Intellectual ChangeEnlightenment- Age of Reason – rationalism over superstition- Scientific Revolution established Natural Laws - Political theorists tried to define the ‘natural laws’ of politics and human interaction

Benjamin Franklin - most prominent American of the Enlightenment - printer, scientist, inventor, writer, statesman - Poor Richard’s Almanac, library, fire company, bifocal glasses, Franklin Stove, lightning is electricity, American Philosophical Society

Freedom of the PressJohn Peter Zenger Case (1735)

John Locke in Three Sentences-Two Treatises on Civil Government-Glorious Revolution

1) People have natural rights of life, liberty, & property

2) People form governments to protect their natural rights

3) If the government does not protect their natural rights people have the right and duty to overthrow or free themselves from that government

Religious Change- Halfway Covenant (1690’s)- Great Awakening (1730’s-1750’s) - Change in denominations - from old lights, Congregational and Anglican, - to new lights, Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian - New Colleges to teach ministers (Ivy League schools) - Jonathan Edwards – “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” - George Whitefield – visiting English minister- Questioning Authority - disputing the authority of churches made it easier to question the authority of the British government

The Emergence of an American National Character

- The colonists developed an outlook and way of life very different from the English

- Influenced by: their motivations for leaving Europe, English political heritage, America’s natural environment

- Exercised free speech and freedom of the press

- Became accustomed to electing representatives to colonial assemblies and accepting government and taxation by them

- No hereditary aristocracy

- Tolerance of a variety of religions

- Intellectual, economic, and religious change during the early 1700’s contributed to the American mindset of questioning authority