Hello and welcome to a history of the United States.

Episode 77.

The Yellow Umbrella.

In 1856, Alexis de Tocqueville published the Ancian Regime la Revolution.

It contained the passage, quote,

It is not always the going from bad to worse that causes a revolution.

It happens more often that the people who have been born without complaint,

and apparently without feeling, most oppressive laws,

throw them off violently as soon as their weight lightens.

The system that a revolution destroys is almost always better than that which immediately preceded it,

and experience teaches that the most dangerous moment for a bad government is usually that in which

it begins to reform." End quote. Tocqueville was trying to come to terms with two drastic events

that occurred in the late 18th century, the American Revolution and the French Revolution.

While this passage is certainly outdated, it does possess elements of truth.

The problems facing the British Empire at the end of the 18th century were caused by its

successes, not by its failures. Just as over the

coming episodes we need to evaluate what was going on in the various American colonies that

led them from where we are presently in the narrative about 1680, we also need to examine what happened in

Britain that brought them to that same point. Now, we have only just begun moving the narrative

with purpose towards the revolution. So my thoughts on the subject are in their very early stages.

The time of writing is 9.24pm on the 30th of April 2017.

And who knows how long it will be until we actually cover the revolution itself.

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