Upon the edge of revolution, a country tottered, waiting for the final push. England had pressed upon a tired and loose colonial aggregate, and though these pressures were sometimes justified, they brought together a quite recently bickering populace with contempt for taxation and other misgivings. From the northmost colony of Maine to the buffer colony Georgia, all knew that contentions were stewing. However, though insurrection was on the mind of each colonist, this concept lie slanted in many different ways. Squarely within one extreme were the Loyalists, for never did they once wish to break with the king of England, who had admittedly protected them well enough. When looking upon the opposite end of the spectrum, there lied the rebels.Their
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Therefore, and with great zeal, the Sons of Liberty, foremost in the propaganda and recruiting of militiamen, would often hunt down these Loyalists, or at least those they supposed to be Loyalists. Tarred and feathered, men such as Peter Oliver, chief justice of the superior court of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, were humiliated and sometimes killed for their beliefs. A paper written by Oliver talked of what he believed to be wrongful insubordination to the Mother Country, inquiring, “And why was the sudden Transaction made, from Obedience to Rebellion, but to gratifye [sic] the Pride, Ambition & Resentment, of a few abandoned Demagogues, who were lost to all Sense of Shame & of Humanity?” (Document F)These Demagogues may or may not have first attempted to split from Britain, but they did not make any attempt to end the hunts. Mccarthyisms ran rampant just as during the Red Scare. Fears boiled over because of suspected subversion and treason, so baseless assumptions were made. Both eras displayed quite clearly the fact that the ‘American Everyman’ was a myth. If there was such political and social conformity, no American, let alone dozens of Americans, would willingly cooperate with an enemy. The point remains that if one is to be American, then one only needs to pay taxes as all others do. No requirement is made as to race, religion, political affiliations, or any other discriminatory facets, for humans are
Therefore, and with great zeal, the Sons of Liberty, foremost in the propaganda and recruiting of militiamen, would often hunt down these Loyalists, or at least those they supposed to be Loyalists. Tarred and feathered, men such as Peter Oliver, chief justice of the superior court of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, were humiliated and sometimes killed for their beliefs. A paper written by Oliver talked of what he believed to be wrongful insubordination to the Mother Country, inquiring, “And why was the sudden Transaction made, from Obedience to Rebellion, but to gratifye [sic] the Pride, Ambition & Resentment, of a few abandoned Demagogues, who were lost to all Sense of Shame & of Humanity?” (Document F)These Demagogues may or may not have first attempted to split from Britain, but they did not make any attempt to end the hunts. Mccarthyisms ran rampant just as during the Red Scare. Fears boiled over because of suspected subversion and treason, so baseless assumptions were made. Both eras displayed quite clearly the fact that the ‘American Everyman’ was a myth. If there was such political and social conformity, no American, let alone dozens of Americans, would willingly cooperate with an enemy. The point remains that if one is to be American, then one only needs to pay taxes as all others do. No requirement is made as to race, religion, political affiliations, or any other discriminatory facets, for humans are