The problem that exists between our government and its people today and what existed between the revolutionists and England in the 1700s, is one of a difference in form, rather than substance. That’s because, in both instances, whether we’re talking about England or our country here, in the 21^st century, the abuses were the same in substance (loss of our Nation’s Integrity), but different in kind (or in the way the abuses were expressed), all of which I discuss in my book What Would Our Founding Fathers Say?: How Today’s Leaders Have Lost Their Way.

In order to understand more fully the problems that existed between the revolutionists and England in the 1700s, we must appreciate the culture that existed at the time.

First, we must remember that those who left their homelands to migrate to the new world separated themselves in fundamental ways from those who would not or could not make that journey. If we assume that the people who chose to come were different, then we can say that the roots of the American Revolution actually go back to the old countries, and that the people who left were in a sense already in a state of unrest and revolt, or revolution.

Secondly, the settling of a new frontier in America was a great leveler since the skills needed for survival in a wilderness environment were independent of a person’s social or cultural background. What America needed and bred were hardy people who were strong in mind and body, tough enough to withstand the rigors of colonial life, and they were not the sort of people who were likely to take kindly to a dominating authority, such as England, attempting to control their lives.

The American Revolutionary era began in 1763, when the British, with the colonists help, won the French and Indian War, which ended the French military threat to British North American Colonies.

England’s violation of our country’s integrity began when it felt the colonists should be willing to help pay its Mother country for some of the expenses of helping the colonists win the French and Indian War by agreeing to have various import taxes levied on future goods received and services rendered. In response, Benjamin Franklin appeared before the British Parliament and testified “The Colonies raised, clothed, and paid, during the last war (French and Indian war), near twenty-five thousand men, and spent many millions,” and expressed his feelings that the colonies need not pay any additional taxes since what they gave was payment enough.

After years of enduring legislation such as the Quartering Act, which forced colonists to board British troops; the stamp Act, which forced colonists to use a special taxed paper for many official documents; and Tea Act, which levied a tax on tea without offering any representation in British Parliament in return, in addition to many other nuisance and annoying taxes, the colonists began to escalate the conflict.

First came the Boston Tea Party in 1773, in which Boston colonists boarded tea ships and dumped the tea into the Boston Harbor in protest of various infringements on their rights. Then came the shot heard ‘round the world, a skirmish between local militiamen and British troops in Lexington, Massachusetts, in 1775.

With that, the Revolutionary War was on.

Because the colonists’ mother country, England, did not serve them well, ultimately, our fledging nation had to declare their independence from England. The list of grievances that precipitated the Revolutionary War were clearly stated in the Declaration of Independence, which I also discuss in some depth in my book.