King and People in Provincial Massachusetts
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Description
The American revolutionaries themselves believed the change from monarchy to republic was the essence of the Revolution. King and People in Provincial Massachusetts explores what monarchy meant to Massachusetts under its second charter and why the momentous change to republican government came about. Richard L. Bushman argues that monarchy entailed more than having a king as head of state: it was an elaborate political culture with implications for social organization as well. Massachusetts, moreover, was entirely loyal to the king and thoroughly imbued with that culture. Why then did the colonies become republican in 1776? The change cannot be attributed to a single thinker such as John Locke or to a strain of political thought such as English country party rhetoric. Instead, it was the result of tensions ingrained in the colonial political system that surfaced with the invasion of parliamentary power into colonial affairs after 1763.
ISBN
9780807843987
Publication Date
1992
Publisher
University of North Carolina Press
City
Chapel Hill
Keywords
Colonial America, history, monarchy
Disciplines
History | United States History
Recommended Citation
Bushman, Richard. King and People in Provincial Massachusetts. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1992.
