American Revolution Books for Adult

I’m basically in the same boat you are! We will begin studying early American history next year, and I am mostly following Truth Quest’s American History for Younger Students Guide. In it, Michelle recommends some books for parents. The two I’m buying for sure for myself are The Story of Liberty and Sweet Land of Liberty, both by Charles Coffin. If you follow the TQ guide, it tells you which chapters to read in which book so that you’re fresh for that event/battle/person history lesson. She also recommends The Light and the Glory by Marshall & Manuel.

I hope that helps us both!

Lindsey

These take some time, but I really enjoyed The Prelude to Glory series. It follows a family through the Revolution and ends after the War of 1812.

I find it telling that at Amazon, under the frequently bought section, The…Constitution is paired with Rules for Radicals. 

In the reviews, multiple reviewers claim that there is no Bibliography. Is that true, Bluej? If that is the case, then I’d say that’s a poor reflection on scholarship. A reader should always able to go and look things up for themselves. A founding principle of personal education to maintain freedom from rulership.

I’d like to see a book that aspouses the atheistic/progressive attempt of using Jefferson’s words as Constitutional principle, but with contextual support from the Founders. Does it exist? 

I also think it’s a useful mental exercise to remember that our Founders’ history is our ancient history. They were babies of the Age of Reason and knew the history of the successes and failures of the Greek democracy, Rome, and the European continent under centuries church domination and the in-fighting between Protestants and Catholics and the havoc that caused: forced conversions, national conversion (i.e. England’s back-and-forth Protestantism and Catholicism) and beliefs that led to wars and oppressions, not to mention the feudal system, which the Founders’ didn’t want repeated. Most importantly, they were also serious students of the Bible, and able to critically debate it individually- unlike our own and most recent generations, IMO – and also weren’t as dogmatic about “denominations” or a set of beliefs as determining one’s inclusion into development of the country: republicanism existed both in Jefferson, the classical unitarian, and in Prebysterian Rev. John Witherspoon. They were liberals in the classical sense, not in the modern/progressive sense.

Also, going back further into the arguments for personal liberty as espoused in the English Parliament is very helpful.

I also think it’s interesting to see the differences between the failure of the French Rev. and the success of ours. I think that if the modern secularists had been the ones who were handling it back then,  we would have ended up similarly to the French. Reading the letters between Adams and Jefferson about the French Rev. is quite interesting. Adams and Washington were correct; Jefferson and Paine were not.

It’s all so interesting!

“Our Constitution was made for a moral and religious people.” John Adams

Now, one can be moral and ethical and still be an atheist and respect the religious freedom of others. An atheist should recognize natural rights and natural law, which keeps tyranny at bay; which benefits their own personal interest of being atheist.

Adams also said to the Arab Barbery pirates that we weren’t a “Christian nation”. It’s important to remember that he was writing from the perspective of the history between the Arabs and the Catholic Church (not to mention the Jews caught in the middle) and how historically, the nations were defined by their religious designation. America was not defined the same way as the historical Arab and Christian nations of the Near East and Europe. Does that make sense? I get annoyed when secular people bring up Adams’ quote to prove the “separation of church and state”. Context, context, context!

Sorry for the long post. I love this topic. Dear OP, my apologies to taking it too far if I did.

*add Democracy in America to the list for a visitor’s view of our nation in the 19th cen.