How Did The Enlightenment Influence The American Revolution

Did you know that the key ideas and thoughts from Enlightenment built a solid foundation that paved the way of the American revolution and to all of the things our country is today? The Enlightenment, also known as the Age of Reason, was a time period in the 17th and 18th century of a philosophical movement, that changed the way people thought and reasoned, enforced liberty, along with many other influential topics. The concepts that were to arise in the Enlightenment time were to further influence the American Revolution, along with many other revolutions and constitutions. The American Revolution was a political battle that took place between 1765 and 1783 where the colonists in the thirteen American colonies overthrew the power of

For example, the natural rights that Locke talks about are the “unalienable rights” in this quote from the Declaration of Independence, “ We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Thomas Jefferson, was heavily influenced by Enlightenment philosophy, which then as he wrote the Declaration of Independence, incorporated and stressed many Enlightenment ideas such as liberty, human rights and equality. The entire opening of the Declaration of Independence is Jefferson applying Locke’s ideas and the constitution as well as reflecting the enlightenment principles. Because colonists believed that the British government had destroyed their natural rights, they thought that the British had not followed the contract well. Therefore, the American colonists’ believed that they didn’t have the right to rule them and decided to fight back. Another quote reveals the influence of the social contract on the country’s founders, “ That whenever any form of government becomes so destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government. The Declaration of Independence echoes Locke’s ideas that such destruction

During this time Enlightenment thinkers, like John Locke, saw no reason why kings should rule rather than having people rule themselves. They believed that a more logical system was one in which the government existed by the consent of the people. They believed that a democracy was the best government that able to protect their natural rights and not take advantage of them. They realized that a monarchy would not protect them or live up the needed standards to be successful. Locke and many others believed that the government's’ duty was to guard and protect the natural rights of humans, life liberty and property. During this time, political attitudes changed and the american intellectuals absorbed these political ideas and then the leaders of the revolution used them to build a foundation of our country. In addition, human reasoning and thinking became to flourish, and people started to break away from traditional ways. The ideas of the Enlightenment encouraged Americans to break away from the traditional ideas of monarchy which then influenced them to demand the consent to be governed, and if they don’t agree with it to overthrow it. The ways of the Enlightenment helped give the Americans the ideas that they should become independent and use their own reasoning to make decisions to benefit them, not go with