In this broadcast, Bob Barney elaborates on the forgotten notion of "LIBERTY!"

Bob Barney---LIBERTY

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In recent years historians of the American Revolution have become increasingly convinced that political ideas, rather than material interests, were what ultimately led American colonists to fight for independence from Great Britain. During the years preceding the Revolution, Americans explained their resistance to British rule in principled terms. They understood liberty to be something real, valuable, and seriously threatened by British actions that were not merely impolitic but fundamentally unjust. American statesmen contended that certain basic principles had to rule governments, and they developed careful, complex arguments to persuade others, in the colonies and in Britain, that the British government was violating these principles to an extent that prudent, well-informed citizens could not allow. "The American Revolution and the Politics of Liberty" is an account of the political thought of the leaders of the American Revolution, authored by Robert H. Webking. He analyzes in turn the ideas of James Otis, Patrick Henry, John Dickinson, Samuel Adams, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson.