How Did The Enlightenment Ideas Influence The American Revolution

The Enlightenment greatly affected colonial thinking regarding the religious, political, and governmental processes in America. It was an intellectual and scientific movement of the 17th and18th century which was characterized by the scientific approach to religious, political, social, and economic issues. During this time, many philosophers were influenced, by which in turn greatly affected the colonies. Next to promoting human reasoning which eventually led to America’s independence from Britain, it also influenced American life directly in the colonies. Many ideas of the Enlightenment can be found in the shaping of the Unites States in its formative years. It

Both the Enlightenment and the Great awakening caused the colonists to alter their views about government, the role of government, as well as society at large which ultimately and collectively helped to motivate the colonists to revolt against England. The Enlightenment was vital in almost every part of the founding of America, which included everything from government, to politics itself, as well as religion. Many of the ideas from the Enlightenment and the Great Awakening shaped our country as a whole in its seminal years, inspiring everything from the American Revolution, to the Constitution, and even electricity and stoves. Without the central ideas and figures of both the Great Awakening and the Enlightenment era, the United States

The American Revolution started when Britain started to tax the colonists without their consent. The stamp acts started a chain reaction of discontent. The colonists realized they were being treated unfairly and unequal to the citizens in Britain. Around this time when the Americans were facing discontent, many Enlightenment ideas were spreading. The colonists took many ideas like John Locke’s into mind when they planned their revolts. They were fighting for natural rights of

There were many people that helped contribute to the Enlightenment, but the most prominent American leader was a well-know political figure named Benjamin Franklin. The Enlightenment, also called the Age of Reason, was period of time when people tried to justify life in terms of scientific theory and rationalism. “The Enlightenment was responsible for inspiring revived interests in education, science, and literature” (“HistoryKing.com”). It also emphasized progression away from traditional customs and foundations

The Enlightenment was the root of many of the ideas of the American Revolution. It was a movement that focused mostly on freedom of speech, equality, freedom of press, and religious tolerance. The American Revolution was the time period where America tried to gain its independence from England. They got influenced very much from many philosophers. That will be discussed throughout the essay. The Enlightenment ideas were the main influences for American Colonies to become their own nation.

The enlightenment era arose in the modern cultural ideology of the 18th century, as ideas among philosophers had a widespread effect among the society. The age of enlightenment, in western society, projected the rejection of traditional Christianity, western philosophy, intellectual advances, scientific, and cultural life, government legitimacy and authority. Upon the enlightenment period multiple philosophers emerged, the individuals arose to leading figures using reason to understand all aspects of human life. The motivations for the enlightenment came primarily from the Englishmen, John Locke. John Locke was a philosophical influence in both political theory and theoretical philosophy, which was embraced among the era of 1789-1914 and

To begin, the main objective of enlightenment was to development the society using reasons, and stimulating the rational though. Enlightenment, also, created a path for independent thought, on the areas of physics, mathematics, politics, economics, and medicine. John Locke made a huge impact on the America colonist by stating the natural rights of life, liberty and property. The most important federal papers were the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. In 1776, the Continental congress declared the Declaration of Independence. The Declaration of Independence is extremely important because Americans were stating that they were able to hold their own grown and did not need any of Great Britain’s laws.

The renowned enlightenment philosopher, John Locke believes in the same principles that the Americans faced when making their difficult decision in 1765. The American Revolution wasn’t just out of pure disagreement from the British, it was based upon Enlightenment principles. Locke, an Enlightenment philosopher, believed that people could improve themselves. The counterargument of the American Revolution not occurring discredits the Americans new way of governing and becoming independent. Enlightenment is entirely based upon questioning the higher power, the British monarchy did not settle to the Americans in the 1700s who believed that the British power was going overboard, in which they decided to revolt.

The American Revolution was precipitated by the irritation of the wealthy due to tax acts imposed by Britain on the colonies. The rich did not like the taxes because of the negative effect the tax acts had on personal financial interests, but the Colonial masses were convinced by men like John Dickinson and Patrick Henry; Dickinson wrote extensively on how the British collection of taxes on the Colonies was illegal and Henry believed taxation shouldn’t be allowed unless the Colonies were properly represented. The writings of John Locke were also influential in creating interest for breaking away from Great Britain.

Enlightenment: The Enlightenment was an eighteenth-century movement in Western philosophy. It was an age of optimism; the movement was the idea that believed reason and knowledge could lead to progress and advancements in a society. At its core was a critical questioning of traditional institutions, customs, and morals as well as questioning government especially the monarch. The significance of the Enlightenment was that it became the idea and thought that we, the people have all right to question the government and have the right to overthrow the leader if the leader is corrupt. Many people of the Enlightenment were John Locke, Baron de Montesquieu, and Thomas Paine all these men help construct the ideas the United States would construct onto their Constitution. The ideas

Americans were very loyal to the British government in until, Britain started taxing them without their consent, this led the American government to rally for freedom and eventually by 1775 the Americans were no longer loyal to Britain. Britain was in deep debt because of the French and Indian war and expected the Colonists to pay without warning. This caused the colonists to start to defy the the British rule. Then people were convincing the Colonists who were so loyal to the crown to defy by writing persuasive things, like Thomas Paine’s Common Sense. Britain did not approve of this and still wanted America to be under their control and their control only. This inspired groups and movements to fight for freedom from the British.

The government shifted after the Glorious Revolution. The government went from, an appointed royal governor to an elected assembly which changed how the people were governed. Now, only the white man was allowed to vote and the elite whites had more authority and more say so in politics and government than the lower classes. The Enlightenment was more prominent in the cities of North America, because that's where the educated “thinkers” were found. In these cities the Enlightenment brought up the idea of Deism (Chapter-4). Deism is a belief in a God who created the world but remained indifferent to it (“Deism”). The Enlightenment shaped and affected the entire world, it brought new advances and made people began to think more about how things work and how they work together. The Enlightenment was world-wide, this brought new advancements to the colonist and new ideas. It made the people question what they thought and believed and how to live that out. The Enlightenment challenged people in many ways and brought about many new things which helped prosper the colonies as a whole (Boyer). Another thing that helped the colonist was the Great Awakening, it brought racial and gender lines. THe Great Awakening started to bring about little ideas and thoughts about equality, which is a huge thing that was brought about in the Enlightenment

The American government has been greatly influenced by important philosophers from historic times. The Enlightenment was a time period consisting of a group of intellectuals who were of great importance, during the Enlightenment. These intelligent philosophers became curious and used logic and reason to form their ideas. The ideas from philosophers Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Voltaire, Baron de Montesquieu, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and Cesare Beccaria have acted as a foundation for the formation of the American government after the American Revolution. Philosophies from Locke and Hobbes have unquestionably impacted the way the modern American government works.

The enlightenment had a big impact on today's government and on us as people. For instance the bill of rights helped create and shape the laws that we have today. People have different views on things because of what they did when the country was just beginning. We have freedom to enjoy because of the ideas that were vocalized.

The glorious revolution involved conflict between monarchs and the parliament and the the conflict influenced new ideas of the government and people started depending less on religion reasoning and relied more on scientific reasoning lead to famous philosophers such as Thomas hobbes and john locke.