The Freedoms We Lost: Consent and Resistance in Revolutionary America

The Freedoms We Lost is an ambitious historical analysis of the American revolution that reinterprets the gains and losses experienced by ordinary Americans and challenges the easy narrative that subsumes the growth of “freedom” into the story of the American nation. Esteemed historian Barbara Clark Smith proposes that many ordinary Americans were in fact more free on the eve of Revolution than they were two decades later.

Smith curator of political history at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History wishes to re examine the idea of freedom and consider some ways in which Americans before the Revolution while lacking the freedom of citizenship possessed a different kind of freedom that we have lost. In a somewhat scholarly study Smith finds that many colonists believed that ordinary men had the knowledge and status to govern their everyday lives establish and enforce community standards laws and goals. This form of political agency was often expressed through the household neighborhood or congregation. But eventually municipal and other authorities began exercising these functions that had previously been a prerogative of "the people"—replacing direct participation with representation and placing government rather than the people at the heart of political life. Smith's useful study sounds a cautionary note to groups using colonial life to illustrate an essential thread of liberty running through American history but her overall thesis could have been demonstrated in a journal article. (Jan.) " Publishers Weekly Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved."

"Smith, curator of political history at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, wishes to re-examine the idea of freedom and consider some ways in which Americans before the Revolution, while lacking the freedom of citizenship, possessed a different kind of freedom that we have lost. In a somewhat scholarly study, Smith finds that many colonists believed that ordinary men had the knowledge and status to govern their everyday lives, establish and enforce community standards, laws, and goals. This form of political agency was often expressed through the household, neighborhood, or congregation. But eventually municipal and other authorities began exercising these functions that had previously been a prerogative of 'the people' — replacing direct participation with representation, and placing government, rather than the people, at the heart of political life. Smith's useful study sounds a cautionary note to groups using colonial life to illustrate an essential thread of liberty running through American history, but her overall thesis could have been demonstrated in a journal article. (Jan.)" Publishers Weekly (Copyright PWyxz LLC)

Barbara Clark Smith is the curator of political history at the Smithsonians National Museum of American History. Her publications include After the Revolution and “Revolution in Boston,” a handbook for the National Park Service Freedom Trail. She lives in Washington, D.C. This is her first trade book.