Abigail Adams urges husband to “remember the ladies”

The Revolutionary War was a huge deal for the world. The U.S gained its freedom from Britain and became an independent country. But just how revolutionary was the revolutionary war. I mean we still had high-class people making decisions for the country

And that was no different than what England had. Saying that the U.S evolved and made more middle-class people representative. There are two sides to this story and both sides should be heard.

The Revolutionary War was the war that broke us away from Great Britain.

The United States had its own country. The United States was technically its own country now. They had their own set of rules and regulations. “ We hold these truths to be self-evident: that every man is created equal; that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness..” (unknown author. “The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America”.

Unknown State. Congress, July 4th, 1776. ) This shows that the U.S was going to be different than the rest of the world. They were going to have equal rights for everyone. Another major thing that the U.S had at the time was every social class could represent.No one else in the world had this. It did not start this way but over time more and more social classes were able to represent their respective area. This can be seen in Document D. There is a graph showing the social classes and the years 1765 and 1785.

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In 1765, wealthy and well-to-do people were representing 83% of New Hampshire, New Jersey, and New York. In 1785, that number dropped to 38% and the moderate class had 62% of the representatives (Turner, Jackson, “Government by the People: The American Revolution and the Democratization of the Legislatures.” Unknown State. William and Mary Quarterly, 1966). You can also see something similar to this in Document C. You can see men playing billiards. Some of the men are dressed fancy and the other men are dressed casually. This shows the different social classes being together and not being restricted to who they can associate with. ( Latrobe Henry, Benjamin. “Billiards in Hanover-Town”. Baltimore, Maryland, Maryland Historical Society, November 1767). This is how our country was different and how it was revolutionary.

Our country also did some things not so revolutionary. Abigail Adams wrote to her husband, John Adams before he went to the Congressional meeting. She wanted women to have some rights because at the moment, women had little to no rights. She said “ I desire you to remember the ladies, and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors” (Adams, Abigail. “ The Book of Abigail and John: Selected Letters of the Adams Family”. Cambridge, Massachusetts. Harvard University Press. 1963). This shows that women STILL did not have rights even after they had their own country that was not ruled by Britain. At that time, no women anywhere had rights but the U.S could have been different. Another example is a young African American man who got valedictorian at his school. He stated “ Shall I be a merchant. No one will employ me; White boys won’t work with me. Shall I be a merchant. No one will have me in his office; white clerks won’t associate with me” ( Unknown Author. “ Speech Made By a Young African-American in 1819, Valedictorian of his New York free school”. Unkown City. Leon Litwack, 1961). He is talking about how he is so smart but he cannot get the same job as a white man even if he is just as or more qualified than the white person also applying for the job. This is something else Britain had. African Americans had no rights once so ever. This shows that the U.S was not revolutionary in some aspects.

In conclusion, The United States had some revolutionary ideas but also had some not-so-revolutionary ideas. The point is, that the U.S went on to fix all these problems. Some of the problems took hundreds of years such as the rights of women and African Americans. Some of the problems took little to no time to fix such as representatives and

Land reform. Everything the U.S did then is still affecting us now. Because of slavery, the races in America still do not have the trust of other races. Every social class now has people representing them in Washington right now. Saying this, the U.S was revolutionary, but also kept some of the horrible qualities of Britain.