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Lee ENG Honors 11 26 November 2013 Rebellion Chorus Revolutionary Americas Thomas Paine fanned the burgeoning flames of rebellion against British taxation with his pamphlet Common Sense, the sales of which ultimately reached half a million copies (438), and which functioned as a landflood that [swept] all before it[sweeping aside] much of the lingering allegiance to King George III [and] paving the way for the Declaration of Independence (Ibid). As the embers of one fire often start another, Paines writings birthed (or closely coincided with) written threats of rebellion on behalf of womens rights from Abigail Adams and Hannah Griffitts, the anti-slavery movement from Thomas Jefferson and Absalom Jones, and religious freedom from Tecumseh and George Washington. Adams and Griffitts were two of the primary womens-rights figures of the 18th century and their writings expressed a dream for gender equality. In a letter to her husband, John Adams, prior to the completion of the Declaration of Independence, Abigail Adams beseeched him to Remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favourable to them than your ancestors, (443), in constructing the new Code of Laws, (443). Indeed, Abigail Adams went so far as to express sexist views against men, portraying them as having pusillanimity and cowardise, (Ibid), and stating that all Men would be tyrants if they could, (Ibid). She finishes with a threat: If [particular] care and attention is not paid to the [ladies] we are determined to foment a [rebellion], and will not hold ourselves bound by any Laws in which we have no voice, or Representation, (Ibid). Griffitts, a female poet, more subtly expresses her feminist views in The Female Patriots. Since the Menare keptso quietly downLet the Daughters of

Liberty nobly arisetrust me a Woman, by honest Invention, / Might give [America] a Dose of Prevention, (436-7). Men were off fighting the Revolutionary War; in their absence, women took over and ran their farms and businesses. In The Female Patriots, Griffitts expresses disdain for the mens failure in the war (how they are keptso quietly down) and praises womens role in the war, saying that they can do a better job than their husbands. Griffitts drives her point home when she signs her alias as A Female before publishing the poem in the Pennsylvania Chronicle (436). Jefferson and Jones were major voices for the pre-Civil War anti-slavery movement. Jefferson wrote the first draft of the Declaration of Independence, which was then revised by Congress before being signed. Congress astonished Jefferson by removing his substantial antislavery section: [King George III] has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphereDetermined to keep open a market where MEN should be bought and sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or restrain this execrable commerce, (451). Jefferson believed that Congress had mangled his draft, (448), by removing his tirade against slavery in the Declaration of Independence. Jones, a freed black slave, wrote a Petition of the People of Colour to the President, Senate, and House of Representatives, (462), seeking anti-slavery measures in the Declaration. He stated that [we] humbly desire you [the writers of the Declaration of Independence] may exert every means in your power to undo the heavy burdens, and prepare the way for the oppressed to go free, that every yoke may be broken, (463), for the solemn compact, (462), of the Constitution is violated, by a trade carried on in a clandestine mannerthose poor helpless [slaves], like droves of cattle, are seized, fettered, and

hurried into places provided for this most horrid trafficleft to deplore the sad separation of the dearest ties in nature, husband from wife, and parents from children; thus packed together, they areinhumanly exposed to sale, (Ibid). Both Jones and Jefferson sought anti-slavery reforms in the Declaration, and their labor came to fruition nearly a century later with the passing of the Thirteenth Amendment. Both Tecumseh and Washington, the one a Native American and the other the head of the government crushing Native society, fought for religious freedom in their writings and their actions. Frightened by United States seizures of three million acres of [Native American] land, (464), Tecumseh foresaw the later suppression of Indian culture and religion, which included cutting mens hair, forcibly breaking up religious ceremonies, and banning traditional rituals and marital practices, (Maier, 546). [Inspired by] the Great Spirit, (465, Belasco), Tecumseh threatened to kill American conspirators among the Native chieftains (Ibid) if they didnt discontinue their war against Native land and society. Newly elected as President, Washington responded to fears of Jewish prosecution with the promise that the Government of the United States [would give] to bigotry no sanction [and] to persecution no assistance, (460), and the wish that the Children of the Stock of Abrahamcontinue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitantsand there shall be none to make him afraid, (Ibid). Rebellions abounded in the Revolutionary era: Washington and Tecumseh sought religious freedom, Jones and Jefferson pled against slavery, and Griffitts and Abigail Adams fought for womens rights. The Declaration of Independence served as the beginning of a new America, and these turmoils reflected different groups visions for the country as it was forged in its war of separation.

Works Cited: Belasco, Susan, et al. The Bedford Anthology of American Literature, Volume One: Beginnings to 1865. Print. St. Martins: 2008. 18 Sept. 2013. Maier, Pauline, et al. Inventing America: A History of the United States. 2nd Edition. Print. W. W. Norton & Company: 2006. November 2013.