The Language of Liberty 1660-1832: Political Discourse and Social Dynamics in the Anglo-American World

422 Pages·1993·12.77 MB·English

by  J. C. D. Clark

This book creates a new framework for the political and intellectual rela-
tions between the British Isles and America in a momentous period which
witnessed the formation of modern states on both sides of the Atlantic and
the overthrow of an Anglican, aristocratic and monarchical order.
Jonathan Clark integrates evidence from law and religion to explain these
events by revealing how the dynamics of early modern societies were essen-
tially denominational. In a study of British and American political dis-
course, he shows how law and religion were profoundly related and how
rival conceptions of liberty were expressed in the conflicts created by Prot-
estant Dissent's hostility to an Anglican hegemony. The book argues that
this model provides a key to collective acts of resistance to the established
order throughout the period. Its final section focuses on the defining episode
for British and American history, and shows the way in which the American
Revolution can be understood as a war of religion.
The Language of Liberty stands as part of a project aimed at revising our
map of early modern English-speaking societies, which includes Dr Clark's
previous books English Society 1688-1832 (1985) and Revolution and Rebellion
(1986). This work has implications for both Britain's and the USA's under-
standings of their historical identities and present predicaments.

THE LANGUAGE OF LIBERTY

THE
LANGUAGE
OF LIBERTY
l66o—1832
Political discourse and social dynamics
in the Anglo-American world
J. C. D. CLARK
SI CAMBRIDGE
UNIVERSITY PRESS
Published by the Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge
The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge CB2 IRP
40 West 20th Street, New York, NY I 00 I I -4211, USA
10 Stamford Road, Oakleigh, Melbourne 3166, Australia
© Cambridge University Press 1994
First published 1994
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress cataloguing in publication data
ISBN o 521 44510 8 hardback
ISBN o 521 44957 x paperback
Transferred to digital printing 2004
Contents
Preface Page xi
Acknowledgements xv
List of abbreviations xvi
INTRODUCTION: THE STRUCTURE OF ANGLO-AMERICAN
POLITICAL DISCOURSE I
I Law, religion and sovereignty i
II Constitutional innovations and their English antecedents 6
III The genesis of political discourse 10
IV Transatlantic ties and their failure 13
V The Commonwealth paradigm 20
VI Denominational discourse 29
VII The implications of theological conflict 35
VIII Denominational dynamics and political rebellions 41
I THE CONFLICT BETWEEN LAWS! SOVEREIGNTY AND
STATE FORMATION IN THE UNITED KINGDOM AND THE
UNITED STATES 46
I Law, nationality and nationalism: monarchical allegiance
and identity 46
II The creation of the United Kingdom, 1536-1801: religion
and the origins of the common-law doctrine of sovereignty 62
III Sovereignty in political theory from Justinian to the English
jurists 75
IV Natural law versus common law: the polarisation of a
common idiom 93
V Sovereignty, Dissent and the American rejection of the
British state 111
VI Sovereignty and the New Republic: the American
constitution in transatlantic perspective 125
viii Contents
2 THE CONFLICT BETWEEN DENOMINATIONS I
THE RELIGIOUS IDENTITY OF EARLY-MODERN
SOCIETIES 141
I Before redefinition: politics and religion in the old society 141
II Anglicanism as an agency of state formation: the question
of establishment 153
III Canon law, heterodoxy and the American perception of
tyranny 167
IV The Anglican ascendancy as the hegemony of discourse 180
V The Anglican dream: harmony and conflict in the English
parish 190
VI The Anglican nightmare: sectarian diversity in colonial
America 203
3 PREDISPOSITIONS: REBELLION AND ITS SOCIAL
CONSTITUENCIES IN THE ENGLISH ATLANTIC EMPIRE,
1660-1832 2l8
I Rebellions and their analysis in the Anglo-American tradition 218
II Covenanters, Presbyterians and Whigs: resistance to the
Stuarts in England and Scotland, 1660-1689 225
III Colonial American rebellions 1660-1689 and transatlantic
discourse 240
IV The rights of Englishmen, the rhetoric of slavery, and
rebellions in Britain and America, 1689-1760 249
V The right of resistance and its sectarian preconditions in
North America, 1760-1799 257
VI The rhetoric of resistance and its social constituencies
in England and Ireland, 1733-1832: some transatlantic
analogies 282
VII Denominations, social constituencies and their activation 290
4 POLITICAL MOBILISATION: THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION
AS A WAR OF RELIGION 296
I The American Revolution as a civil war 296
II Predispositions, accelerators and catalysts: the role of
theology 303
III Heterodox and orthodox in the Church of England 311
IV The divisions and disruptions of English Dissent 317
V Heterodoxy and rebellion in colonial America, 1760-1776 335
Contents ix
(A) The American Anglicans 339
(B) The American Presbyterians 351
(C) The American Gongregationalists 363
(D) The American Baptists 372
CONCLUSION: 'DESOLATING DEVASTATION':
THE ORIGINS OF ANGLO-AMERICAN DIVERGENCE 382
Index 392