In a Defiant Stance: The Conditions of Law in Massachusetts Bay, the Irish Comparison, and the Coming of the American RevolutionThe minimum of violence accompanying the success of the American Revolution resulted in large part, argues this book, from the conditions of law the British allowed in the American colonies. By contrast, Ireland's struggle for independence was prolonged, bloody, and bitter largely because of the repressive conditions of law imposed by Britain. Examining the most rebellious American colony, Massachusetts Bay, Professor Reid finds that law was locally controlled while imperial law was almost nonexistent as an influence on the daily lives of individuals. In Ireland the same English common law, because of imperial control of legal machinery, produced an opposite result. The Irish were forced to resort to secret, underground violence. The author examines various Massachusetts Bay institutions to show the consequences of whig party control, in contrast to the situation in 18th-century Ireland. A general conclusion is that law, the conditions of positive law, and the matter of who controls the law may have more significant effects on the course of events than is generally assumed. |
From inside the book
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... than can the French. The American Revolution, after all, sprang from a constitutional history and a tradition of civil and political rights that the colonists inherited / In the Very Face of Government The American Comparison.
... constitutional history and a tradition of civil and political rights that the colonists inherited from England and were not shared with Bourbon France . To discover that the American Revolution was less violent than the French may show ...
... constitutional yearnings that gave birth to rebellion in eighteenth - century America . Certainly the misrule and exploitation that produced the bloody history of modern Ireland was never practiced in the colonies across the Atlantic ...
... constitutional practice — that a member should vote as directed by his patron or resign . Less wealthy borough owners either served themselves or sold their seats to others who were free to deal on their own.14 Private gain was the ...
... constitutional argument also had to be different . Irish reformers were primarily intent on changing parliament , making it both representative and responsible to the people , Catholics as well as Protestants . The Americans sought to ...
Contents
1 | |
7 | |
17 | |
27 | |
Juries Lie Open to Management The Uses of the Grand Jury | 41 |
In Defiance of the Threats The Criminal Traverse Jury | 55 |
Unless Laws Are Enforced The Legitimacy of Whig Law | 65 |
By Consent of the Council The Import of Local Control | 74 |
Disjointed and Independent of Each Other The Conditions of Imperial Law | 100 |
The Government They Have Set Up The Emergence of Whig Government | 118 |
The Oppression of Centuries The Irish Comparison | 135 |
A Most Dreadful Ruin The Legal Mind of BritishRuled Ireland | 143 |
To Effect a Revolution The Execution of Imperial Law | 150 |
Enforced by Mobs The Rule of Law | 160 |
Notes | 174 |
Acknowledgments | 219 |
The Seeds of Anarchy The Execution of Whig Law | 85 |
The Same Leaven with the People The Legal Mind of the American Whig | 92 |
Index | 220 |