How Did The Enlightenment Contribute To The Success Of The American Revolution

The Enlightenment was a revolution of ideas that changed perspectives and inspired people throughout the world to revolt against despotic forms of government. Some key ideas of the Enlightenment were equality, liberty, consent of the governed and freedom of thought. Enlightenment thinkers developed ambitious goals for humanity, but putting their ideas into practice was challenging within the framework of the societies in which they lived. This is why their ideas ignited revolutions. Colonial revolts based on Enlightenment ideas shook America in 1776 and Haiti in 1791. These revolutions were idealistically driven, but were not fully successful. While the American Revolution ultimately achieved the Enlightenment ideals of democratic self governance, but only for properly white men, the Haitian Revolution, while managing to abolish slavery, failed to even achieve the basic

Afraid still of despotism, the American revolutionaries sought to ensure that the people’s rights would not be infringed by adopting Montesquieu’s idea that a separation of powers would prevent tyranny. This resulted in the system of checks and balances which has proved remarkably successful in preventing the rise of tyranny over the past 200 years. The American experiment therefore succeeded in establishing one of the most stable democratic governments of its time, however, it ultimately failed in ensuring equality for all and thereby achieving a system in which the consent of the governed actually occurred. The Haitian Revolution, unlike the American Revolution, managed to abolish slavery, thus fulfilling the Enlightenment ideals of equality; however, it failed to establish a democratically elected and stable government. The Haitian Revolution involved a long struggle for equality among slaves and freemen of color against their French