Revolutions in America and France

Beginning of article

The American and French Revolutions, separated by eight years, invoked similar principles of human rights, yet the two were radically different.

When Parliament tried to impose taxes on the colonies after they had enjoyed 150 years of freedom from parliamentary rule, the colonials resisted, denying Parliament's authority to govern America without American representation. At first the colonials demanded their rights as English subjects, but when their "British brethren" repeatedly rejected every appeal, the colonies declared independence from Britain and the birth of a new nation based on the natural right of all men to govern themselves by consent under "the laws of Nature …