Essay on American War Of Independence Against Great Britain

Many myths are associated with the American War of Independence against Great Britain. Perhaps the greatest of these myths, is the belief that the schism occurred as a result of a simple tax revolt against “big government.” This view of American history contains a flaw; accordingly, the Revolution was not the result of some substantive reason of a greater principle but just a conflict of moneyed personal interests. Between the years of 1763 and 1776, Great Britain and its rebellious colonists were arguing not about bad law, but instead, natural law and the rights of humans. The gentry elite fought against Parliament and the King on the basis that their rights as Caucasian land-owning citizens were being violated to a great extent and all other peoples under the English Crown possessed no political standing and thus were excluded. These very rights that the landed class was arguing for only applied to that same class until later in American history. At the same time that the American colonists were fighting for “unalienable rights,” they were taking away the rights and property of loyalists, barring females from political participation, consolidating the status of slavery, and denying Native Americans basic rights that the tyrant King of Britain awarded them. The example of the Declaration of Independence serves as a strong rallying point for any subordinated classes in America due to the fact that it contains the self-aggrandizing phrase “all men are created equal.” However…