Ideological Origins of the American Revolution

The fiftieth-anniversary edition of the Pulitzer and Bancroft Prize-winning classic. “One cannot claim to understand the Revolution without having read this book.” —New York Times Book Review“[This book] influenced an entire generation of historians. For many, it remains the most persuasive interpretation of the Revolution.” —Gordon S. Wood, Wall Street Journal Awarded both the Pulitzer and the Bancroft prizes, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution has become a classic of American historical literature. Hailed at its first appearance as “the most brilliant study of the meaning of the Revolution to appear in a generation,” it was enlarged in a second edition to include the nationwide debate on the ratification of the Constitution, hence exploring not only the Founders’ initial hopes and aspirations but also their struggle to implement their ideas in constructing the national government. In a preface he wrote for this fiftieth-anniversary edition, Bernard Bailyn reconsidered key features of the book and highlighted the Founders’ profound concern with power. In pamphlets, letters, newspapers, and sermons, they returned again and again to the problem of the uses and misuses of power—the great benefits of power when gained and used by popular consent and the political and social devastation when acquired by those who seize it by force or other means and use it for their personal benefit. This fiftieth-anniversary edition has been welcomed by readers long familiar with Bailyn’s work and has introduced a new generation to a study that remains required reading for anyone seeking to understand the nation’s historical roots.