Our Republic’s Forgotten Origins
What causes revolutionary change? What drives history forward? When we think of the American War of Independence, we correctly give credit to the ideas put forth by Enlightened thinkers who reshaped the way people thought about liberty, justice, and equality. Ideas that began in the Old World were reconsidered and reformulated in the New World by great minds like Jefferson, Adams, Hamilton, and Madison into explicit plans for a new republic, an intellectual shift that led to the creation of the United States.
However, the ideas expressed by these philosophers and founders were not the beginning of the Revolution. Instead, they were often giving voice to the actions of thousands of colonists who were increasingly resistant to the British crown. The resistance spread through taverns, farms, workshops, and ports; among men and women, old and young, rich and poor, rural and urban. Americans acted independently before they thought about independence. It was their revolutionary experiences that encouraged their revolutionary ideas.
Colonists had been shaping their own identity for a long time before the War of Independence, including as members of the British Empire. By the mid-1700s, Britain was the reigning global superpower. Its army was feared by all enemies. Its navy dominated the seas. London had emerged as the financial capital of the world. With its transatlantic commercial network, the country’s future expansion seemed unstoppable. Just a decade before the Revolution began, colonists living in North America were proud to have contributed to this success and understood themselves to be integral members of the Empire.
However, the end of the Seven Years’ War in 1763 represented a turning point in the relationship between Americans and the British Empire. Having fought valiantly to secure Britain’s victory in the war, colonists expected to be handsomely rewarded by their mother country. Instead, their personal experiences reshaped the way they interacted with and thought about the empire, leading many toward an independence movement a decade later.
First came restrictions on westward settlement, which Britain hoped would stabilize relations with Native nations and lower military costs. For colonists who had fought over this land during the war with France, the closing of the frontier was an affront to their efforts. More broadly, the frontier represented something larger — those restrictions meant closing the gate to the American dream. Acquiring land meant freedom and real, tangible wealth. Being told to stay east of the Appalachian Mountains was unacceptable, especially for the thousands of hopeful would-be settlers living in the increasingly crowded eastern seaboard.
Next came taxes on everyday goods like paper and sugar, which affected a much broader swath of people. Even colonists who could ignore restrictions on westward migration were bothered by a tax on everyday goods. It was especially galling considering the British government had instituted these taxes on Americans without any direct representation in Parliament. Colonists had long grown accustomed to managing their own affairs, and the implementation of new taxes encouraged new ways of thinking about membership in the Empire. Many were frustrated, and some resisted.
Americans expressed their frustrations in many different ways. Local groups formed to share news and coordinate protests, stitching the colonies together. Boycotts of British goods, encouraged and maintained by groups of local shopkeepers and consumers, gave voice to the concerns of the colonists and an opportunity for anyone to participate in the resistance. Men proudly refused British clothes in favor of homespun fabric, which was often made locally by spinning parties of American women. Most dramatically, a group of Bostonians disguised as Mohawk warriors dumped over 46 tons of tea into the harbor to protest the British East India Company’s monopoly on tea. Across the colonies, an increasing number of common people were exposed to the idea that Americans were both capable of doing things on their own and perhaps better off.
And it was ordinary farmers in rural areas who would initiate the events culminating in a war for independence and a new country. In April 1775, British commanders in Boston marched toward Concord to seize colonial weapons, another example of imperial control that Americans could see and hear for themselves. In response, local men mobilized and exchanged fire with British soldiers on Lexington Green.
Highly trained and well-equipped British regulars retreated under a rain of musket fire from farmers, falling all the way back to Boston to await reinforcements and further orders. The character of this initial engagement reveals the fundamental role common people played in formulating revolutionary ideas and taking revolutionary action.
By the summer of 1776, the sentiments of frustrated colonists would be explicitly declared by Thomas Jefferson, just one of many intellectuals whose ideas would so strongly shape the future to come. But these sentiments belonged just as much to the ordinary men and women throughout the colonies, who had their own lives to lead and their own reasons for considering secession from Britain. Indeed, the two concepts — ideas from above, action from below — reinforced each other, both helping tie a diverse set of communities into a single nation over the course of the late 1700s.
About the Authors
Dr. Alexander Tokarev is an Associate Professor of Economics and Philosophy at Northwood University. A Northwood University alumna, Kristin Tokarev is a producer for Stossel TV. Dr. Dale Moler serves as Assistant Professor of History and Honors Program Lead at Northwood University. This piece originally was published in the February 2026 edition of When Free to Choose, Northwood University’s signature publication dedicated to exploring the importance of free enterprise. Click here to receive When Free to Choose in your inbox!