Continuity and change 1754-1800

Continuity

Amidst a litany of profound disruptions and changes that will be analyzed below, critical continuities included the maintenance, and expansion, of chattel slavery, confrontation and conflict with Native Americans, and the political and economic predominance of men. Another continuity is that even after American independence from the United Kingdom, Americans continued to confront significant European imperial and Native American challenges and competition for land and resources.

Socially and culturally, late colonial and early American republican society remained largely patriarchal and Protestant Christian; the diversity of Protestant denominations had increased dramatically during the First Great Awakening in the 1720s and 1730s and would expand further in the Second Great Awakening in the 1820s. While religious diversity and toleration generally prevailed, tensions periodically surfaced, particularly during the American Revolution. As for the status of women and girls, they were systematically excluded from most forms of economic and political power; women faced severe property and inheritance restrictions, primarily worked within the home and on farms, could not hold political office in either the colonies or the early American republic, and only a small number of unmarried and/or widowed women in New Jersey could vote after independence.

Economically, the vast majority of Americans continued work in agriculture, often living in rural areas and small country towns and villages, although the burgeoning Industrial Revolution, then starting to flourish in Great Britain, would soon bring profound changes and transformations to the American economy. The American economy continued to rely on the abundance of its natural resources, particularly land, for growth and expansion; as noted above, much of this land remained under the control of various Native American societies, with further American encroachment precipitating further conflict.

Change

Changes during the period 1754-1800 include the 13 British colonies in North America obtaining independence from the United Kingdom, the introduction of 2 different governing regimes, the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution, and the introduction of a new, democratic experiment in republican government. The emergence of a new constitutional republic that openly rejected hereditary monarchy and absolutism in favor of a limited government with checks and balances and separation of powers represented a novel and, from the perspective of European monarchs, disconcerting example. While by today’s standards only a small number of men, 21 and older, who owned property could vote in the new United States, by the standards of the 18th century, American men enjoyed greater voting power and rights than in any of the major European powers from which most of their ancestors had migrated.

As Americans continued to move westward, they incorporated more territory and resources into a rapidly expanding country. The physical transformation of the countryside coincided with the continued development of an increasingly assertive American identity as fundamentally distinct from their European forebears. John Dickinson, Thomas Paine and Hector St. John de Crèvecouer all articulated vital portrayals of this emerging American identity, an identity that would be further expounded upon by future American and European authors, including Alexis de Tocqueville, in the coming decades.