The American Revolution

The American Revolution (1765–1783) was the political upheaval through which thirteen British colonies in North America declared independence, fought and won a war against the world's most powerful empire, and established a republic based on Enlightenment principles of popular sovereignty, natural rights, and constitutional government.

The revolution's origins lay in disputes over taxation and representation following the Seven Years' War (1756–1763). Britain's attempts to tax the colonies — the Stamp Act (1765), Townshend Acts (1767), Tea Act (1773) — without colonial consent provoked escalating resistance based on the principle of 'no taxation without representation.' The Declaration of Independence (1776), primarily authored by Thomas Jefferson, articulated a revolutionary philosophy: that 'all men are created equal' with 'unalienable Rights' to 'Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness,' and that governments derive their 'just powers from the consent of the governed.'

The war itself (1775–1783) was won through a combination of George Washington's leadership, French military and financial support, and the difficulty of projecting British power across an ocean. The Constitution of 1787 created a federal republic with separated powers, checks and balances, and a Bill of Rights — a political experiment that became a model for democratic movements worldwide. The revolution's promise of equality, however, coexisted with slavery, indigenous dispossession, and the exclusion of women from political life — contradictions that would take centuries to address.