The period from 1680 to about 1720 was one of the most complex and difficult in the history of British politics, to contemporaries as well as to posterity. The parameters of political obligation were decisively shifted by the Revolution of 1688; statesmen and politicians had now to accustom themselves to the novelty of a parliament in session every year; Britain was almost continuously engaged in the most ambitious and expensive wars in her history to date; political parties were slow to form, and of doubtful repute when they did. Professor Kenyon's Ford Lectures, delivered in Oxford in 1976 and now published as a paperback for the first time, remain a standard account of the period. For this reissue, Professor Kenyon has written a new preface which discusses the book in the light of recent historiography.

Republication of the Principles and Acts of the Revolution in America or, an attempt to collect and preserve some of the speeches, orations, & proceedings, with sketches and remarks on men and things, and other fugitive or neglected pieces, belonging to the men of the revolutionary period in the United States.

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1800 edition. Excerpt: ... that the world ever beheld. They drew up, without ever so much as asking the free assent of the king, a constitUr tion so called, the incompetency, the impracticability, the ridiculous absurdity of which was so great, that, even among its authors--(another unexampled yet indubitable fact) not a single man would ever have seriously defended it. This constitution they compelled the king, upon pain of being immediately dethroned, to subscribe and swear to. Scarcely had this happened, when their successors, who by virtue of this constitution alone, had a sort of legal existence, and held something resembling an authority to shew, them. The colonies wished to rnaintaiaiheir old constitution; the government.destroyed it. The resistance, which the colonies opposed against the mother country, was, in every period of this unhappy contest, exactly commensurate with the attack; the total separation was not resolved, until the utter impossibility of preserving the ancient condition was proved. The stamp-act threw America into the most violent commotion; tumultuous scenes, though attended with no acts of bloody violence, broke out in all the provinces. But they were no where formally sanctioned by the approbation of the legislative authorities. The litde congress of 28 deputies of several colonies, who in the year 1765 assembled at New-York, and served as the model for the subsequent larger assembly, passed no other resolution than that " the colonies could only be taxed by their representatives," and expressed this perfectly lawful resolve, in petitions to the king. The single general measure, which was then offered, the non-importation agreement, was a voluntary engagement, sanctioned by no public authorityV: The declaratory act, ...