Was the American Revolution Just?

[hakcenter]

I have a hard time finding justice in any war because when you basically boil all the BS out of it what you have are a bunch of average every day people who probably never had any real say in what was going on around them end up killing and maiming a bunch of other regular everyday people on the other end who's only difference was they were born on the other side of some line drawn on a map. I just cant find any justice in that. As for the necessity of war thats an unfortunate part of the world we live in.

You put entirely too much emphasis on who the people ARE and not what their fighting FOR.

The freedoms that people take for granted every single day, for the rest of their life disgust me. But that doesn't make average joe death's any lesser even if we never won in the first place.

How people can argue over the justice of a revolution about the country they even live in.. is just completely absurd. Who's team are you really on ? These people spit on the faces of all the dead soldiers, women and children that got us to where we are today have some damn respect, those are graves your standing on.

It is never about justice, for the American Revolution, if you want to put some kind of label on the people. It was the INjustice they received from their country. Apparently it was worth dying over, who are you whine and complain about the soldiers that choose to be ? I don't remember there ever being a draft in the history books for the revolution.

[Gryff]

How people can argue over the justice of a revolution about the country they even live in.. is just completely absurd. Who's team are you really on ? These people spit on the faces of all the dead soldiers, women and children that got us to where we are today have some damn respect, those are graves your standing on.

[3rdI]

How does one determine what is "just" and unjust?

[Francis Marion]

Captain Levi Preston

Source: Liberty and Freedom by David Hackett Fischer, Oxford University Press, 2005, pp 1-2.

A Conversation with Captain Preston

In the year 1843, a bright young scholar named Mellen Chamberlain was collecting evidence on the origins of the American Revolution. He interviewed Captain Levi Preston, ninety-one years old, a cantankerous Yankee who had fought on the day of Lexington and Concord.

"Captain Preston," the historian began, "what made you go to the Concord Fight?" The old soldier bristled at the idea that anyone had made him fight.

"What did I go for?" he replied. The scholar missed his meaning and tried again.

"Were you oppressed by the Stamp Act?"

"I never saw any stamps," Captain Preston answered, "and I always understood that none were ever sold."

"Well, what about the tea tax?"

"Tea tax? I never drank a drop of the stuff. The boys threw it all overboard."

"But I suppose you had been reading Harrington, Sidney, Locke and the eternal principle of Liberty?"

"I never heard of these men," Captain Preston said. "The only books we had were the Bible, the Catechism, Watts' Psalms, and hymns and the almanacs."

"Well, then, what was the matter?"

"Young man," Captain Preston replied, "What we meant in going for those Redcoats was this: we always had been free, and we meant to be free always. They didn't mean we should."

[Wherryj]

War sucks. The winner writes history. Everything else is circle jerking.

I believe that you just succinctly paraphrased the essence of life.

[Wherryj]

How does one determine what is "just" and unjust?

Much like ethics, it depends upon one's point of view.

[Decoligny]

"That's the problem with war today, it's too clean."

You obviously haven't seen war 'today'.

Compared to past wars, today's war, i.e. Iraq/Afghanistan are clean as the driven snow.

WWI ~ 16 Million Dead - 21 Million Wounded
WWII ~ 54 Million Dead
Korean War ~ 2 Million Dead
Vietnam War ~ 5 Million Dead
Iraq War - ~ 500 thousand Dead

[GuyW]

....I've apparently stumbled into a parallel (and stupid) universe....
.

[Nodda Duma]

Was not the American Revolution - on the American side - fought entirely by volunteers? They knew what they were getting into. They fought for liberty and freedom, and enough volunteers felt justified to fight in that war that the Colonists were able to sustain their efforts for 6 bloody years and realize the objective of self-governance.

-Jason

[hakcenter]

Was not the American Revolution - on the American side - fought entirely by volunteers? They knew what they were getting into. They fought for liberty and freedom, and enough volunteers felt justified to fight in that war that the Colonists were able to sustain their efforts for 6 bloody years and realize the objective of self-governance.

-Jason

That's what I remember, and they mostly won from guerrilla warfare tactics ? I don't believe the red coats were used to being shot from behind trees