that it applied toall persons, and not just to English subjects. Lockealso expanded the contemporary understanding ofliberty by arguing that it included other rights—in particular a right to religious toleration (orliberty of conscience), as well as a right to resistgovernments that violated liberty. In addition,Locke argued that the traditional English common

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law right to property was also a natural right, andwas an important part of the subject’s liberty.

Locke began his political theory by arguing thatliberty was the natural state of mankind. Accordingto Locke, all men are “naturally” in a “State ofperfect Freedom to order” their “Actions, anddispose of their Possessions, and Persons as theythink fit, within the bounds of the Law of Nature,without asking leave, or depending upon the Willof any other Man.”

However, Locke did not argue that this naturalliberty was a license to do whatever we want.“Freedom is not,” he argued,“A Liberty for every Man todo what he lists (For whocould be free, when everyother Man’s humour mightdomineer over him?).”Rather, Locke held that sinceall men are “equal andindependent, no one oughtto harm another in his Life, health, Liberty, orPossessions.” According to Locke, each of us has“an uncontroulable Liberty to dispose of ourpersons and possession,” but we do not have theright to interfere with the equal liberty of others todo the same.

In Locke’s political theory, men enter intosociety and form governments to better preservethis natural liberty. When they do so, they create apolitical system where the natural law limits onliberty in the state of nature are translated into alegal regime of rights. In such a system, Lockeargued, each person retains his “Liberty to dispose,and order, as he lists, his Person, Actions,Possession, and his whole Property, within theAllowance of those Laws under which he is; andtherein not to be subject to the arbitrary Will ofanother, but freely follow his own.”

For Locke, as for the common lawyers, the ruleof law was necessary for liberty. In Locke’s view,“the end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but topreserve and enlarge Freedom.” According to Locke,“Where there is no Law, there is no Freedom. ForLiberty is to be free from restraint and violence fromothers which cannot be, where there is no law.”

Building on both the English common law andon Locke’s ideas, the eighteenth-century Englishwriter Cato argued “that liberty is the unalienableright of mankind.” It is “the power which everyMan has over his own Actions, and his Right toenjoy the Fruit of his Labour, Art, and Industry, asfar as by it he hurts not the Society, or anymembers of it, by taking from any Member or by

hindering him from enjoying what he himselfenjoys.” Cato was the pseudonym for two Britishwriters, John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon.Their co-authored Cato’s Letters (1720–1723) werewidely read in the American colonies.

On the eve of the American Revolution, then,the received understanding of liberty in the Anglo-American world was a powerful amalgam of boththe English common law and the liberal ideas ofwriters like Locke and Cato. On this view, libertymeant being able to act freely, secure in your basicrights, unhindered by the coercive actions of others,

and subject only to thelimitation of such laws as youhave consented to. Central tothis idea of liberty was theright to hold property and tohave it secure from arbitraryseizure. In addition, under theinfluence of Locke, liberty wasincreasingly being seen on

both sides of the Atlantic as a universal right, onenot limited to English subjects. Equally influentialwas Locke’s argument that if a government violatedits citizens’ liberty the people could resist thegovernment’s edicts and create a new politicalauthority. However, despite the gains that had beenmade since the seventeenth century, manyEnglishmen in the eighteenth century still worriedthat liberty was fragile and would always beendangered by the ambitions of powerful men.

Since the first settlements were established in the early seventeenth century, the Americancolonists shared in this English understanding ofliberty. In particular, they believed that they hadtaken their English rights with them when theycrossed the Atlantic. It was on the basis of theserights that they made a case for their freedom ascolonists under the Crown. In addition, in theeighteenth century, the colonists were increasinglyinfluenced by the Lockean idea that liberty was anatural right. As a result, when they were confrontedwith the policies of the British Crown and Parliamentin the 1760s and 1770s to tax and legislate for themwithout their consent, the colonists viewed them asan attack on their liberty.

In response, the colonists argued that theseBritish taxes and regulations were illegal because theyviolated fundamental rights. They were particularlyresistant to the claims of the British Parliament, asexpressed in the Declaratory Act of 1766, to legislatefor the colonies “in all cases whatsoever.” By 1774,following the Boston Tea Party organized by SamuelAdams and John Hancock, and the subsequent


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No ideal was proclaimed more often in the eighteenth-century

Anglo-American world than liberty.


Coercive Acts, many leading colonists such asThomas Paine and James Otis argued that they hada natural right to govern themselves, and that sucha right was the only protection for their liberty. Inaddition to several essays in defense of rights,including Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania,John Dickinson wrote the first patriotic song, “TheLiberty Song.”

This colonial thinking about liberty and rightsculminated in the Declaration of Independenceissued by the Continental Congress in 1776, whichproclaimed that, because their liberty wasendangered, the colonists had a natural right toresist the English King and Parliament.

Having made a revolution in the name of liberty,the American challenge was to create a form ofgovernment that preserved liberty better than thevaunted British constitution had done. In doing so,the founders turned to the ancient ideal of republicanself-government, arguing that it alone could preservethe people’s liberty. They further argued that themodern understanding of liberty as the possession ofrights needed to be a central part of any properrepublican government. Beginning in 1776, in themidst of the Revolutionary War, all of the formercolonies began to construct republican governmentswhich rested on the people’s consent and whichincluded bills of rights to protect the people’s liberty.

Since there was widespread consensus amongthe Founders that liberty required the protection ofrights and the rule of law, much of the politicaldebate in the crucial decades following the AmericanRevolution revolved around the question of whichinstitutional arrangements best supported liberty.Was liberty best protected by strong stategovernments jealously guarding the people’s libertiesfrom excessive federal authority, as leading Anti-Federalists like George Mason contended; or, wasan extended federal republic best able to preservethe freedom of all, as leading Federalists like JamesMadison and Alexander Hamilton argued?

The era of the American Revolution also gavebirth to a further series of important debates aboutliberty. Was slavery, as some Americans in theeighteenth century were beginning to recognize, anunjust infringement upon the liberty of AfricanAmericans? Were women, long deprived of basiclegal rights, also entitled to have equal liberty withtheir male fellow citizens? By making a Revolutionin its name, the Founders ensured that debatesabout the nature and extent of liberty wouldremain at the center of the American experimentin self-government.

Craig Yirush, Ph.D.University of California, Los Angeles

Liberty

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Suggestions for Further ReadingBailyn, Bernard. The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1967.Kammen, Michael. Spheres of Liberty: Changing Perceptions of Liberty in American Culture. Madison:

University of Wisconsin Press, 1986.Reid, John Phillip. The Concept of Liberty in the Age of the American Revolution. Chicago: University of

Chicago Press, 1988.Skinner, Quentin. Liberty Before Liberalism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.Wood, Gordon. The Creation of the American Republic, 1776–1787. Chapel Hill: University of North

Carolina Press, 1969.


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In 1760, what was to become the United States ofAmerica consisted of a small group of coloniesstrung out along the eastern seaboard of NorthAmerica. Although they had experienced significanteconomic and demographic growth in theeighteenth century and had just helped Britaindefeat France and take control of most of NorthAmerica, they remained politically and economicallydependent upon London. Yet, in the next twenty-five years, they would challenge the political controlof Britain, declare independence, wage a bloody war,and lay the foundations fora trans-continental, federalrepublican state. In thesecrucial years, the colonieswould be led by a newgeneration of politicians,men who combinedpractical political skillswith a firm grasp ofpolitical ideas. In order to better understand theseextraordinary events, the Founders who madethem possible, and the new Constitution that theycreated, it is necessary first to understand thepolitical ideas that influenced colonial Americansin the crucial years before the Revolution.

The Common Law and the Rightsof EnglishmenThe political theory of the American colonists inthe seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was deeplyinfluenced by English common law and its idea ofrights. In a guide for religious dissenters written inthe late seventeenth century, William Penn, thefounder of Pennsylvania, offered one the bestcontemporary summaries of this common-lawview of rights. According to Penn, all Englishmenhad three central rights or privileges by commonlaw: those of life, liberty, and property. For Penn,these English rights meant that every subject was“to be freed in Person & Estate from ArbitraryViolence and Oppression.” In the widely usedlanguage of the day, these rights of “Liberty andProperty” were an Englishman’s “Birthright.”

In Penn’s view, the English system of governmentpreserved liberty and limited arbitrary power byallowing the subjects to express their consent to thelaws that bound them through two institutions:

“Parliaments and Juries.”“By the first,” Penn argued,“the subject has a share by his chosen Representativesin the Legislative (or Law making) Power.” Penn feltthat the granting of consent through Parliamentwas important because it ensured that “no new Lawsbind the People of England, but such as are bycommon consent agreed on in that great Council.”

In Penn’s view, juries were an equally importantmeans of limiting arbitrary power. By serving onjuries, Penn argued, every freeman “has a share in theExecutive part of the Law, no Causes being tried, nor

any man adjudged to loose[sic] Life, member orEstate, but upon the Verdictof his Peers or Equals.” ForPenn, “These two grandPillars of English Liberty”were “the Fundamentalvital Priviledges [sic]” ofEnglishmen.

The other aspect of their government thatseventeenth-century Englishmen celebrated was asystem that was ruled by laws and not by men. AsPenn rather colorfully put it: “In France, and otherNations, the meer [sic] Will of the Prince is Law, hisWord takes off any mans Head, imposeth Taxes, orseizes a mans Estate, when, how and as often as helists; and if one be accussed [sic], or but so much assuspected of any Crime, he may either presentlyExecute him, or banish, or Imprison him atpleasure.” By contrast, “In England,” Penn argued,“the Law is both the measure and the bound ofevery Subject’s Duty and Allegiance, each manhaving a fixed Fundamental-Right born with him,as to Freedom of his Person and Property in hisEstate, which he cannot be deprived of, but eitherby his Consent, or some Crime, for which the Lawhas impos’d such a penalty or forfeiture.”

This common law view of politics understoodpolitical power as fundamentally limited byEnglishmen’s rights and privileges. As a result, itheld that English kings were bound to ruleaccording to known laws and by respecting theinherent rights of their subjects. It also enshrinedthe concept of consent as the major means to theend of protecting these rights. According to Pennand his contemporaries, this system ofgovernment—protecting as it did the “unparallel’d

Explaining the Founding

Introductory Essay:Explaining the Founding

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Priviledge [sic] of Liberty and Property”—hadmade the English nation “more free and happythan any other People in the World.”

The Founders imbibed this view of Englishrights through the legal training that was commonfor elites in the eighteenth-century Anglo-Americanworld. This legal education also made them awareof the history of England in the seventeenth century,a time when the Stuart kings had repeatedlythreatened their subjects’ rights. In response, manyEnglishmen drew on the common law to argue thatall political power, even that of a monarch, should belimited by law. Colonial Americans in the eighteenthcentury viewed the defeat of the Stuarts and thesubsequent triumph of Parliament (which was seen asthe representative ofsubjects’ rights) in theGlorious Revolution of 1688as a key moment in Englishhistory. They believed that ithad enshrined in England’sunwritten constitution therule of law and the sanctityof subjects’ rights. Thisawareness of English history instilled in theFounders a strong fear of arbitrary power and aconsequent desire to create a constitutional formof government that limited the possibility of rulersviolating the fundamental liberties of the people.

The seriousness with which the colonists tookthese ideas can be seen in their strong opposition toParliament’s attempt to tax or legislate for themwithout their consent in the 1760s and 1770s. Afterthe Revolution, when the colonists formed their owngovernments, they wrote constitutions that includedmany of the legal guarantees that Englishmen hadfought for in the seventeenth century as a means oflimiting governmental power. As a consequence,both the state and federal constitutions typicallycontained bills of rights that enshrined coreEnglish legal rights as fundamental law.

Natural RightsThe seventeenth century witnessed a revolution inEuropean political thought, one that was to proveprofoundly influential on the political ideas ofthe American Founders. Beginning with the Dutchwriter Hugo Grotius in the early 1600s, severalimportant European thinkers began to construct anew understanding of political theory that arguedthat all men by nature had equal rights, and thatgovernments were formed for the sole purpose ofprotecting these natural rights.

The leading proponent of this theory in theEnglish-speaking world was John Locke (1632–1704).Deeply involved in the opposition to the Stuartkings in the 1670s and 1680s, Locke wrote a book onpolitical theory to justify armed resistance toCharles II and his brother James. “To understandpolitical power right,” Locke wrote, “and derive itfrom its original, we must consider, what state allmen are naturally in, and that is, a state of perfectfreedom to order their actions, and dispose of theirpossessions and persons, as they think fit, within thebounds of the law of nature, without asking leave, ordepending upon the will of any other man.” ForLocke, the state of nature was “a state also ofequality, wherein all the power and jurisdiction is

reciprocal, no one havingmore than another.”

Although thispregovernmental state ofnature was a state of perfectfreedom, Locke contendedthat it also lacked animpartial judge or umpire toregulate disputes among

men. As a result, men in this state of naturegathered together and consented to create agovernment in order that their natural rightswould be better secured. Locke further argued that,because it was the people who had created thegovernment, the people had a right to resist itsauthority if it violated their rights. They could thenjoin together and exercise their collective orpopular sovereignty to create a new government oftheir own devising. This revolutionary politicaltheory meant that ultimate political authoritybelonged to the people and not to the king.

This idea of natural rights became a centralcomponent of political theory in the Americancolonies in the eighteenth century, appearing innumerous political pamphlets, newspapers, andsermons. Its emphasis on individual freedom andgovernment by consent combined powerfully withthe older idea of common law rights to shape thepolitical theory of the Founders. When faced withthe claims of the British Parliament in the 1760sand 1770s to legislate for them without theirconsent, American patriots invoked both thecommon law and Lockean natural rights theory toargue that they had a right to resist Britain.

Thomas Jefferson offers the best example ofthe impact that these political ideas had on thefounding. As he so eloquently argued in theDeclaration of Independence: “We hold these


The political theory of the Americancolonists in the seventeenth andeighteenth centuries was deeplyinfluenced by English common

law and its idea of rights.


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truths to be self-evident, that all men are createdequal, that they are endowed by their Creatorwith certain unalienable Rights, that among theseare Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.That to secure these rights, Governments areinstituted among Men, deriving their just powersfrom the consent of the governed, That wheneverany Form of Government becomes destructive ofthese ends, it is the Right of the People to alter orabolish it, and to institute new Government,laying its foundations on such principles andorganizing its powers in such form, as to themshall seem most likely to effect their Safety andHappiness.”

This idea of natural rights also influenced thecourse of political events inthe crucial years after 1776.All the state governments putthis new political theoryinto practice, basing theirauthority on the people,and establishing writtenconstitutions that protectednatural rights. As GeorgeMason, the principal author of the influentialVirginia Bill of Rights (1776), stated in thedocument’s first section: “All men are by natureequally free and independent, and have certaininherent rights, of which, when they enter into astate of society, they cannot, by any compact, depriveor divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment oflife and liberty, with the means of acquiring andpossessing property, and pursuing and obtaininghappiness and safety.” The radical implications ofthis insistence on equal natural rights would slowlybecome apparent in postrevolutionary Americansociety as previously downtrodden groups began toinvoke these ideals to challenge slavery, argue for awider franchise, end female legal inequality, and fullyseparate church and state.

In 1780, under the influence of John Adams,Massachusetts created a mechanism by which thepeople themselves could exercise their sovereignpower to constitute governments: a specialconvention convened solely for the purpose ofwriting a constitution, followed by a process ofratification. This American innovation allowed theideas of philosophers like Locke to be put intopractice. In particular, it made the people’s naturalrights secure by enshrining them in a constitutionwhich was not changeable by ordinary legislation.This method was to influence the authors of thenew federal Constitution in 1787.

Religious Toleration and theSeparation of Church and State

A related development in seventeenth-centuryEuropean political theory was the emergence ofarguments for religious toleration and theseparation of church and state. As a result of thebloody religious wars between Catholics andProtestants that followed the Reformation, a fewthinkers in both England and Europe argued thatgovernments should not attempt to force individualsto conform to one form of worship. Rather, theyinsisted that such coercion was both unjust anddangerous. It was unjust because true faithrequired voluntary belief; it was dangerous becausethe attempts to enforce religious beliefs in Europe

had led not to religiousuniformity, but to civil war.These thinkers furtherargued that if governmentsceased to enforce religiousbelief, the result would becivil peace and prosperity.

Once again the Englishphilosopher John Locke

played a major role in the development of these newideas. Building on the work of earlier writers, Lockepublished in 1689 A Letter Concerning Toleration, inwhich he contended that there was a natural rightof conscience that no government could infringe.As he put it: “The care of Souls cannot belong to theCivil Magistrate, because his Power consists only inoutward force; but true and saving Religion consistsin the inward perswasion [sic] of the Mind, withoutwhich nothing can be acceptable to God. And suchis the nature of the Understanding, that it cannotbe compell’d to the belief of any thing by outwardforce. Confiscation of Estate, Imprisonment,Torments, nothing of that nature can have anysuch Efficacy as to make Men change the inwardJudgment that they have formed of things.”

These ideas about the rights of conscience andreligious toleration resonated powerfully in theEnglish colonies in America. Although thePuritans in the seventeenth century had originallyattempted to set up an intolerant commonwealthwhere unorthodox religious belief would beprohibited, dissenters like Roger Williamschallenged them and argued that true faith couldnot be the product of coercion. Forced to flee bythe Puritans, Williams established the colony ofRhode Island, which offered religious toleration toall and had no state-supported church. As thePuritan Cotton Mather sarcastically remarked,


Natural rights became a centralcomponent of political theory in theAmerican colonies . . . , appearing in

numerous political pamphlets,newspapers, and sermons.


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Rhode Island contained “everything in the worldbut Roman Catholics and real Christians.” Inaddition, Maryland, founded in the 1630s, andPennsylvania, founded in the 1680s, both providedan extraordinary degree of religious freedom bythe standard of the time.

In the eighteenth century, as these arguments forreligious toleration spread throughout the English-speaking Protestant world, the American colonies,becoming ever more religiously pluralistic, provedparticularly receptive to them.As a result, the idea thatthe government should not enforce religious beliefhad become an important element of Americanpolitical theory by the lateeighteenth century. After theRevolution, it was enshrinedas a formal right in many ofthe state constitutions, aswell as most famously in theFirst Amendment to thefederal Constitution.

Colonial Self-GovernmentThe political thinking of the Founders in the lateeighteenth century was also deeply influenced bythe long experience of colonial self-government.Since their founding in the early seventeenthcentury, most of the English colonies in theAmericas (unlike the French and Spanish colonies)had governed themselves to a large extent in localassemblies that were modeled on the EnglishParliament. In these colonial assemblies theyexercised their English common law right toconsent to all laws that bound them.

The existence of these strong local governmentsin each colony also explains in part the speed withwhich the Founders were able to create viableindependent republican governments in the yearsafter 1776. This long-standing practice of self-government also helped to create an indigenouspolitical class in the American colonies with therequisite experience for the difficult task of nationbuilding.

In addition to the various charters and royalinstructions that governed the English colonies,Americans also wrote their own Foundingdocuments. These settler covenants were an earlytype of written constitution and they provided animportant model for the Founders in the lateeighteenth century as they sought to craft a newconstitutional system based on popular consent.

Classical RepublicanismNot all the intellectual influences on the Foundersoriginated in the seventeenth century. Becausemany of the Founders received a classicaleducation in colonial colleges in the eighteenthcentury, they were heavily influenced by thewritings of the great political thinkers andhistorians of ancient Greece and Rome.

Antiquity shaped the Founders’ politicalthought in several important ways. First, itintroduced them to the idea of republicanism, orgovernment by the people. Ancient political thinkersfrom Aristotle to Cicero had praised republican

self-government as the bestpolitical system. Thisclassical political thoughtwas important for theFounders as it gave themgrounds to dissent from theheavily monarchical politicalculture of eighteenth-centuryEngland, where even thecommon law jurists who

defended subjects’ rights against royal powerbelieved strongly in monarchy. By reading theclassics, the American Founders were introducedto an alternate political vision, one that legitimizedrepublicanism.

The second legacy of this classical idea ofrepublicanism was the emphasis that it put on themoral foundations of liberty. Though ancientwriters believed that a republic was the best formof government, they were intensely aware of itsfragility. In particular, they argued that because thepeople governed themselves, republics required fortheir very survival a high degree of civic virtue intheir citizenry. Citizens had to be able to put thegood of the whole (the res publica) ahead of theirown private interests. If they failed to do this, therepublic would fall prey to men of power andambition, and liberty would ultimately be lost.

As a result of this need for an exceptionallyvirtuous citizenry, ancient writers also taught thatrepublics had to be small. Only in a small andrelatively homogeneous society, they argued,would the necessary degree of civic virtue beforthcoming. In part, it was this classical teachingabout the weakness of large republics thatanimated the contentious debate over theproposed federal Constitution in the 1780s.

In addition to their reading of ancient authors,the Founders also encountered republican ideas in


By reading the classics, the AmericanFounders were introduced to an

alternate political vision, one thatlegitimated republicanism.


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the political theory of a group of eighteenth-century English writers called the “radical Whigs.”These writers kept alive the republican legacy ofthe English Civil War at a time when mostEnglishmen believed that their constitutionalmonarchy was the best form of government in theworld. Crucially for the Founding, these radicalWhigs combined classical republican thought withthe newer Lockean ideas of natural rights andpopular sovereignty. They thus became animportant conduit for a modern type ofrepublicanism to enter American political thought,one that combined the ancient concern with avirtuous citizenry and the modern insistence onthe importance of individual rights.

These radical Whigs also provided theFounders with an important critique of theeighteenth-century British constitution. Instead ofseeing it as the best form of government possible,the radical Whigs argued that it was both corrupt

and tyrannical. In order to reform it, they called fora written constitution and a formal separation ofthe executive branch from the legislature. Thisclassically inspired radical Whig constitutionalismwas an important influence on the development ofAmerican republicanism in the late eighteenthcentury.

ConclusionDrawing on all these intellectual traditions, theFounders were able to create a new kind ofrepublicanism in America based on equal rights,consent, popular sovereignty, and the separation ofchurch and state. Having set this broad context forthe Founding, we now turn to a more detailedexamination of important aspects of the Founders’political theory, followed by detailed biographicalstudies of the Founders themselves.

Craig Yirush, Ph.D.University of California, Los Angeles


Suggestions for Further ReadingBailyn, Bernard. The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University

Press, 1967.Lutz, Donald. Colonial Origins of the American Constitution: A Documentary History. Indianapolis, Ind.:

Liberty Fund, 1998.Reid, John Phillip. The Constitutional History of the American Revolution. Abridged Edition. Madison: The

University of Wisconsin Press, 1995.Rossiter, Clinton. Seedtime of the Republic: The Origins of the American Tradition of Political Liberty. New

York: Harcourt Brace, 1953.Zuckert, Michael. Natural Rights and the New Republicanism. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press,

1994.

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Visual Assessment1. Founders Posters—Have students create posters for either an individual Founder,

a group of Founders, or an event. Ask them to include at least one quotation(different from classroom posters that accompany this volume) and one image.

2. Coat of Arms—Draw a coat of arms template and divide into6 quadrants (see example). Photocopy and hand out to theclass. Ask them to create a coat of arms for a particularFounder with a different criterion for each quadrant (e.g.,occupation, key contribution, etc.). Include in the assignmentan explanation sheet in which they describe why they chosecertain colors, images, and symbols.

3. Individual Illustrated Timeline—Ask each student to create a visual timeline ofat least ten key points in the life of a particular Founder. In class, put the studentsin groups and have them discuss the intersections and juxtapositions in each oftheir timelines.

4. Full Class Illustrated Timeline—Along a full classroom wall, tape poster paper inone long line. Draw in a middle line and years (i.e., 1760, 1770, 1780, etc.). Putstudents in pairs and assign each pair one Founder. Ask them to put together tenkey points in the life of the Founder. Have each pair draw in the key points on themaster timeline.

5. Political Cartoon—Provide students with examples of good political cartoons,contemporary or historical. A good resource for finding historical cartoons on theWeb is <http://www.boondocksnet.com/gallery/political_cartoons.html>. Askthem to create a political cartoon based on an event or idea in the Founding period.

Performance Assessments1. Meeting of the Minds—Divide the class into five groups and assign a Founder to

each group. Ask the group to discuss the Founder’s views on a variety of pre-determined topics. Then, have a representative from each group come to the frontof the classroom and role-play as the Founder, dialoguing with Founders fromother groups. The teacher will act as moderator, reading aloud topic questions(based on the pre-determined topics given to the groups) and encouragingdiscussion from the students in character. At the teacher’s discretion, questioningcan be opened up to the class as a whole. For advanced students, do not provide alist of topics—ask them to know their character well enough to present himproperly on all topics.

2. Create a Song or Rap—Individually or in groups, have students create a songor rap about a Founder based on a familiar song, incorporating at least five keyevents or ideas of the Founder in their project. Have students perform their songin class. (Optional: Ask the students to bring in a recording of the song forbackground music.)

Web/Technology Assessments1. Founders PowerPoint Presentation—Divide students into groups. Have each

group create a PowerPoint presentation about a Founder or event. Determine thenumber of slides, and assign a theme to each slide (e.g., basic biographicinformation, major contributions, political philosophy, quotations, repercussionsof the event, participants in the event, etc.). Have them hand out copies of theslides and give the presentation to the class. You may also ask for a copy of the

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presentation to give you the opportunity to combine all the presentations into anend-of-semester review.

2. Evaluate Web sites—Have students search the Web for three sites related to aFounder or the Founding period (you may provide them with a “start list” from theresource list at the end of each lesson). Create a Web site evaluation sheet thatincludes such questions as: Are the facts on this site correct in comparison to othersites? What sources does this site draw on to produce its information? Who are themain contributors to this site? When was the site last updated? Ask students tograde the site according to the evaluation sheet and give it a grade for reliability,accuracy, etc. They should write a 2–3 sentence explanation for their grade.

3. Web Quest—Choose a Web site(s) on the Constitution, Founders, or Foundingperiod. (See suggestions below.) Go to the Web site(s) and create a list of questionstaken from various pages within the site. Provide students with the Web addressand list of questions, and ask them to find answers to the questions on the site,documenting on which page they found their answer. Web site suggestions:

• The Avalon Project <http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/avalon.htm>• The Founders’ Constitution <http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/>• Founding.com <http://www.founding.com/>• National Archives Charters of Freedom

<http://www.archives.gov/national_archives_experience/charters.html>• The Library of Congress American Memory Page <http://memory.loc.gov/>• Our Documents <http://www.ourdocuments.gov/>• Teaching American History <http://www.teachingamericanhistory.org/>

A good site to help you construct the Web Quest is: <http://trackstar.hprtec.org>

Verbal Assessments1. Contingency in History—In a one-to-two page essay, have students answer the

question, “How would history have been different if [Founder] had not beenborn?” They should consider repercussions for later events in the political world.

2. Letters Between Founders—Ask students to each choose a “CorrespondencePartner” and decide which two Founders they will be representing. Have themread the appropriate Founders essays and primary source activities. Over a periodof time, the pair should then write at least three letters back and forth (with a copybeing given to the teacher for review and feedback). Instruct them to be mindfulof their Founders’ tone and writing style, life experience, and political views inconstructing the letters.

3. Categorize the Founders—Create five categories for the Founders (e.g., slave-holders vs. non-slaveholders, northern vs. southern, opponents of theConstitution vs. proponents of the Constitution, etc.) and a list of Foundersstudied. Ask students to place each Founder in the appropriate category. Foradvanced students, ask them to create the five categories in addition tocategorizing the Founders.

4. Obituaries and Gravestones—Have students write a short obituary or gravestoneengraving that captures the major accomplishments of a Founder (e.g., ThomasJefferson’s gravestone). Ask them to consider for what the Founder wished to beremembered.

5. “I Am” Poem—Instruct students to select a Founder and write a poem that refersto specific historical events in his life (number of lines at the teacher’s discretion).



Each line of the poem must begin with “I” (i.e., “I am…,” “I wonder…,” “I see…,”etc.). Have them present their poem with an illustration of the Founder.

6. Founder’s Journal—Have students construct a journal of a Founder at a certainperiod in time. Ask them to pick out at least five important days. In the journalentry, make sure they include the major events of the day, the Founder’s feelingsabout the events, and any other pertinent facts (e.g., when writing a journal aboutthe winter at Valley Forge, Washington may have included information about thetroops’ morale, supplies, etc.).

7. Résumé for a Founder—Ask students to create a resume for a particular Founder.Make sure they include standard resume information (e.g., work experience,education, skills, accomplishments/honors, etc.). You can also have them researchand bring in a writing sample (primary source) to accompany the resume.

8. Cast of Characters—Choose an event in the Founding Period (e.g., the signing ofthe Declaration of Independence, the debate about the Constitution in a stateratifying convention, etc.) and make a list of individuals related to the incident.Tell students that they are working for a major film studio in Hollywood that hasdecided to make a movie about this event. They have been hired to cast actors foreach part. Have students fill in your list of individuals with actors/actresses (pastor present) with an explanation of why that particular actor/actress was chosen forthe role. (Ask the students to focus on personality traits, previous roles, etc.)

Review Activities1. Founders Jeopardy—Create a Jeopardy board on an overhead sheet or handout

(six columns and five rows). Label the column heads with categories and fill in allother squares with a dollar amount. Make a sheet that corresponds to the Jeopardyboard with the answers that you will be revealing to the class. (Be sure to includeDaily Doubles.)

a. Possible categories may include:• Thomas Jefferson (or the name of any Founder)• Revolutionary Quirks (fun Founders facts)• Potpourri (miscellaneous)• Pen is Mightier (writings of the Founders)

b. Example answers:• This Founder drafted and introduced the first formal proposal for a

permanent union of the thirteen colonies. Question: Who is BenjaminFranklin?

• This Founder was the only Roman Catholic to sign the Declaration ofIndependence. Question: Who is Charles Carroll?

2. Who Am I?—For homework, give each student a different Founder essay. Ask eachstudent to compile a list of five-to-ten facts about his/her Founder. In class, askindividuals to come to the front of the classroom and read off the facts one at atime, prompting the rest of the class to guess the appropriate Founder.

3. Around the World—Develop a list of questions about the Founders and plot a“travel route” around the classroom in preparation for this game. Ask one studentto volunteer to go first. The student will get up from his/her desk and “travel”along the route plotted to an adjacent student’s desk, standing next to it. Read aquestion aloud, and the first student of the two to answer correctly advances to thenext stop on the travel route. Have the students keep track of how many placesthey advance. Whoever advances the furthest wins.

ADDITIONAL CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES



Common Good: General conditions that are equally to everyone’s advantage. In arepublic, held to be superior to the good of the individual, though its attainment oughtnever to violate the natural rights of any individual.

Democracy: From the Greek, demos, meaning “rule of the people.” Had a negativeconnotation among most Founders, who equated the term with mob rule. The Foundersconsidered it to be a form of government into which poorly-governed republicsdegenerated.

English Rights: Considered by Americans to be part of their inheritance as Englishmen;included such rights as property, petition, and trials by jury. Believed to exist from timeimmemorial and recognized by various English charters as the Magna Carta, the Petitionof Right of 1628, and the English Bill of Rights of 1689.

Equality: Believed to be the condition of all people, who possessed an equality of rights.In practical matters, restricted largely to land-owning white men during the FoundingEra, but the principle worked to undermine ideas of deference among classes.

Faction: A small group that seeks to benefit its members at the expense of the commongood. The Founders discouraged the formation of factions, which they equated withpolitical parties.

Federalism: A political system in which power is divided between two levels ofgovernment, each supreme in its own sphere. Intended to avoid the concentration ofpower in the central government and to preserve the power of local government.

Government: Political power fundamentally limited by citizens’ rights and privileges.This limiting was accomplished by written charters or constitutions and bills of rights.

Happiness: The ultimate end of government. Attained by living in liberty and bypracticing virtue.

Inalienable Rights: Rights that can never justly be taken away.

Independence: The condition of living in liberty without being subject to the unjustrule of another.

Liberty: To live in the enjoyment of one’s rights without dependence upon anyone else.Its enjoyment led to happiness.

Natural Rights: Rights individuals possess by virtue of their humanity. Were thought tobe “inalienable.” Protected by written constitutions and bills of rights that restrainedgovernment.

Property: Referred not only to material possessions, but also to the ownership of one’sbody and rights. Jealously guarded by Americans as the foundation of liberty during thecrisis with Britain.


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AN EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY GLOSSARY

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Reason: Human intellectual capacity and rationality. Believed by the Founders to be thedefining characteristic of humans, and the means by which they could understand theworld and improve their lives.

Religious Toleration: The indulgence shown to one religion while maintaining aprivileged position for another. In pluralistic America, religious uniformity could not beenforced so religious toleration became the norm.

Representation: Believed to be central to republican government and the preservationof liberty. Citizens, entitled to vote, elect officials who are responsible to them, and whogovern according to the law.

Republic: From the Latin, res publica, meaning “the public things.” A government systemin which power resides in the people who elect representatives responsible to them andwho govern according to the law. A form of government dedicated to promoting thecommon good. Based on the people, but distinct from a democracy.

Separation of Church and State: The doctrine that government should not enforcereligious belief. Part of the concept of religious toleration and freedom of conscience.

Separation of Powers/Checks and Balances: A way to restrain the power of governmentby balancing the interests of one section of government against the competing interestsof another section. A key component of the federal Constitution. A means of slowingdown the operation of government, so it did not possess too much energy and thusendanger the rights of the people.

Slavery: Referred both to chattel slavery and political slavery. Politically, the fate that befellthose who did not guard their rights against governments. Socially and economically, aninstitution that challenged the belief of the Founders in natural rights.

Taxes: Considered in English tradition to be the free gift of the people to the government.Americans refused to pay them without their consent, which meant actual representationin Parliament.

Tyranny: The condition in which liberty is lost and one is governed by the arbitrarywill of another. Related to the idea of political slavery.

Virtue: The animating principle of a republic and the quality essential for a republic’ssurvival. From the Latin, vir, meaning “man.” Referred to the display of such “manly”traits as courage and self-sacrifice for the common good.

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B.1. The Declaration of Independence

states, “All men are created equal.”2. All people have the inalienable rights.3. Slavery abridges those rights to life,

liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

GouverneurMorrisHandout A—Gouverneur Morris(1752–1816)1. As a teenager, Morris’s right arm was

badly burned when a pot of scaldingwater overturned on him. The armwas badly crippled for the rest of hislife. Morris lost his left leg after a car-riage accident in Philadelphia. His leftankle was caught in the spokes of amoving carriage’s wheel. Doctorsamputated the leg just below the knee.

2. Aggravated by Congress’ failure to sup-port the troops, Morris began to hintto some that the Continental Armyitself might employ force if Congressdid not act. In March 1783, the officersof the Continental Army assembled ata barn in Newburgh, New York. Talk oftreason was in the air, as many officerswhispered about marching on Philadel-phia. Fortunately for the republic,Washington himself quelled the conspir-acy by appearing at the gathering.

3. At the Convention, Morris became aleader of the nationalist bloc. He was theonly delegate to make a lengthy speechagainst the institution of slavery. Mor-ris was appointed to the Committee ofStyle as the debates ended. Morrisworked on the document for four daysto fashion a finished product that wasmore concise and clear than the draftgiven to him. He also glossed thewording of the Constitution so as toenhance the power of the new federalgovernment. Most significantly, Morrisbegan the Preamble with the phrase,“We the people,” to signal that the new

government was not the creature ofthe states, but the handiwork of theentire nation.

4. Some students may list the following asMorris’s shortcomings: his propensityto engage in affairs; his encouraging theContinental Army to consider usingforce against Congress; his dismissiveattitude toward the lower classes,demonstrated by his calling the people“reptiles.” Students might list the fol-lowing as Morris’s strengths: his charmand intelligence; his moral vision,shown in his denunciation of slavery atthe Philadelphia convention; his polit-ical skill, evidenced by the use of hisposition as writer of the Constitution toget what he wanted; his bravery duringthe Reign of Terror in Paris; his patriot-ism, demonstrated by his service to hisstate and country.

5. Some students will say yes, Morris hadfought to make the federal governmentsupreme over the states at the Consti-tutional Convention, yet secession con-tradicts this principle. Other studentswill say no, that states always retain theright of secession; this right is notrelated to the strength of the centralgovernment.

James OtisHandout A—James Otis(1725–1783)1. Writs of assistance were search warrants

that gave customs officials broad author-ity to inspect ships, warehouses, andeven private homes. Officials did nothave to present evidence to a judge beforea search was conducted. They also didnot have to specify what they were look-ing for. Writs of assistance soon becameone of the chief complaints of thecolonists against the British government.

2. In defending the liberty of his fellowcolonists, Otis appealed to both naturaland English rights. He asserted that everyman possessed inalienable rights of

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life, liberty, and property, which couldnot rightfully be taken away by anyone.Otis argued that the British govern-ment had no right to tax the coloniesbecause they were not represented inParliament. Otis argued that Britishtaxation of the American colonies “isabsolutely irreconcilable with therights of the colonists as British sub-jects and as men.” Taking away one’sproperty without one’s consent, Otisclaimed, makes a person a “slave.”

3. Otis condemned slavery as a violationof the rights of the enslaved. He arguedthat “all men are, white or black . . . bythe law of nature freeborn.” Otis con-demned slavery as “the most shockingviolation of the law of nature” anddeclared that it “makes every dealer init a tyrant.”

4. Though he lost the writs of assistancecase of 1761, Otis became a hero amongAmericans. During the 1760s, Otisbecame a leader of the Patriot resist-ance to the British government’sattempt to tax the American colonies.He soon became an ally of SamuelAdams and John Hancock. Otis headedthe Massachusetts committee of corre-spondence. He gave speeches and wroteessays in defense of American liberty.In 1764, Otis published The Rights ofthe British Colonies Asserted and Proved.Otis played a leading role in the StampAct Congress. In 1767, he and SamuelAdams wrote a circular letter to theother colonies, coordinating resistanceto the Townshend Duties.

5. Otis’s challenge of writs of assistancewas based on natural, rather thanEnglish, rights. Otis headed theBoston Committee of Correspon-dence, and spoke and wrote publiclyopposing British policies. He chal-lenged British authority to tax thecolonists. He used the term “tyrant” todescribe slaveowners.

Handout B—Vocabulary andContext Questions1. Vocabulary

a. serenityb. well-beingc. brothersd. collective unit of peoplee. limitlessf. peddlerg. tradeh. given up

2. Contexta. James Otis wrote this document.b. This document was written in

1764.c. This is a pamphlet.d. This document was written to

bring the colonists’ attention toBritish tyranny.

Handout D—Analysis: James Otisand John Locke’s Theory ofNatural Rights1. Otis’s main idea is that the only pur-

pose of a just government is to protectthe security, life, liberty, and propertyof the people. Locke’s main idea isthat all men have equal rights, andthat they choose to unite in commu-nities for the protection of thoserights. Otis may have been influencedby the idea that governments exist toprotect rights.

2. Otis’s main idea is that the colonistsare human beings, just as English-men are human beings. Therefore,they have the same rights as English-men, and furthermore, the same natu-ral rights. They need only surrenderthose rights if they come together asa society under one government.Locke’s main idea is that people vol-untarily give up some liberty to bet-ter preserve their own good. Otismay have been influenced by the ideathat government protects the com-mon good.

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3. Otis’s main idea is that slavery is anobvious and terrible violation ofAfricans’ natural rights. Locke’s mainidea is that all men are created equaland there can be no natural subordi-nation of one people to another. Otismay have been influenced by the ideathat all men have equal claim to natu-ral rights.

4. Otis’s main idea is that men are bynature free, and that property rightsare essential to freedom. Locke’s mainidea is that property (lives, liberties,and estates) and liberty are interde-pendent. Otis may have been influ-enced by the idea that all propertyrights are essential to freedom.

Thomas PaineHandout A—Thomas Paine(1737–1809)1. Paine condemned slavery as a “savage

practice.” He pointed out the irony bywhich Americans held Africans as slavesand at the same time complained ofattempts by the British government toenslave the colonies.

2. He rejected the idea that Britain wasAmerica’s mother country. British poli-cies violated American liberty and hin-dered the country’s economic prospects.Paine called for the colonists to fightfor their independence. He also argued“government even in its best state isbut a necessary evil.” He also denouncedcustom as no more than “a long habitof not thinking a thing wrong.” Painealso saw the American cause as a partof worldwide uprising against tyranny.

3. The Rights of Man’s critique of monar-chy was so radical that the British gov-ernment (a monarchy) attempted toarrest Paine for inciting resistance togovernment. Even more radically, hecalled for social programs to help thepoor. In The Age of Reason, Painestrongly condemned all organized

religion, and in particular Christianity,as a series of “fabulous inventions.”He claimed the only true religion wasDeism.

4. Some students may say that Paine diddeserve the negative reaction he received.His condemnation of organized religionwas offensive to many, and his open,hostile letter to the very popular GeorgeWashington created enemies. Othersmay say that he did not deserve the neg-ative reaction he received. He acknowl-edged freedom of belief in The Age ofReason, and freedom of belief andnon-belief is a cherished American lib-erty. They may say that while his letterto Washington might have offendedmany, Paine maintained his right toexpress his opinions and the lettershould not have affected his reputation.

5. Thomas Paine’s commitment to repub-lican government remained constantthrough his career. His work inspiredthe Continental Army to perseverewhen they felt neglected by the Con-gress. His words also summoned sup-port for independence in the manywho read Common Sense. His beliefthat the people have the right to do awaywith a government that does not pro-tect their rights, and replace it with ajust one, was essential to the AmericanRevolution.

Handout B—Vocabulary andContext Questions1. Vocabulary

a. oppressive powerb. beatenc. comfortd. valuee. difficulty or expensef. heavenlyg. disrespectfulh. God’s carei. comfortj. trickery

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