
The Founding Fathers of the United States, often simply referred to as the Founding Fathers or the Founders, were a group of late-18th-century
American revolutionary leaders who
united the
Thirteen Colonies
The Thirteen Colonies were the British colonies on the Atlantic coast of North America which broke away from the British Crown in the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783), and joined to form the United States of America.
The Thirteen C ...
, oversaw the
War of Independence
Wars of national liberation, also called wars of independence or wars of liberation, are conflicts fought by nations to gain independence. The term is used in conjunction with wars against foreign powers (or at least those perceived as foreign) ...
from
Great Britain
Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-west coast of continental Europe, consisting of the countries England, Scotland, and Wales. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the List of European ...
, established the
United States of America
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 contiguo ...
, and crafted a
framework of government for the new nation.
The Founding Fathers include those who wrote and signed the
United States Declaration of Independence
The Declaration of Independence, formally The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen States of America in the original printing, is the founding document of the United States. On July 4, 1776, it was adopted unanimously by the Second Continen ...
, the
Articles of Confederation
The Articles of Confederation, officially the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, was an agreement and early body of law in the Thirteen Colonies, which served as the nation's first Constitution, frame of government during the Ameri ...
, and the
Constitution of the United States
The Constitution of the United States is the Supremacy Clause, supreme law of the United States, United States of America. It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution, on March 4, 1789. Originally includi ...
— all adopted in the colonial capital of
Philadelphia
Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...
— certain military personnel who fought in the
American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which Am ...
, and others who greatly assisted in the nation's formation. Many of them were wealthy
slave-owners before and after the country's founding. The single person most identified as "Father" of the United States is
George Washington
George Washington (, 1799) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the first president of the United States, serving from 1789 to 1797. As commander of the Continental Army, Washington led Patriot (American Revoluti ...
, a general in the American Revolution and the nation's first president. In 1973, historian
Richard B. Morris identified seven figures as key founders, based on what he called the "triple tests" of leadership, longevity, and statesmanship:
John Adams
John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before Presidency of John Adams, his presidency, he was a leader of ...
,
Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin (April 17, 1790) was an American polymath: a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher and Political philosophy, political philosopher.#britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Wood, 2021 Among the m ...
,
Alexander Hamilton
Alexander Hamilton (January 11, 1755 or 1757July 12, 1804) was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the first U.S. secretary of the treasury from 1789 to 1795 dur ...
,
John Jay
John Jay (, 1745 – May 17, 1829) was an American statesman, diplomat, signatory of the Treaty of Paris (1783), Treaty of Paris, and a Founding Father of the United States. He served from 1789 to 1795 as the first chief justice of the United ...
,
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (, 1743July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the United States Declaration of Indepe ...
,
James Madison
James Madison (June 28, 1836) was an American statesman, diplomat, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the fourth president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. Madison was popularly acclaimed as the ...
, and Washington.
[ Morris, 1973, p. 1]
Most of the Founding Fathers were of English ancestry, though many had family roots extending across various regions of the
British Isles
The British Isles are an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean off the north-western coast of continental Europe, consisting of the islands of Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Inner Hebrides, Inner and Outer Hebr ...
, including
Scotland
Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...
,
Wales
Wales ( ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by the Irish Sea to the north and west, England to the England–Wales border, east, the Bristol Channel to the south, and the Celtic ...
, and
Ireland
Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...
. Additionally, some traced their lineage back to the early Dutch settlers of New York (
New Netherland) during the colonial era, while others were descendants of French
Huguenots
The Huguenots ( , ; ) are a Religious denomination, religious group of French people, French Protestants who held to the Reformed (Calvinist) tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, ...
who settled in the colonies, escaping religious persecution in
France
France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...
.
Historical founders
Historian Richard Morris' selection of seven key founders was widely accepted through the 20th century.
John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin were members of the
Committee of Five that were charged by the
Second Continental Congress
The Second Continental Congress (1775–1781) was the meetings of delegates from the Thirteen Colonies that united in support of the American Revolution and American Revolutionary War, Revolutionary War, which established American independence ...
with drafting the
Declaration of Independence
A declaration of independence is an assertion by a polity in a defined territory that it is independent and constitutes a state. Such places are usually declared from part or all of the territory of another state or failed state, or are breaka ...
. Franklin, Adams, and John Jay negotiated the 1783
Treaty of Paris, which established American independence and brought an end to the
American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which Am ...
. The constitutions drafted by Jay and Adams for their respective states of
New York (1777) and
Massachusetts (1780) proved influential in the language used in developing the U.S. Constitution. ''
The Federalist Papers
''The Federalist Papers'' is a collection of 85 articles and essays written by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay under the collective pseudonym "Publius" to promote the ratification of the Constitution of the United States. The ...
'', which advocated the ratification of the
Constitution
A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organization or other type of entity, and commonly determines how that entity is to be governed.
When these pri ...
, were written by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and Jay. George Washington was
commander-in-chief of the
Continental Army
The Continental Army was the army of the United Colonies representing the Thirteen Colonies and later the United States during the American Revolutionary War. It was formed on June 14, 1775, by a resolution passed by the Second Continental Co ...
and later president of the
Constitutional Convention.
[ Jilson, 1994, p. 291]
Each of these men held additional important roles in the early government of the United States. Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Madison served as the first four presidents; Adams and Jefferson were the nation's first two vice presidents; Jay was the nation's first
chief justice; Hamilton was the first
secretary of the treasury
The United States secretary of the treasury is the head of the United States Department of the Treasury, and is the chief financial officer of the federal government of the United States. The secretary of the treasury serves as the principal a ...
; Jefferson was the first
secretary of state; and Franklin was America's most senior diplomat from the start of the Revolutionary War through its conclusion with the signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1783.
The list of Founding Fathers is often expanded to include the
signers of the Declaration of Independence and individuals who later approved the
U.S. Constitution.
[ Some scholars regard all delegates to the Constitutional Convention as Founding Fathers whether they approved the Constitution or not.][ National Archives: Signers of the Declaration, Outline of signers]National Archives
National archives are the archives of a country. The concept evolved in various nations at the dawn of modernity based on the impact of nationalism upon bureaucratic processes of paperwork retention.
Conceptual development
From the Middle Ages i ...
, Framers of the Constitution In addition, some historians include signers of the Articles of Confederation
The Articles of Confederation, officially the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, was an agreement and early body of law in the Thirteen Colonies, which served as the nation's first Constitution, frame of government during the Ameri ...
, which was adopted in 1781 as the nation's first constitution.[ Padover, 1958, pp. 191–214]
Historians have come to recognize others as founders, such as Revolutionary War military leaders as well as participants in developments leading up to the war, including prominent writers, orators, and other men and women who contributed to cause.[ Sneff, 2016, Essay] Since the 19th century, the Founding Fathers have shifted from the concept of them as demigods who created the modern nation-state, to take into account their inability to address issues such as slavery
Slavery is the ownership of a person as property, especially in regards to their labour. Slavery typically involves compulsory work, with the slave's location of work and residence dictated by the party that holds them in bondage. Enslavemen ...
and the debt owed after the American Revolutionary War. Scholars emphasize that the Founding Fathers' accomplishments and shortcomings be viewed within the context of their time.
Origin of phrase
The phrase "Founding Fathers" was first used by U.S. senator Warren G. Harding
Warren Gamaliel Harding (November 2, 1865 – August 2, 1923) was the 29th president of the United States, serving from 1921 until his death in 1923. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he was one of the most ...
in his keynote speech at the Republican National Convention of 1916. Harding later repeated the phrase at his March 4, 1921, presidential inauguration. While U.S. presidents used the terms "founders" and "fathers" in their speeches throughout much of the early 20th century, it was another 60 years before Harding's phrase would be used again during the presidential inaugural ceremonies. Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan (February 6, 1911 – June 5, 2004) was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He was a member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party a ...
referred to "Founding Fathers" at both his first inauguration on January 20, 1981, and his second on January 20, 1985.
In 1811, responding to praise for his generation, John Adams
John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before Presidency of John Adams, his presidency, he was a leader of ...
wrote to a younger Josiah Quincy III, "I ought not to object to your Reverence for your Fathers as you call them ... but to tell you a very great secret ... I have no reason to believe We were better than you are." He also wrote, "Don't call me, ... Father ... rFounder ... These titles belong to no man, but to the American people in general."
In Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (, 1743July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the United States Declaration of Indepe ...
's second presidential inaugural address in 1805, he referred to those who first came to the New World as "forefathers". At his 1825 inauguration, John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams (; July 11, 1767 – February 23, 1848) was the sixth president of the United States, serving from 1825 to 1829. He previously served as the eighth United States secretary of state from 1817 to 1825. During his long diploma ...
called the U.S. Constitution "the work of our forefathers" and expressed his gratitude to "founders of the Union". In July of the following year, President J. Quincy Adams, in an executive order upon the deaths of his father, John, and Jefferson, who both died on the same day, paid tribute to them as "Fathers" and "Founders of the Republic". These terms were used in the U.S. throughout the 19th century, from the inaugurations of Martin Van Buren
Martin Van Buren ( ; ; December 5, 1782 – July 24, 1862) was the eighth president of the United States, serving from 1837 to 1841. A primary founder of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as Attorney General o ...
and James Polk in 1837 and 1845, to Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the 16th president of the United States, serving from 1861 until Assassination of Abraham Lincoln, his assassination in 1865. He led the United States through the American Civil War ...
's Cooper Union speech in 1860 and his Gettysburg Address in 1863, and up to William McKinley
William McKinley (January 29, 1843September 14, 1901) was the 25th president of the United States, serving from 1897 until Assassination of William McKinley, his assassination in 1901. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Repub ...
's first inauguration in 1897.
At a 1902 celebration of Washington's Birthday in Brooklyn
Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...
, James M. Beck
James Montgomery Beck (July 9, 1861 – April 12, 1936) was an American lawyer, politician, and author from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was a member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, who se ...
, a constitutional lawyer and later a U.S. congressman, delivered an address, "Founders of the Republic", in which he connected the concepts of founders and fathers, saying: "It is well for us to remember certain human aspects of the founders of the republic. Let me first refer to the fact that these fathers of the republic were for the most part young men."
List of Founding Fathers
Framers and signers
The National Archives
National archives are the archives of a country. The concept evolved in various nations at the dawn of modernity based on the impact of nationalism upon bureaucratic processes of paperwork retention.
Conceptual development
From the Middle Ages i ...
has identified three founding documents as the " Charters of Freedom": Declaration of Independence, United States Constitution
The Constitution of the United States is the Supremacy Clause, supreme law of the United States, United States of America. It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution, on March 4, 1789. Originally includi ...
, and Bill of Rights. According to the Archives, these documents "have secured the rights of the American people for nearly two and a half centuries and are considered instrumental to the founding and philosophy of the United States." In addition, as the nation's first constitution, the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union is also a founding document. As a result, signers of three key documents are generally considered to be Founding Fathers of the United States: Declaration of Independence (DI), Articles of Confederation (AC), and U.S. Constitution (USC). The following table provides a list of these signers, some of whom signed more than one document.
Other delegates
The 55 delegates who attended the Constitutional Convention are referred to as framers. Of these, the 16 listed below did not sign the document. Three refused, while the remainder left early, either in protest of the proceedings or for personal reasons. Nevertheless, some sources regard all framers as founders, including those who did not sign:
* William Richardson Davie, North Carolina
* Oliver Ellsworth, Connecticut
* Elbridge Gerry, Massachusetts *
* William Houston
William Churchill Houston ( 1746 – August 12, 1788), a Founding Father of the United States, was a teacher, lawyer and statesman. Houston served as a delegate representing New Jersey in both the Continental Congress and Constitutional Conventio ...
, New Jersey
* William Houstoun, Georgia
* John Lansing Jr., New York
* Alexander Martin, North Carolina
* Luther Martin, Maryland
* George Mason, Virginia *
* James McClurg, Virginia
* John Francis Mercer, Maryland
* William Pierce, Georgia
* Edmund Randolph, Virginia *
* Caleb Strong, Massachusetts
* George Wythe, Virginia
* Robert Yates, New York
(*) Randolph, Mason, and Gerry were the only three present at the Constitution's adoption who refused to sign.
Additional Founding Fathers
In addition to the signers and Framers of the founding documents and one of the seven notable leaders previously mentioned—John Jay
John Jay (, 1745 – May 17, 1829) was an American statesman, diplomat, signatory of the Treaty of Paris (1783), Treaty of Paris, and a Founding Father of the United States. He served from 1789 to 1795 as the first chief justice of the United ...
—the following are regarded as founders based on their contributions to the creation and early development of the new nation:
* Elias Boudinot, New Jersey representative in the Continental Congress, Congress of the Confederation
The Congress of the Confederation, or the Confederation Congress, formally referred to as the United States in Congress Assembled, was the governing body of the United States from March 1, 1781, until March 3, 1789, during the Confederation ...
(president 1782–1783), and the first three U.S. Congresses. Boudinot was director of the U.S. Mint under presidents Washington, Adams, and Jefferson, and also was the founding president of the American Bible Society.[ Holmes, 2006, p. 150]
* Aaron Burr, vice president under Jefferson
* George Clinton, first governor of New York, 1777–1795, served again from 1801 to 1805, and was the fourth vice president of the US, 1805–1812. He was an anti-Federalist advocate of the Bill of Rights.
*
* , gifted orator, known for his famous quote, " Give me liberty or give me death!", served in the First Continental Congress in 1774 and briefly in the Second Congress in 1775 before returning to Virginia to lead its militia. He then completed terms as the first and sixth governor of Virginia, 1776–1779 and 1784–1786.
* Esek Hopkins, commander-in-chief of the Continental Navy
The Continental Navy was the navy of the United Colonies and United States from 1775 to 1785. It was founded on October 13, 1775 by the Continental Congress to fight against British forces and their allies as part of the American Revolutionary ...
* Henry Knox served as chief artillery
Artillery consists of ranged weapons that launch Ammunition, munitions far beyond the range and power of infantry firearms. Early artillery development focused on the ability to breach defensive walls and fortifications during sieges, and l ...
officer in most of Washington's campaigns. His earliest achievement was the capture of over 50 pieces of artillery, primarily cannons, at New York's Fort Ticonderoga, one of the keys to Washington's capture of Boston in early 1776. Knox became the first secretary of war
The secretary of war was a member of the U.S. president's Cabinet, beginning with George Washington's administration. A similar position, called either "Secretary at War" or "Secretary of War", had been appointed to serve the Congress of the ...
under the U.S. Constitution in 1789.
* Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette
Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier de La Fayette, Marquis de La Fayette (; 6 September 1757 – 20 May 1834), known in the United States as Lafayette (), was a French military officer and politician who volunteered to join the Conti ...
, French Marquis who became a Continental Army general. Served without pay, brought a ship to America, outfitted for war, provided clothing and other provisions for the patriot cause, all at his own expense.
* Arthur Lee, diplomat who helped negotiate and signed the 1778 Treaty of Alliance with France, along with Benjamin Franklin and Silas Deane.
* Robert R. Livingston, member of the Committee of Five that drafted the Declaration of Independence, 1776; first U.S. secretary of foreign affairs, 1781–1783, and first chancellor of New York, 1777–1801. He administered the presidential oath of office at the first inauguration of George Washington and with James Monroe negotiated the Louisiana Purchase
The Louisiana Purchase () was the acquisition of the Louisiana (New France), territory of Louisiana by the United States from the French First Republic in 1803. This consisted of most of the land in the Mississippi River#Watershed, Mississipp ...
as the minister to France.
* John Marshall
John Marshall (September 24, 1755July 6, 1835) was an American statesman, jurist, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the fourth chief justice of the United States from 1801 until his death in 1835. He remai ...
served with George Washington at Valley Forge and later would be the first to refer to him as "the Father of his country". Appointed the fourth chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court under John Adams, Marshall defined the authority of the court and ensured the stability of the federal government during the first three decades of the 19th century.[ Bernstein, 2009, pp. 126, 180]
* James Monroe
James Monroe ( ; April 28, 1758July 4, 1831) was an American Founding Father of the United States, Founding Father who served as the fifth president of the United States from 1817 to 1825. He was the last Founding Father to serve as presiden ...
, elected to the Virginia legislature (1782); member of the Continental Congress (1783–1786); fifth president of the United States for two terms (1817–1825); Negotiated the Louisiana Purchase along with Robert Livingston.
* James Otis Jr., pamphleteer, one of the earliest proponents of patriotic causes, an opponent of slavery, and leader of Massachusetts' Committee of Correspondence, all in the 1760s.
* Thomas Paine, author of '' Common Sense'' and other influential pamphlets in the 1770s; sometimes referred to as "Father of the American Revolution".[ While John Adams strongly criticized Paine for failing to see the need for a separation of powers in government, ''Common Sense'' proved crucial in building support for independence following its publication in January 1776.
* Timothy Pickering, Secretary of War, U.S. secretary of state, from Massachusetts. Fired by President John Adams; replaced by John Marshall.
* Thomas Pinckney, signer of the Pinckney's Treaty with Spain, fought as an officer in the ]Continental Army
The Continental Army was the army of the United Colonies representing the Thirteen Colonies and later the United States during the American Revolutionary War. It was formed on June 14, 1775, by a resolution passed by the Second Continental Co ...
and served as a United States ambassador to Great Britain
* Peyton Randolph
Peyton Randolph (September 10, 1721 – October 22, 1775) was an American politician and planter who was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father of the United States. Born into Virginia's Randolph family of Virginia, wealthies ...
, speaker of Virginia's House of Burgesses
The House of Burgesses () was the lower house of the Virginia General Assembly from 1619 to 1776. It existed during the colonial history of the United States in the Colony of Virginia in what was then British America. From 1642 to 1776, the Hou ...
, president of the First Continental Congress, and a signer of the Continental Association.
* John Rogers, Maryland lawyer and judge, delegate to the Continental Congress
The Continental Congress was a series of legislature, legislative bodies, with some executive function, for the Thirteen Colonies of British America, Great Britain in North America, and the newly declared United States before, during, and after ...
who voted for the Declaration of Independence but fell ill before he could sign it.
* Charles Thomson
Charles Thomson (November 29, 1729 – August 16, 1824) was an Irish-born Founding Father of the United States and secretary of the Continental Congress (1774–1789) throughout its existence. As secretary, Thomson prepared the Journals of the ...
, secretary of the Continental Congress from its formation to its final session, 1774–1789.
* Joseph Warren
Joseph Warren (June 11, 1741 – June 17, 1775), a Founding Father of the United States, was an American physician who was one of the most important figures in the Patriot (American Revolution), Patriot movement in Boston, Massachusetts, Bos ...
, respected physician and architect of the Revolutionary movement, known as the "Founding Martyr" for his death at the Battle of Bunker Hill, drafted the Suffolk Resolves in response to the Intolerable Acts.[ Cary, 1961, pp. viii, 19–20]
* "Mad Anthony" Wayne, a prominent army general during the Revolutionary War.
* Thomas Willing, delegate to the Continental Congress
The Continental Congress was a series of legislature, legislative bodies, with some executive function, for the Thirteen Colonies of British America, Great Britain in North America, and the newly declared United States before, during, and after ...
from Pennsylvania, the first president of the Bank of North America
The Bank of North America was the first chartered bank in the United States, and served as the country's first ''de facto'' central bank. It was chartered by the Congress of the Confederation on May 26, 1781, and opened in Philadelphia, Pennsy ...
, and the first president of the First Bank of the United States
The President, Directors and Company of the Bank of the United States, commonly known as the First Bank of the United States, was a National bank (United States), national bank, chartered for a term of twenty years, by the United States Congress ...
* Henry Wisner, New York Continental Congress delegate who voted for the Declaration of Independence but left Philadelphia before the signing.
Women founders
Historians have come to recognize the roles women played in the nation's early development, using the term "Founding Mothers". Among the women honored in this respect are:
* Abigail Adams, wife, confidant, advisor to John Adams
John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before Presidency of John Adams, his presidency, he was a leader of ...
, second first lady, and mother of the sixth U.S. president John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams (; July 11, 1767 – February 23, 1848) was the sixth president of the United States, serving from 1825 to 1829. He previously served as the eighth United States secretary of state from 1817 to 1825. During his long diploma ...
, famously extolled her husband to "Remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favourable to them than your ancestors . . . rwe are determined to foment a Rebelion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any Laws in which we have no voice, or Representation".
* Mercy Otis Warren, poet, playwright, and pamphleteer during the American Revolution
The American Revolution (1765–1783) was a colonial rebellion and war of independence in which the Thirteen Colonies broke from British America, British rule to form the United States of America. The revolution culminated in the American ...
[
]
Other patriots
The following men and women are also recognized for the notable contributions they made during the founding era:
* Ethan Allen
Ethan Allen ( – February 12, 1789) was an American farmer, writer, military officer and politician. He is best known as one of the founders of Vermont and for the capture of Fort Ticonderoga during the American Revolutionary War, and wa ...
, military leader and founder of Vermont.[ Bernstein, 2009, p. 179]
* Richard Allen, African-American bishop, founder of the Free African Society and the African Methodist Episcopal Church
The African Methodist Episcopal Church, usually called the AME Church or AME, is a Methodist denomination based in the United States. It adheres to Wesleyan theology, Wesleyan–Arminian theology and has a connexionalism, connexional polity. It ...
* Crispus Attucks, believed to be of Native American and African descent, was the first of five persons killed in the Boston Massacre of 1770, and thus the first to die in the American Revolution. Of the deaths at Boston John Adams would later write, "On that night the foundations of American independence was laid."
* Penelope Barker, organized and wrote the resolution of the Edenton Tea Party (October 1774), an activist throughout the American Revolution.
* John Barry, an officer in the Continental Navy
The Continental Navy was the navy of the United Colonies and United States from 1775 to 1785. It was founded on October 13, 1775 by the Continental Congress to fight against British forces and their allies as part of the American Revolutionary ...
during the American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which Am ...
, has been credited as "The Father of the American Navy" (sharing the descriptor with John Paul Jones
John Paul Jones (born John Paul; July 6, 1747 – July 18, 1792) was a Scottish-born naval officer who served in the Continental Navy during the American Revolutionary War. Often referred to as the "Father of the American Navy", Jones is regard ...
and John Adams
John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before Presidency of John Adams, his presidency, he was a leader of ...
) and was the first captain of a U.S. warship commissioned for service under the Continental flag.
* Israel Bissell, a patriot post rider in Massachusetts who rode the news to Philadelphia of the British attack on Lexington and Concord.
* Hugh Henry Brackenridge, lawyer, judge, author, chaplain in the Continental army, ally of Madison, collaborator with Freneau, and central figure in early western Pennsylvania
* Cato, a Black Patriot and slave who served as a spy alongside his owner, Hercules Mulligan. Cato carried intelligence gathered by Mulligan to officers in the Continental Army and other revolutionaries, including through British-held territory, which was credited for likely saving George Washington
George Washington (, 1799) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the first president of the United States, serving from 1789 to 1797. As commander of the Continental Army, Washington led Patriot (American Revoluti ...
's life on at least two occasions. He was granted his freedom in 1778 for his service.
* Angelica Schuyler Church, sister-in-law of Alexander Hamilton, corresponded with many of the leading Founding Fathers, including Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, and the Marquis de Lafayette.
* Tench Coxe, economist in the Continental Congress
* Philip Freneau, called the "Poet of the Revolution"
* Albert Gallatin, politician and treasury secretary[ Dungan, Nicholas, 2010]
* Nathanael Greene
Major general (United States), Major General Nathanael Greene (August 7, 1742 – June 19, 1786) was an American military officer and planter who served in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, Revolutionary War. He emerge ...
, Revolutionary War general; commanded the southern theater
* Nathan Hale, captured U.S. soldier, executed in 1776 for spying on British in New York
* Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton, wife of Alexander Hamilton
* James Iredell
James Iredell (October 5, 1751 – October 20, 1799) was one of the first justices of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was appointed by President George Washington and served from 1790 until his death in 1799. His son, James Iredel ...
, essayist for independence and advocate for the constitution, early Supreme Court Justice[
* ]John Paul Jones
John Paul Jones (born John Paul; July 6, 1747 – July 18, 1792) was a Scottish-born naval officer who served in the Continental Navy during the American Revolutionary War. Often referred to as the "Father of the American Navy", Jones is regard ...
, U.S. Navy captain; when the British requested his surrender, he replied, "I have not yet begun to fight"
* Benjamin Kent, lawyer, Massachusetts attorney general, senior member of the Sons of Liberty and the North End Caucus. In April 1776, Kent encouraged John Adams to declare American independence.
* Tadeusz Kościuszko
Andrzej Tadeusz Bonawentura Kościuszko (; 4 or 12 February 174615 October 1817) was a Polish Military engineering, military engineer, statesman, and military leader who then became a national hero in Poland, the United States, Lithuania, and ...
, American general, former Polish army general[
* Bernardo de Galvez, Spanish military, governor of Spanish Louisiana. Captured Baton Rouge, Natchez, and Mobile, all in British West Florida.
* John Laurance, New York politician and judge who served as Judge advocate general during the Revolution
* ]Henry Lee III
Henry Lee III (January 29, 1756 – March 25, 1818) was an early American Patriot (American Revolution), Patriot and politician who served as the ninth Governor of Virginia and as the Virginia United States House of Representatives, Representa ...
, army officer and Virginia governor[ Buchanan, 2007, pp. 522–524]
* William Maclay, Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania, officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a U.S. state, state spanning the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern United States, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes region, Great Lakes regions o ...
politician and U.S. senator[
* ]Daniel Morgan
Daniel Morgan (c. 1736 – July 6, 1802) was an American pioneer, soldier, and politician from Virginia. One of the most respected battlefield tacticians of the American Revolutionary War of 1775–1783, he later commanded troops during the sup ...
, military leader and Virginia congressman
* Hercules Mulligan, Irish-American tailor and spy, member of the Sons of Liberty. Introduced Alexander Hamilton into New York society and helped him recruit men for his artillery units.
* Samuel Nicholas, commander-in-chief of the Continental Marines
The Continental Marines were the Amphibious warfare, amphibious infantry of the Thirteen Colonies, American Colonies (and later the United States) during the American Revolutionary War. The Corps was formed by the Continental Congress on Novem ...
* Andrew Pickens, army general and South Carolina
South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...
congressman
* Oliver Pollock, a merchant, diplomat, and financier of the American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which Am ...
* Israel Putnam, army general[Raphael, Ray. ''The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Founding Fathers And the Birth of Our Nation'' (Penguin, 2011).]
* Paul Revere, silversmith, member of the Sons of Liberty which staged the Boston Tea Party, and one of two horsemen in the midnight ride.
* Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau, French army general[
* Haym Salomon, along with Robert Morris, was the prime financier of the American Revolution. He also spied for the Continental Army.
* ]Philip Schuyler
Philip John Schuyler (; November 20, 1733 - November 18, 1804) was an American general in the American Revolutionary War, Revolutionary War and a United States Senate, United States Senator from New York (state), New York. He is usually known as ...
, Revolutionary War general, U.S. senator from New York, father of the Schuyler sisters.
* John Sevier, cofounder of the Watauga Association, Revolutionary War soldier, called the Founding Father of Tennessee
* Arthur St. Clair, major general, president of the Confederation Congress, and later first governor of the Northwest Territory
* Thomas Sumter, South Carolina
South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...
military leader, and member of both houses of Congress
* John Trumbull
John Trumbull (June 6, 1756 – November 10, 1843) was an American painter and military officer best known for his historical paintings of the American Revolutionary War, of which he was a veteran. He has been called the "Painter of the Revolut ...
, artist, whose paintings inform the collective memory of the early American Republic
* Richard Varick, private secretary to George Washington
George Washington (, 1799) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the first president of the United States, serving from 1789 to 1797. As commander of the Continental Army, Washington led Patriot (American Revoluti ...
, recorder of New York City (1786); Speaker of the New York Assembly (1787); second attorney general of New York state
New York, also called New York State, is a state in the northeastern United States. Bordered by New England to the east, Canada to the north, and Pennsylvania and New Jersey to the south, its territory extends into both the Atlantic Ocean and ...
(1788–1789); Mayor of New York City (1789–1801); founder of the American Bible Society (1828)
* Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben, Prussian officer;[ Inspector General of Continental Army; present at Valley forge with Washington, training militia
* Noah Webster, political writer, ]lexicographer
Lexicography is the study of lexicons and the art of compiling dictionaries. It is divided into two separate academic disciplines:
* Practical lexicography is the art or craft of compiling, writing and editing dictionary, dictionaries.
* The ...
, educator
The colonies unite (1765–1774)
In the mid-1760s, Parliament began levying taxes on the colonies to finance Britain's debts from the French and Indian War
The French and Indian War, 1754 to 1763, was a colonial conflict in North America between Kingdom of Great Britain, Great Britain and Kingdom of France, France, along with their respective Native Americans in the United States, Native American ...
, a decade-long conflict that ended in 1763. Opposition to Stamp Act and Townshend Acts united the colonies in a common cause.[ Chaffin, 1991, p. 132.] While the Stamp Act was withdrawn, taxes on tea remained under the Townshend Acts and took on a new form in 1773 with Parliament's adoption of the Tea Act. The new tea tax, along with stricter customs enforcement, was not well-received across the colonies, particularly in Massachusetts.[ Carp, 2010, pp. 193–195]
On December 16, 1773, 150 colonists disguised as Mohawk Indians boarded ships in Boston and dumped 342 chests of tea into the city's harbor, a protest that came to be known as the Boston Tea Party
The Boston Tea Party was a seminal American protest, political and Mercantilism, mercantile protest on December 16, 1773, during the American Revolution. Initiated by Sons of Liberty activists in Boston in Province of Massachusetts Bay, colo ...
. Orchestrated by Samuel Adams and the Boston Committee of Correspondence, the protest was viewed as treasonous by British authorities.[ Andrilk, 2012, pp. 98–99] In response, Parliament passed the Coercive or Intolerable Acts, a series of punitive laws that closed Boston's port and placed the colony under direct control of the British government. These measures stirred unrest throughout the colonies, which felt Parliament had overreached its authority and was posing a threat to the self-rule that had existed in the Americas since the 1600s.[
Intent on responding to the acts, twelve of the ]Thirteen Colonies
The Thirteen Colonies were the British colonies on the Atlantic coast of North America which broke away from the British Crown in the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783), and joined to form the United States of America.
The Thirteen C ...
agreed to send delegates to meet in Philadelphia as the First Continental Congress
The First Continental Congress was a meeting of delegates of twelve of the Thirteen Colonies held from September 5 to October 26, 1774, at Carpenters' Hall in Philadelphia at the beginning of the American Revolution. The meeting was organized b ...
, with Georgia
Georgia most commonly refers to:
* Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus
* Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the southeastern United States
Georgia may also refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Georgia (name), a list of pe ...
declining because it needed British military support in its conflict with native tribes. The concept of an American union had been entertained long before 1774, but always embraced the idea that it would be subject to the authority of the British Empire. By 1774, however, letters published in colonial newspapers, mostly by anonymous writers, began asserting the need for a "Congress" to represent all Americans, one that would have equal status with British authority.
Continental Congress (1774–1775)
The Continental Congress
The Continental Congress was a series of legislature, legislative bodies, with some executive function, for the Thirteen Colonies of British America, Great Britain in North America, and the newly declared United States before, during, and after ...
was convened to deal with a series of pressing issues the colonies were facing with Britain. Its delegates were men considered to be the most intelligent and thoughtful among the colonialists. In the wake of the Intolerable Acts, at the hands of an unyielding British king and Parliament, the colonies were forced to choose between either totally submitting to arbitrary Parliamentary authority or resorting to unified armed resistance. The new Congress functioned as the directing body in declaring a great war and was sanctioned only by reason of the guidance it provided during the armed struggle. Its authority remained ill-defined, and few of its delegates realized that events would soon lead them to decide policies that ultimately established a "new power among the nations". In the process the Congress performed many experiments in government before an adequate Constitution evolved.
First Continental Congress (1774)
The First Continental Congress
The First Continental Congress was a meeting of delegates of twelve of the Thirteen Colonies held from September 5 to October 26, 1774, at Carpenters' Hall in Philadelphia at the beginning of the American Revolution. The meeting was organized b ...
convened at Philadelphia's Carpenter's Hall on September 5, 1774. The Congress, which had no legal authority to raise taxes or call on colonial militias, consisted of 56 delegates, including George Washington of Virginia; John Adams and Samuel Adams of Massachusetts; John Jay of New York; John Dickinson of Pennsylvania; and Roger Sherman of Connecticut. Peyton Randolph
Peyton Randolph (September 10, 1721 – October 22, 1775) was an American politician and planter who was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father of the United States. Born into Virginia's Randolph family of Virginia, wealthies ...
of Virginia was unanimously elected its first president.[ Mount Vernon, Peyton Randolph, Essay]
The Congress came close to disbanding in its first few days over the issue of representation, with smaller colonies desiring equality with the larger ones. While , from the largest colony, Virginia, disagreed, he stressed the greater importance of uniting the colonies: "The distinctions between Virginians, Pennsylvanians, New Yorkers, and New Englanders are no more. I am not a Virginian, but an American!". The delegates then began with a discussion of the Suffolk Resolves, which had just been approved at a town meeting in Milton, Massachusetts
Milton is a town in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. Milton is an immediate southern suburb of Boston, Massachusetts. The population was 28,630 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census.
Milton is located in the relatively hilly ...
.[ Suffolk, 1973, pp. 21–34] Joseph Warren, chairman of the Resolves drafting committee, had dispatched Paul Revere to deliver signed copies to the Congress in Philadelphia. The Resolves called for the ouster of British officials, a trade embargo of British goods, and the formation of a militia
A militia ( ) is a military or paramilitary force that comprises civilian members, as opposed to a professional standing army of regular, full-time military personnel. Militias may be raised in times of need to support regular troops or se ...
throughout the colonies.[ Despite the radical nature of the resolves, on September 17 the Congress passed them in their entirety in exchange for assurances that Massachusetts' colonists would do nothing to provoke war.
The delegates then approved a series of measures, including a Petition to the King in an appeal for peace and a Declaration and Resolves which introduced the ideas of natural law and natural rights, foreshadowing some of the principles found in the Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights. The declaration asserted the rights of colonists and outlined Parliament's abuses of power. Proposed by ]Richard Henry Lee
Richard Henry Lee (January 20, 1732June 19, 1794) was an American statesman and Founding Father from Virginia, best known for the June 1776 Lee Resolution, the motion in the Second Continental Congress calling for the colonies' independence fr ...
, it also included a trade boycott known as the Continental Association
The Continental Association, also known as the Articles of Association or simply the Association, was an agreement among the Thirteen Colonies, American colonies, adopted by the First Continental Congress, which met inside Carpenters' Hall in Phi ...
. The Association, a crucial step toward unification, empowered committees of correspondence
The committees of correspondence were a collection of American political organizations that sought to coordinate opposition to British Parliament and, later, support for American independence during the American Revolution. The brainchild of Sa ...
throughout the colonies to enforce the boycott. The Declaration and its boycott directly challenged Parliament's right to govern in the Americas, bolstering the view of King George III and his administration under Lord North that the colonies were in a state of rebellion.
Lord Dartmouth, the secretary of state for the colonies
The secretary of state for the colonies or colonial secretary was the Cabinet of the United Kingdom's government minister, minister in charge of managing certain parts of the British Empire.
The colonial secretary never had responsibility for t ...
who had been sympathetic to the Americans, condemned the newly established Congress for what he considered its illegal formation and actions. In tandem with the Intolerable Acts, British Army commander-in-chief Lieutenant General Thomas Gage was installed as governor of Massachusetts. In January 1775, Gage's superior, Lord Dartmouth, ordered the general to arrest those responsible for the Tea Party and to seize the munitions that had been stockpiled by militia forces outside of Boston. The letter took several months to reach Gage, who acted immediately by sending out 700 army regulars. During their march to Lexington and Concord on the morning of April 19, 1775, the British troops encountered militia forces, who had been warned the night before by Paul Revere and another messenger on horseback, William Dawes. Even though it is unknown who fired the first shot, the Revolutionary War began.
Second Continental Congress (1775)
On May 10, 1775, less than three weeks after the Battles at Lexington and Concord, the Second Continental Congress
The Second Continental Congress (1775–1781) was the meetings of delegates from the Thirteen Colonies that united in support of the American Revolution and American Revolutionary War, Revolutionary War, which established American independence ...
convened in the Pennsylvania State House. The gathering essentially reconstituted the First Congress with many of the same delegates in attendance. Among the new arrivals were Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin (April 17, 1790) was an American polymath: a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher and Political philosophy, political philosopher.#britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Wood, 2021 Among the m ...
of Pennsylvania, John Hancock
John Hancock ( – October 8, 1793) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father, merchant, statesman, and prominent Patriot (American Revolution), Patriot of the American Revolution. He was the longest-serving Presi ...
of Massachusetts, and in June, Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (, 1743July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the United States Declaration of Indepe ...
of Virginia. Hancock was elected president two weeks into the session when Peyton Randolph was recalled to Virginia to preside over the House of Burgesses
The House of Burgesses () was the lower house of the Virginia General Assembly from 1619 to 1776. It existed during the colonial history of the United States in the Colony of Virginia in what was then British America. From 1642 to 1776, the Hou ...
as speaker, and Jefferson was named to replace him in the Virginia delegation. After adopting the rules of debate from the previous year and reinforcing its emphasis on secrecy, the Congress turned to its foremost concern, the defense of the colonies.
The provincial assembly in Massachusetts, which had declared the colony's governorship vacant, reached out to the Congress for direction on two matters: whether the assembly could assume the powers of civil government and whether the Congress would take over the army being formed in Boston. In answer to the first question, on June 9 the colony's leaders were directed to choose a council to govern within the spirit of the colony's charter. As for the second, Congress spent several days discussing plans for guiding the forces of all thirteen colonies. Finally, on June 14 Congress approved provisioning the New England militias, agreed to send ten companies of riflemen from other colonies as reinforcements, and appointed a committee to draft rules for governing the military, thus establishing the Continental Army
The Continental Army was the army of the United Colonies representing the Thirteen Colonies and later the United States during the American Revolutionary War. It was formed on June 14, 1775, by a resolution passed by the Second Continental Co ...
. The next day, Samuel and John Adams nominated Washington as commander-in-chief, a motion that was unanimously approved.[ Andrilk, 2012, p. 132][ Chernow, 2010, pp. 185–187] Two days later, on June 17, the militias clashed with British forces at Bunker Hill, a victory for Britain but a costly one.
The Congress's actions came despite the divide between conservatives who still hoped for reconciliation with England and at the other end of the spectrum, those who favored independence. To satisfy the former, Congress adopted the Olive Branch Petition
The Olive Branch Petition was adopted by the Second Continental Congress on July 5, 1775, and signed on July 8, 1775, in a final attempt to avoid war between Great Britain and the Thirteen Colonies in America. The Congress had already authoriz ...
on July 5, an appeal for peace to King George III written by John Dickinson. Then, the following day, it approved the Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms, a resolution justifying military action.[ The declaration, intended for Washington to read to the troops upon his arrival in Massachusetts, was drafted by Jefferson but edited by Dickinson who thought its language too strong. When the Olive Branch Petition arrived in London in September, the king refused to look at it. By then, he had already issued a ]proclamation
A proclamation (Lat. ''proclamare'', to make public by announcement) is an official declaration issued by a person of authority to make certain announcements known. Proclamations are currently used within the governing framework of some nations ...
declaring the American colonies in rebellion.
Declaration of Independence (1776)
Under the auspices of the Second Continental Congress
The Second Continental Congress (1775–1781) was the meetings of delegates from the Thirteen Colonies that united in support of the American Revolution and American Revolutionary War, Revolutionary War, which established American independence ...
and its Committee of Five, Thomas Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence
A declaration of independence is an assertion by a polity in a defined territory that it is independent and constitutes a state. Such places are usually declared from part or all of the territory of another state or failed state, or are breaka ...
. It was presented to the Congress by the Committee on June 28,[ Maier, 1998, p. 131] and after much debate and editing of the document, on July 2, 1776, Congress passed the Lee Resolution, which declared the United Colonies independent from Great Britain. Two days later, on July 4, the Declaration of Independence was adopted. The name "United States of America", which first appeared in the Declaration, was formally approved by the Congress on September 9, 1776.
In an effort to get this important document promptly into the public realm John Hancock
John Hancock ( – October 8, 1793) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father, merchant, statesman, and prominent Patriot (American Revolution), Patriot of the American Revolution. He was the longest-serving Presi ...
, president of the Second Continental Congress, commissioned John Dunlap, editor and printer of the '' Pennsylvania Packet'', to print 200 broadside copies of the Declaration, which came to be known as the Dunlap broadsides. Printing commenced the day after the Declaration was adopted. They were distributed throughout the 13 colonies/states with copies sent to General Washington and his troops at New York with a directive that it be read aloud. Copies were also sent to Britain and other points in Europe.[
]
Fighting for independence
While the colonists were fighting the British to gain independence their newly formed government, with its Articles of Confederation, were put to the test, revealing the shortcomings and weaknesses of America's first Constitution. During this time Washington became convinced that a strong federal government was urgently needed, as the individual states were not meeting the organizational and supply demands of the war on their own individual accord. Key precipitating events included the Boston Tea Party
The Boston Tea Party was a seminal American protest, political and Mercantilism, mercantile protest on December 16, 1773, during the American Revolution. Initiated by Sons of Liberty activists in Boston in Province of Massachusetts Bay, colo ...
in 1773, Paul Revere's Ride in 1775, and the Battles of Lexington and Concord
The Battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775 were the first major military actions of the American Revolutionary War between the Kingdom of Great Britain and Patriot (American Revolution), Patriot militias from America's Thirteen Co ...
in 1775. George Washington's crossing of the Delaware River was a major American victory over Hessian forces at the Battle of Trenton and greatly boosted American morale. The Battle of Saratoga and the Siege of Yorktown, which primarily ended the fighting between American and British, were also pivotal events during the war. The 1783 Treaty of Paris marked the official end of the war.
After the war, Washington was instrumental in organizing the effort to create a "national militia" made up of individual state units, and under the direction of the federal government. He also endorsed the creation of a military academy to train artillery officers and engineers. Not wanting to leave the country disarmed and vulnerable so soon after the war, Washington favored a peacetime army of 2,600 men. He also favored the creation of a navy that could repel any European intruders. He approached Henry Knox, who accompanied Washington during most of his campaigns, with the prospect of becoming the future Secretary of War.
Treaty of Paris
After Washington's final victory at the surrender at Yorktown on October 19, 1781, more than a year passed before official negotiations for peace commenced. The Treaty of Paris was drafted in November 1782, and negotiations began in April 1783. The completed treaty was signed on September 3. Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, John Jay and Henry Laurens represented the United States, while David Hartley, a member of Parliament, and Richard Oswald
Richard Oswald (5 November 1880 – 11 September 1963) was an Austrian film director, producer, screenwriter, and father of German-American film director Gerd Oswald.
Early life and career
Richard Oswald, born in Vienna as Richard W. Ornstein, ...
, a prominent and influential Scottish businessman, represented Great Britain.
Franklin, who had a long-established rapport with the French and was almost entirely responsible for securing an alliance with them a few months after the start of the war, was greeted with high honors from the French council, while the others received due accommodations but were generally considered to be amateur negotiators. Communications between Britain and France were largely effected through Franklin and Lord Shelburne who was on good terms with Franklin. Franklin, Adams and Jay understood the concerns of the French at this uncertain juncture and, using that to their advantage, in the final sessions of negotiations convinced both the French and the British that American independence was in their best interests.
Constitutional Convention
Under the Articles of Confederation, the Congress of the Confederation
The Congress of the Confederation, or the Confederation Congress, formally referred to as the United States in Congress Assembled, was the governing body of the United States from March 1, 1781, until March 3, 1789, during the Confederation ...
had no power to collect taxes, regulate commerce, pay the national debt, conduct diplomatic relations, or effectively manage the western territories. Key leaders – George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and others – began fearing for the young nation's fate. As the Articles' weaknesses became more and more apparent, the idea of creating a strong central government gained support, leading to the call for a convention to amend the Articles.[ Jensen, 1950, p. 421]
The Constitutional Convention met in the Pennsylvania State House from May 14 through September 17, 1787. The 55 delegates in attendance represented a cross-section of 18th-century American leadership. The vast majority were well-educated and prosperous, and all were prominent in their respective states with over 70 percent (40 delegates) serving in the Congress when the convention was proposed.
Many delegates were late to arrive, and after eleven days' delay, a quorum
A quorum is the minimum number of members of a group necessary to constitute the group at a meeting. In a deliberative assembly (a body that uses parliamentary procedure, such as a legislature), a quorum is necessary to conduct the business of ...
was finally present on May 25 to elect Washington, the nation's most trusted figure, as convention president. Four days later, on May 29, the convention adopted a rule of secrecy, a controversial decision but a common practice that allowed delegates to speak freely.
Virginia and New Jersey plans
Immediately following the secrecy vote, Virginia governor Edmund Randolph introduced the Virginia Plan, fifteen resolutions written by Madison and his colleagues proposing a government of three branches: a single executive, a bicameral
Bicameralism is a type of legislature that is divided into two separate Deliberative assembly, assemblies, chambers, or houses, known as a bicameral legislature. Bicameralism is distinguished from unicameralism, in which all members deliberate ...
(two-house) legislature, and a judiciary. The lower house was to be elected by the people, with seats apportioned by state population. The upper house would be chosen by the lower house from delegates nominated by state legislatures. The executive, who would have veto power over legislation, would be elected by the Congress, which could overrule state laws. While the plan exceeded the convention's objective of merely amending the Articles, most delegates were willing to abandon their original mandate in favor of crafting a new form of government.
Discussions of the Virginia resolutions continued into mid-June, when William Paterson of New Jersey presented an alternative proposal. The New Jersey Plan retained most of the Articles' provisions, including a one-house legislature and equal power for the states. One of the plan's innovations was a "plural" executive branch, but its primary concession was to allow the national government to regulate trade and commerce. Meeting as a committee of the whole, the delegates discussed the two proposals beginning with the question of whether there should be a single or three-fold executive and then whether to grant the executive veto power. After agreeing on a single executive who could veto legislation, the delegates turned to an even more contentious issue, legislative representation. Larger states favored proportional representation
Proportional representation (PR) refers to any electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to political divisions (Political party, political parties) amon ...
based on population, while smaller states wanted each state to have the same number of legislators.
Connecticut Compromise
By mid-July, the debates between the large-state and small-state factions had reached an impasse. With the convention on the verge of collapse, Roger Sherman of Connecticut introduced what became known as the Connecticut (or Great) Compromise. Sherman's proposal called for a House of Representatives elected proportionally and a Senate where all states would have the same number of seats. On July 16, the compromise was approved by the narrowest of margins, 5 states to 4.
The proceedings left most delegates with reservations.[ Maier, 2010, p. 35][ Beeman, 2009, pp. 362–363] Several went home early in protest, believing the convention was overstepping its authority. Others were concerned about the lack of a Bill of Rights safeguarding individual liberties. Even Madison, the Constitution's chief architect, was dissatisfied, particularly over equal representation in the Senate and the failure to grant Congress the power to veto state legislation. Misgivings aside, a final draft was approved overwhelmingly on September 17, with 11 states in favor and New York unable to vote since it had only one delegate remaining, Hamilton. Rhode Island, which was in a dispute over the state's paper currency, had refused to send anyone to the convention. Of the 42 delegates present, only three refused to sign: Randolph and George Mason, both of Virginia, and Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts.[
]
State ratification conventions
The U. S. Constitution faced one more hurdle: approval by the legislatures in at least nine of the 13 states. Within three days of the signing, the draft was submitted to the Congress of the Confederation, which forwarded the document to the states for ratification. In November, Pennsylvania's legislature convened the first of the conventions. Before it could vote, Delaware became the first state to ratify, approving the Constitution on December 7 by a 30–0 margin. Pennsylvania followed suit five days later, splitting its vote 46–23. Despite unanimous votes in New Jersey and Georgia, several key states appeared to be leaning against ratification because of the omission of a Bill of Rights, particularly Virginia where the opposition was led by Mason and Patrick Henry, who had refused to participate in the convention claiming he "smelt a rat".[ Jillson, 2016, p. 50] Rather than risk everything, the Federalists relented, promising that if the Constitution was adopted, amendments would be added to secure people's rights.
Over the next year, the string of ratifications continued. Finally, on June 21, 1788, New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify, making the Constitution the law of the land. Virginia followed suit four days later, and New York did the same in late July. After North Carolina's assent in November, another year-and-a-half would pass before the 13th state would weigh in.[ Warren, 1928, p. 820] Facing trade sanctions and the possibility of being forced out of the union, Rhode Island approved the Constitution on May 29, 1790, by a begrudging 34–32 vote.
New form of government
The Constitution officially took effect on , when the House and Senate met for their first sessions. On April 30, Washington was sworn in as the nation's first president. Ten amendments, known collectively as the United States Bill of Rights
The United States Bill of Rights comprises the first ten list of amendments to the United States Constitution, amendments to the United States Constitution. It was proposed following the often bitter 1787–88 debate over the Timeline of dr ...
, were ratified on December 15, 1791. Because the delegates were sworn to secrecy, Madison's notes on the ratification were not published until after his death in 1836.
Bill of Rights
The Constitution, as drafted, was sharply criticized by the Anti-Federalists, a group that contended the document failed to safeguard individual liberties from the federal government. Leading Anti-Federalists included Patrick Henry and Richard Henry Lee, both from Virginia, and Samuel Adams of Massachusetts. Delegates at the Constitutional Convention who shared their views were Virginians George Mason and Edmund Randolph and Massachusetts representative Elbridge Gerry, the three delegates who refused to sign the final document. Henry, who derived his hatred of a central governing authority from his Scottish ancestry, did all in his power to defeat the Constitution, opposing Madison every step of the way.
The criticisms are what led to the amendments proposed under the Bill of Rights. Madison, the bill's principal author, was originally opposed to the amendments, but was influenced by the 1776 Virginia Declaration of Rights
The Virginia Declaration of Rights was drafted in 1776 to proclaim the inherent rights of men, including the right to reform or abolish "inadequate" government. It influenced a number of later documents, including the United States Declaratio ...
, primarily written by Mason, and the Declaration of Independence, by Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson, while in France, shared Henry's and Mason's fears about a strong central government, especially the president's power, but because of his friendship with Madison and the pending Bill of Rights, he quieted his concerns. Alexander Hamilton, however, was opposed to a Bill of Rights believing the amendments not only unnecessary but dangerous:
Why declare things shall not be done, which there is no power to do ... that the liberty of the press shall not be restrained, when no power is given by which restrictions may be imposed?
Madison had no way of knowing the debate between Virginia's two legislative houses would delay the adoption of the amendments for more than two years.[ Labunski, 2006, p. 240, 253] The final draft, referred to the states by the federal Congress on September 25, 1789, was not ratified by Virginia's Senate until December 15, 1791.
The Bill of Rights drew its authority from the consent of the people and held that,
Madison came to be recognized as the founding era's foremost proponent of religious liberty, free speech, and freedom of the press.
Ascending to the presidency
The first five U.S. presidents are regarded as Founding Fathers for their active participation in the American Revolution: Washington, John Adams, Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe. Each of them served as a delegate to the Continental Congress
The Continental Congress was a series of legislature, legislative bodies, with some executive function, for the Thirteen Colonies of British America, Great Britain in North America, and the newly declared United States before, during, and after ...
.
Demographics and other characteristics
The Founding Fathers represented the upper echelon of political leadership in the British colonies during the latter half of the 18th century. All were leaders in their communities and respective colonies who were willing to assume responsibility for public affairs.
Of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, and U.S. Constitution, nearly all were native born and of British heritage, including Scots, Irish, and Welsh. Nearly half were lawyers, while the remainder were primarily businessmen and planter-farmers. The average age of the founders was 43. Benjamin Franklin, born in 1706, was the oldest, while only a few were born after 1750 and thus were in their 20s.
The following sections discuss these and other demographic topics in greater detail. For the most part, the information is confined to signers/delegates associated with the Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, and Constitution.
Political experience
All of the Founding Fathers had extensive political experience at the national and state levels. As just one example, the signers of the Declaration of Independence and Articles of Confederation were members of Second Continental Congress, while four-fifths of the delegates at the Constitutional Convention had served in the Congress either during or prior to the convention. The remaining fifth attending the convention were recognized as leaders in the state assemblies that appointed them.
Following are brief profiles of the political backgrounds of some of the more notable founders:
* John Adams began his political career as a town council member in Braintree outside Boston. He came to wider attention following a series of essays he wrote during the Stamp Act crisis of 1765. In 1770, he was elected to the Massachusetts General Assembly, went on to lead Boston's Committee of Correspondence, and in 1774, was elected to the Continental Congress. Adams later became the first vice president (1789–1797) and second president (1797–1801) of the nation he helped found.
* John Dickinson was one of the leaders of the Pennsylvania Assembly during the 1770s. As a member of the First and Second Continental Congress, he wrote two petitions for the Congress to King George III seeking a peaceful solution. Dickinson opposed independence and refused to sign the Declaration of Independence, but served as an officer in the militia and wrote the initial draft of the Articles of Confederation. In the 1780s, he served as president of Pennsylvania and president of Delaware and as a delegate to the Constitutional Convention.
* Benjamin Franklin retired from his business activities in 1747 and was elected to the Pennsylvania Assembly in 1751. He was sent to London in 1757 for the first of two diplomatic missions on behalf of the colony. Upon returning from England in 1775, Franklin was elected to the Second Continental Congress. After signing the Declaration of Independence in 1776, he was appointed Minister to France and then Sweden, and in 1783 helped negotiate the Treaty of Paris. Franklin was governor of Pennsylvania
The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a Typography, typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a star (heraldry), heraldic star.
Computer scientists and Mathematici ...
from 1785 to 1788 and was a delegate to the Constitutional Convention.
* John Jay was a New York delegate to the First and Second Continental Congress and in 1778 was elected Congress president. In 1782, he was summoned to Paris by Franklin to help negotiate the Treaty of Paris with Great Britain. As a supporter of the proposed Constitution, he wrote five of the Federalist Papers and became the first chief justice of the Supreme Court following the Constitution's adoption. Minister to Spain[ Jillson & Wilson, 1994, p. 77]
* Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (, 1743July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the United States Declaration of Indepe ...
was a delegate from Virginia to the Second Continental Congress (1775–1776) and was the primary author of the Declaration of Independence. He was elected the second governor of Virginia (1779–1781) and served as Minister to France (1785–1789). He later served as the first secretary of state (1790–1793), second vice president (1797–1801) and third president of the United States (1801–1809)
* Robert Morris had been a member of the Pennsylvania Assembly and president of Pennsylvania's Committee of Safety. He was also a member of the Committee of Secret Correspondence and member of the Second Continental Congress. Under the Articles of Confederation he served as the minister of finance and served as a delegate to the Constitutional Convention.
* Roger Sherman had served in the First and Second Continental Congresses, Connecticut House of Representatives and Justice of the Peace before attending the Constitutional Convention as a delegate. After the Constitution was ratified he served in both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate representing his home state of Connecticut. He was the only Founder to sign all four of the major founding documents, the Continental Association, Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, and the U.S. Constitution.
Education
More than a third of the Founding Fathers attended or graduated from colleges in the American colonies, while additional founders attended college abroad, primarily in England and Scotland. All other founders either were home schooled, received tutoring, completed apprenticeships, or were self-educated.
American institutions
Following is a listing of founders who graduated from six of the nine colleges established in the Americas during the Colonial Era. A few founders, such as Alexander Hamilton and James Monroe, attended college (Columbia and William & Mary, respectively) but did not graduate. The other three colonial colleges, all founded in the 1760s, included Brown University
Brown University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. It is the List of colonial colleges, seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the US, founded in 1764 as the ' ...
(College of Rhode Island), Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College ( ) is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Hanover, New Hampshire, United States. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, Dartmouth is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the America ...
, and Rutgers University
Rutgers University ( ), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of three campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's C ...
(Queen's College).
* College of William & Mary
The College of William & Mary (abbreviated as W&M) is a public university, public research university in Williamsburg, Virginia, United States. Founded in 1693 under a royal charter issued by King William III of England, William III and Queen ...
: Thomas Jefferson, John Blair Jr., James McClurg, James Francis Mercer, Edmund Randolph
* Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...
(King's College): John Jay, Robert R. Livingston, Gouverneur Morris,
* Harvard University
Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
(Harvard College): John Adams, Samuel Adams, Francis Dana, William Ellery, Elbridge Gerry, John Hancock, William Hooper, William Samuel Johnson (also Yale), Rufus King, James Lovell, Robert Treat Paine, Caleb Strong, Joseph Warren, John Wentworth Jr., William Williams
* Princeton University
Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...
(The College of New Jersey): Gunning Bedford Jr., William Richardson Davie, Jonathan Dayton, Oliver Ellsworth, Joseph Hewes, William Houstoun, Richard Hutson, James Madison, Alexander Martin, Luther Martin, William Paterson, Joseph Reed, Benjamin Rush, Nathaniel Scudder, Jonathan Bayard Smith, Richard Stockton
* University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania (Penn or UPenn) is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. One of nine colonial colleges, it was chartered in 1755 through the efforts of f ...
( College of Philadelphia): Francis Hopkinson, Henry Marchant, Thomas Mifflin, William Paca, Hugh Williamson
* Yale University
Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...
(Yale College): Andrew Adams, Abraham Baldwin, Lyman Hall, Titus Hosmer, Jared Ingersoll, William Samuel Johnson (also Harvard), Philip Livingston, William Livingston, Lewis Morris, Oliver Wolcott
British institutions
Following are founders who graduated from institutions in Britain:
* Inner Temple
The Honourable Society of the Inner Temple, commonly known as the Inner Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court and is a professional association for barristers and judges. To be called to the Bar and practice as a barrister in England and Wa ...
, is one of the four Inns of Court
The Inns of Court in London are the professional associations for barristers in England and Wales. There are four Inns of Court: Gray's Inn, Lincoln's Inn, Inner Temple, and Middle Temple.
All barristers must belong to one of them. They have s ...
in London offering legal studies for admission to the English Bar: William Houstoun, William Paca (also University of Pennsylvania graduate)[ The North Carolina Review, p. 278]
* Middle Temple
The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known simply as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court entitled to Call to the bar, call their members to the English Bar as barristers, the others being the Inner Temple (with whi ...
, also one of the four Inns of Court: John Banister, John Blair, John Dickinson, Thomas Heyward Jr.,[ The North Carolina Review, p. 279] Thomas Lynch Jr. (also University of Cambridge graduate), John Matthews, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney,[ The North Carolina Review, p. 280] Peyton Randolph, John Rutledge
* University of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...
, England: Thomas Lynch Jr. (also Middle Temple graduate), Thomas Nelson Jr.
* University of Edinburgh
The University of Edinburgh (, ; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a Public university, public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Founded by the City of Edinburgh Council, town council under th ...
, Scotland: Benjamin Rush, John Witherspoon
Ethnicity
All of the founders were white, and two-thirds (36 out of 55) were natives of the American Colonies, while nineteen were born in other parts of the British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, Crown colony, colonies, protectorates, League of Nations mandate, mandates, and other Dependent territory, territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It bega ...
.
* England: William Richardson Davie, William Duer, Button Gwinnett, Robert Morris, Thomas Paine
* Ireland: Pierce Butler,[ Dictionary of American biography, 1932, v. 3, pp. 364–365] Thomas Fitzsimons,[ Dictionary of American biography, 1932, v. 6, p. 444] James McHenry,[ Dictionary of American biography, 1932, v. 18, pp. 324–325] William Paterson, James Smith, George Taylor, Charles Thomson, Matthew Thornton
* Scotland: Edward Telfair, James Wilson, John Witherspoon
* Wales: Francis Lewis
* West Indies: Alexander Hamilton, Daniel Roberdeau
Occupations
While the Founding Fathers were engaged in a broad range of occupations, most had careers in three professions: about half the founders were lawyers, a sixth were planters/farmers, another sixth were merchants/businessmen, and the others were spread across miscellaneous professions.
* Ten founders were physicians: Josiah Bartlett, Lyman Hall, Samuel Holten, James McClurg, James McHenry (surgeon), Benjamin Rush, Nathaniel Scudder, Matthew Thornton, Joseph Warren, and Hugh Williamson.
* John Witherspoon was the only minister, although Lyman Hall had been a preacher prior to becoming a physician.
* George Washington, a Virginia planter, was a land surveyor before becoming a colonel in the Virginia Regiment.
* Benjamin Franklin was a successful printer and publisher and an accomplished scientist and inventor, in Philadelphia. Franklin retired at age 42 to focus first on scientific pursuits and then politics and diplomacy, serving as a member of the Continental Congress, first postmaster general, minister to Great Britain, France, and Sweden, and governor of Pennsylvania.[ Isaacson, 2004, pp. 127–128, 176, 206–209, 291, 325, 382]
Religion
Of the 55 delegates to the Constitutional Convention in 1787, 28 were Anglicans (Church of England
The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...
or Episcopalian), 21 were other Protestants
Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that emphasizes Justification (theology), justification of sinners Sola fide, through faith alone, the teaching that Salvation in Christianity, salvation comes by unmerited Grace in Christianity, divin ...
, and three were Catholics (Daniel Carroll and Fitzsimons; Charles Carroll was Catholic but was not a Constitution signatory).[ Lambert, 2003, p. ] Among the non-Anglican Protestant delegates to the Constitutional Convention, eight were Presbyterians, seven were Congregationalists, two were Lutherans
Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched the Reformation in 15 ...
, two were Dutch Reformed, and two were Methodists.
A few prominent Founding Fathers were anti-clerical, notably Jefferson. Many founders deliberately avoided public discussion of their faith. Historian David L. Holmes uses evidence gleaned from letters, government documents, and second-hand accounts to identify their religious beliefs.
Founders on currency and postage
Four U.S. founders are minted on American currency—Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin (April 17, 1790) was an American polymath: a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher and Political philosophy, political philosopher.#britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Wood, 2021 Among the m ...
, Alexander Hamilton
Alexander Hamilton (January 11, 1755 or 1757July 12, 1804) was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the first U.S. secretary of the treasury from 1789 to 1795 dur ...
, Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (, 1743July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the United States Declaration of Indepe ...
, and George Washington
George Washington (, 1799) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the first president of the United States, serving from 1789 to 1797. As commander of the Continental Army, Washington led Patriot (American Revoluti ...
; Washington and Jefferson both appear on three different denominations.
Political and cultural impact
Political rhetoric
According to David Sehat, in modern politics: Everyone cites the Founders. Constitutional originalists consult the Founders' papers to decide original meaning. Proponents of a living and evolving Constitution turn to the Founders as the font of ideas that have grown over time. Conservatives view the Founders as architects of a free enterprise system that built American greatness. The more liberal-leaning, following their sixties parents, claim the Founders as egalitarians, suspicious of concentrations of wealth. Independents look to the Founders to break the logjam of partisan brinksmanship. Across the political spectrum, Americans ground their views in a supposed set of ideas that emerged in the eighteenth century.
But, in fact, the Founders disagreed with each other....they had vast and profound differences. They argued over federal intervention in the economy and about foreign policy. They fought bitterly over how much authority rested with the executive branch, about the relationship and prerogatives of federal and state government. The Constitution provided a nearly limitless theater of argument. The founding era was, in reality, one of the most partisan periods of American history.
Holidays
Independence Day
An independence day is an annual event memorialization, commemorating the anniversary of a nation's independence or Sovereign state, statehood, usually after ceasing to be a group or part of another nation or state, or after the end of a milit ...
(colloquially called the ''Fourth of July'') is a United States national holiday celebrated yearly on July 4 to commemorate the signing of the Declaration of Independence and the founding of the nation. Washington's Birthday is also observed as a national federal holiday, and on April 13 Jefferson's Birthday honors the US founder and president.
Media and theater
The Founding Fathers were portrayed in the Tony Award
The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Broadway Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes excellence in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ce ...
–winning 1969 musical ''1776'', which depicted the debates over and eventual adoption of the Declaration of Independence. The stage production was adapted into the 1972 film of the same name. The 1989 film '' A More Perfect Union'', which was filmed on location in Independence Hall
Independence Hall is a historic civic building in Philadelphia, where both the United States Declaration of Independence, Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States were debated and adopted by the Founding Fathers of ...
, depicts the events of the Constitutional Convention. The writing and passing of the founding documents are depicted in the 1997 documentary miniseries '' Liberty!'', and the passage of the Declaration of Independence is portrayed in the second episode of the 2008 miniseries ''John Adams
John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before Presidency of John Adams, his presidency, he was a leader of ...
'' and the third episode of the 2015 miniseries '' Sons of Liberty''. The Founders also feature in the 1986 miniseries '' George Washington II: The Forging of a Nation'', the 2002–2003 animated television series '' Liberty's Kids'', the 2020 miniseries '' Washington'', and in many other films and television portrayals.
Several Founding Fathers, Hamilton, Washington, Jefferson, and Madison—were reimagined in ''Hamilton'', a 2015 musical
Musical is the adjective of music.
Musical may also refer to:
* Musical theatre, a performance art that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance
* Musical film
Musical film is a film genre in which songs by the Character (arts), charac ...
inspired by Ron Chernow
Ronald Chernow (; born March 3, 1949) is an American writer, journalist, and biographer. He has written bestselling historical non-fiction biographies.
Chernow won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize, 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Biography and the 2011 American ...
's 2004 biography ''Alexander Hamilton'', with music, lyrics and book by Lin-Manuel Miranda. The musical won eleven Tony Awards and a Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
Sports
Several major professional sports teams in the Northeastern United States are named for themes based on the founders:
* New England Patriots
The New England Patriots are a professional American football team based in the Greater Boston area. The Patriots compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the American Football Conference (AFC) AFC East, East division. The Pa ...
(National Football League
The National Football League (NFL) is a Professional gridiron football, professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National ...
)
* New England Revolution (Major League Soccer
Major League Soccer (MLS) is a professional Association football, soccer league in North America and the highest level of the United States soccer league system. It comprises 30 teams, with 27 in the United States and 3 in Canada, and is sanc ...
)
* New York Liberty (Women's National Basketball Association
The Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) is a women's professional basketball league in the United States. The league comprises 13 teams (scheduled to expand to 15 in 2026). The WNBA is headquartered in Midtown Manhattan.
The WNBA w ...
)
* Philadelphia 76ers (National Basketball Association
The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada). The NBA is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Ca ...
)
* Washington Capitals
The Washington Capitals (colloquially known as the Caps) are a professional ice hockey team based in Washington, D.C. The Capitals compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Metropolitan Division in the Eastern Conference (NH ...
(National Hockey League
The National Hockey League (NHL; , ''LNH'') is a professional ice hockey league in North America composed of 32 teams25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. The NHL is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Cana ...
)
* Washington Nationals
The Washington Nationals are an American professional baseball team based in Washington, D.C. The Nationals compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (NL) East Division. They play their home games at Na ...
(Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball league composed of 30 teams, divided equally between the National League (baseball), National League (NL) and the American League (AL), with 29 in the United States and 1 in Canada. MLB i ...
)
Religious freedom
Religious persecution had existed for centuries around the world and it existed in colonial America.[ Gelfand, 1969, pp. 7–8] Founders such as Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (, 1743July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the United States Declaration of Indepe ...
, James Madison
James Madison (June 28, 1836) was an American statesman, diplomat, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the fourth president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. Madison was popularly acclaimed as the ...
, , and George Mason first established a measure of religious freedom in Virginia
Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States between the East Coast of the United States ...
in 1776 with the Virginia Declaration of Rights
The Virginia Declaration of Rights was drafted in 1776 to proclaim the inherent rights of men, including the right to reform or abolish "inadequate" government. It influenced a number of later documents, including the United States Declaratio ...
, which became a model for religious liberty for the nation.[ Gelfand, 1969, p. 34, 37] Prior to this, Baptists
Baptists are a Christian denomination, denomination within Protestant Christianity distinguished by baptizing only professing Christian believers (believer's baptism) and doing so by complete Immersion baptism, immersion. Baptist churches ge ...
, Presbyterians, and Lutherans
Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched the Reformation in 15 ...
had for a decade petitioned against the Church of England
The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...
's efforts to suppress religious liberties in Virginia.
Jefferson left the Continental Congress to return to Virginia to join the fight for religious freedom, which proved difficult since many members of the Virginia legislature belonged to the established Church of England. While Jefferson was not completely successful, he managed to have repealed the various laws that were punitive toward those with different religious beliefs.[ Meacham, 2012, p. 123] Jefferson was the architect for separation of Church and State
The separation of church and state is a philosophical and Jurisprudence, jurisprudential concept for defining political distance in the relationship between religious organizations and the State (polity), state. Conceptually, the term refers to ...
, which opposed the use of public funds to support any established religion and believed it was unwise to link civil rights to religious doctrine.[
The United States Constitution, ratified in 1788, states in Article VI that "no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States". ]Freedom of religion
Freedom of religion or religious liberty, also known as freedom of religion or belief (FoRB), is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or community, in public or private, to manifest religion or belief in teaching, practice ...
and freedom of speech
Freedom of speech is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction. The rights, right to freedom of expression has been r ...
were further affirmed as the nation's law in the Bill of Rights. The 14th Amendment of 1868 provided all Americans with "equal protection under the laws" and thus applied the First Amendment restriction against limiting the free exercise of religion to the states.
Washington, a local leader of the Church of England, was also a strong proponent of religious freedom. He assured Baptists worried that the Constitution might not protect their religious liberties, that, "... certainly, I would never have placed my signature to it." Jews also viewed Washington as a champion of freedom and sought his assurances that they would enjoy complete religious freedom. Washington responded by declaring America's revolution in religion stood as an example for the rest of the world.
Slavery
The Founding Fathers were not unified on the issue of slavery and continued to accommodate it within the new nation. Some were morally opposed to it and some attempted to end it in several of the colonies, but nationally, slavery remained protected. In her study of Jefferson, a slaveholder of 600 slaves, Annette Gordon-Reed notes ironically, "Others of the founders held slaves, but no other founder drafted the charter for American freedom".[ Gordon-Reed, 2000, pp. 171–182] As well as Jefferson, Washington and many other Founding Fathers were slaveowners; 41 of the 56 signers of the Declaration owned slaves. Some were conflicted by the institution, seeing it as immoral and politically divisive; Washington freed his slaves, in his will. Jay and Hamilton led the successful fight to outlaw the international slave trade in New York, with efforts beginning in 1777.
Thomas Jefferson included an anti slavery clause in his original draft of the Declaration of Independence:
"He ing George
Ing, ING or ing may refer to:
Art and media
* ''...ing'', a 2003 Korean film
* i.n.g, a Taiwanese girl group
* The Ing, a race of dark creatures in the 2004 video game ''Metroid Prime 2: Echoes''
* "Ing", the first song on The Roches' 1992 al ...
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 & carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither. This piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is the warfare of the Christian King of Great Britain. Determined to keep open a market where Men should be bought & sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or restrain this execrable commerce. And that this assemblage of horrors might want no fact of distinguished die, he is now exciting those very people to rise in arms among us, and to purchase that liberty of which he has deprived them, by murdering the people on whom he has obtruded them: thus paying off former crimes committed again the Liberties of one people, with crimes which he urges them to commit against the lives of another."
Founders such as Samuel Adams and John Adams were against slavery. Rush wrote a pamphlet in 1773 which criticized the slave trade, and slavery. Rush argued scientifically that Africans are not intellectually or morally inferior, and any apparent evidence to the contrary is only the "perverted expression" of slavery, which "is so foreign to the human mind, that the moral faculties, as well as those of the understanding are debased, and rendered torpid by it." The Continental Association contained a clause which banned any Patriot involvement in slave trading.
Franklin, though a key founder of the Pennsylvania Abolition Society,[ Wright, 2002] owned slaves whom he manumitted (released). While serving in the Rhode Island Assembly, in 1769 Hopkins introduced one of the earliest anti-slavery laws in the colonies. When Jefferson entered public life as a member of the House of Burgesses, he began as a social reformer by an effort to secure legislation permitting emancipation of slaves. Jefferson say's "In 1769, I became a member of the legislature…. I made one effort in that body for the permission of the emancipation of slaves, which was rejected", but the representatives of the Crown sought "to direct our labors in subservience to he mother country'sinterest…. and… the Royal negative closed the last door to every hope of amelioration." Jay founded the New York Manumission Society in 1785, for which Hamilton became an officer. They and other members of the Society founded the African Free School in New York, to educate the children of free blacks and slaves. When Jay was governor of New York in 1798, he helped secure and signed into law an abolition law; fully ending forced labor as of 1827. He freed his slaves in 1798. Hamilton opposed slavery, as his experiences left him familiar with it and its effect on slaves and slaveholders, though he did negotiate slave transactions for his wife's family, the Schuylers. Evidence suggests Hamilton may have owned a house slave and after the Jay Treaty
The Treaty of Amity, Commerce, and Navigation, Between His Britannic Majesty and the United States of America, commonly known as the Jay Treaty, and also as Jay's Treaty, was a 1794 treaty between the United States and Great Britain that averted ...
was signed, Hamilton advocated that American slaves freed by the British during the war be forcibly returned to their enslavers. Henry Laurens, ran the largest slave trading house in North America. In the 1750s alone, his firm, Austin and Laurens, handled sales of more than 8,000 Africans.
Slaves and slavery are mentioned indirectly in the 1787 Constitution. For example, Article 1, Section 2, Clause 3 prescribes that "three-fifths of all other Persons" are to be counted for the apportionment of seats in the House of Representatives
House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entities. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often ...
and direct taxes. Additionally, in Article 4, Section 2, Clause 3, slaves are referred to as "persons held in service or labor".[ Freehling, 1972, p. 85] The Founding Fathers made some efforts to contain slavery. Many Northern states had adopted legislation to end, or significantly reduce slavery, during and after the revolution. In 1782, Virginia passed a manumission law that allowed owners to free their slaves by will or deed.[ Cambridge History of Law, 2008, p. 278] As a result, thousands of slaves were manumitted in Virginia.[ In the Ordinance of 1784, Jefferson proposed to ban slavery in all the western territories, which failed to pass Congress by one vote. Partially following Jefferson's plan, Congress did ban slavery in the ]Northwest Ordinance
The Northwest Ordinance (formally An Ordinance for the Government of the Territory of the United States, North-West of the River Ohio and also known as the Ordinance of 1787), enacted July 13, 1787, was an organic act of the Congress of the Co ...
, for lands north of the Ohio River
The Ohio River () is a river in the United States. It is located at the boundary of the Midwestern and Southern United States, flowing in a southwesterly direction from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to its river mouth, mouth on the Mississippi Riv ...
. The international slave trade was banned in all states except South Carolina by 1800. In 1807, President Jefferson called for and signed into law a federally enforced ban on the international slave trade, throughout the U.S. and its territories. It became a federal crime to import or export a slave. However, the domestic slave trade was allowed for expansion or for diffusion of slavery into the Louisiana Territory.[
]
Reconstruction as a "Second Founding"
According to Jeffrey K. Tulis and Nicole Mellow:The Founding, Reconstruction (often called "the second founding"), and the New Deal are typically heralded as the most significant turning points in the country's history, with many observers seeing each of these as political triumphs through which the United States has come to more closely realize its liberal ideals of liberty and equality.
Scholars such as Eric Foner have expanded the theme. Black abolitionists played a key role by stressing that freed blacks needed equal rights after slavery was abolished. Biographer David Blight states that Frederick Douglass, "played a pivotal role in America's Second Founding out of the apocalypse of the Civil War, and he very much wished to see himself as a founder and a defender of the Second American Republic." Constitutional provision for racial equality for free blacks was enacted by a Republican Congress led by Thaddeus Stevens, Charles Sumner
Charles Sumner (January 6, 1811March 11, 1874) was an American lawyer and statesman who represented Massachusetts in the United States Senate from 1851 until his death in 1874. Before and during the American Civil War, he was a leading American ...
and Lyman Trumbull. The "second founding" comprised the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments to the Constitution. All citizens now had federal rights that could be enforced in federal court. In a deep reaction, after 1876 freedmen lost many of these rights and had second class citizenship in the era of lynching and Jim Crow laws
The Jim Crow laws were U.S. state, state and local laws introduced in the Southern United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries that enforced Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, "Jim Crow (character), Ji ...
. Finally in the 1950s the U.S., Supreme Court started to restore those rights. Under the leadership of Martin Luther King and James Bevel, the Civil Rights movement made the nation aware of the crisis, and under President Lyndon Johnson major civil rights legislation was passed in 1964–65, and 1968.
Scholarly analysis
There are thousands of historians who have written about the American Revolution
The American Revolution (1765–1783) was a colonial rebellion and war of independence in which the Thirteen Colonies broke from British America, British rule to form the United States of America. The revolution culminated in the American ...
era and the founding of the United States government. Some of the most prominent ones are listed below. While most scholarly works maintain overall objectivity, historian Arthur H. Shaffer notes that many of the early works about the American Revolution often express a national bias, or anti-bias. Shaffer maintains that this bias lends a direct insight into the minds of the founders and their adversaries respectively. He notes that any bias is the product of a national interest and prevailing political mood, and as such cannot be dismissed as having no historic value for the modern historian. Conversely, various modern accounts of history contain anachronisms, modern day ideals and perceptions used in an effort to write about the past and as such can distort the historical account in an effort to placate a modern audience.
Early historians
Several of the earliest histories of the founding of the United States and its founders were written by Jeremy Belknap, author of his three-volume work, ''The history of New-Hampshire'', published in 1784.
* Henry Adams, grandson of John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams (; July 11, 1767 – February 23, 1848) was the sixth president of the United States, serving from 1825 to 1829. He previously served as the eighth United States secretary of state from 1817 to 1825. During his long diploma ...
, wrote a nine-volume work, ''The History of the United States of America During the Administrations of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison'', which is acclaimed for its literary style, documentary evidence, and first-hand knowledge of major figures during the early Revolutionary
A revolutionary is a person who either participates in, or advocates for, a revolution. The term ''revolutionary'' can also be used as an adjective to describe something producing a major and sudden impact on society.
Definition
The term—bot ...
era.
* Rufus Wilmot Griswold authored ''Washington and the Generals of the Revolution'', a two-volume work, in 1885.
* Albert Bushnell Hart, a Harvard University
Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
history professor, edited a 27-volume work, ''The American Nation: A History'', published in 1904–1918.
* John Marshall
John Marshall (September 24, 1755July 6, 1835) was an American statesman, jurist, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the fourth chief justice of the United States from 1801 until his death in 1835. He remai ...
, a U.S. Supreme Court Justice, published a two-volume biography of Washington in 1832, three years before his death.
* David Ramsay is regarded as one of the first major historians of the American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which Am ...
.[ Cooney, 1967 Master of Arts Thesis]
* Mercy Otis Warren, who wrote extensively about the Revolution and post-Revolution eras, published all her works anonymously until 1790.
* Mason Locke Weems authored the first biography of Washington in 1800, which includes the famed story about a young Washington cutting down a cherry tree.
* William Wirt wrote the first biography on in 1805, but was accused for excessive praise of Henry.
Modern historians
Articles and books by these and other 20th- and 21st-century historians, combined with the digitization of primary sources such as handwritten letters, continue to contribute to an encyclopedic body of knowledge about the Founding Fathers:
* Ron Chernow
Ronald Chernow (; born March 3, 1949) is an American writer, journalist, and biographer. He has written bestselling historical non-fiction biographies.
Chernow won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize, 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Biography and the 2011 American ...
won the Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prizes () are 23 annual awards given by Columbia University in New York City for achievements in the United States in "journalism, arts and letters". They were established in 1917 by the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made his fo ...
for his 2010 biography of Washington. His 2004 bestselling book ''Alexander Hamilton'' inspired the 2015 blockbuster musical of the same name.
* Douglas Southall Freeman wrote an extensive seven volume biography on Washington. Historian and George Washington biographer John E. Ferling maintains that no other biography for Washington compares to that of Freeman's work.
* Dumas Malone is noted for his six-volume biography ''Jefferson and His Time'', for which he received the 1975 Pulitzer Prize, and for his co-editorship of the 20-volume '' Dictionary of American Biography''.
* Annette Gordon-Reed is an American historian and Harvard Law School
Harvard Law School (HLS) is the law school of Harvard University, a Private university, private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1817, Harvard Law School is the oldest law school in continuous operation in the United ...
professor. She is noted for changing scholarship on Jefferson regarding his alleged relationship with Sally Hemings
Sarah "Sally" Hemings ( 1773 – 1835) was a Black people, black woman Slavery in the United States, enslaved to the third President of the United States Thomas Jefferson, inherited among many others from his father-in-law, John Wayles.
Hemi ...
and her children. She has studied the challenges faced by the Founding Fathers, particularly as it relates to their position and actions on slavery.
* Jack P. Greene is an American historian who specializes in colonial-era American history.
* David McCullough
David Gaub McCullough (; July 7, 1933 – August 7, 2022) was an American popular historian. He was a two-time winner of both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. In 2006, he was given the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United S ...
's Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prizes () are 23 annual awards given by Columbia University in New York City for achievements in the United States in "journalism, arts and letters". They were established in 1917 by the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made his fo ...
–winning 2001 book ''John Adams
John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before Presidency of John Adams, his presidency, he was a leader of ...
'' focuses on Adams, and his 2005 book, ''1776
Events January–February
* January 1 – American Revolutionary War – Burning of Norfolk: The town of Norfolk, Virginia is destroyed, by the combined actions of the British Royal Navy and occupying Patriot forces.
* January ...
'' details Washington's military history in the American Revolution and other independence events carried out by America's founders.[ McCullough, 2001, 751 pages]
* Peter S. Onuf and Jack N. Rakove have researched Jefferson extensively.
According to American historian Joseph Ellis, the concept of the Founding Fathers of the U.S. emerged in the 1820s as the last survivors died out. Ellis says the founders, or the fathers comprised an aggregate of semi-sacred figures whose particular accomplishments and singular achievements were decidedly less important than their sheer presence as a powerful but faceless symbol of past greatness. For the generation of national leaders coming of age in the 1820s and 1830s, such as Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before Presidency of Andrew Jackson, his presidency, he rose to fame as a general in the U.S. Army and served in both houses ...
, Henry Clay
Henry Clay (April 12, 1777June 29, 1852) was an American lawyer and statesman who represented Kentucky in both the United States Senate, U.S. Senate and United States House of Representatives, House of Representatives. He was the seventh Spea ...
, Daniel Webster, and John C. Calhoun, the founders represented heroic but anonymous abstraction whose long shadow fell across all followers and whose legendary accomplishments defied comparison.
Noted collections
* Adams Papers Editorial Project, an ongoing project by the Massachusetts Historical Society to organize, transcribe, and documents authored by and by the family of John Adams
John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before Presidency of John Adams, his presidency, he was a leader of ...
, his wife Abigail Adams, and their family, including John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams (; July 11, 1767 – February 23, 1848) was the sixth president of the United States, serving from 1825 to 1829. He previously served as the eighth United States secretary of state from 1817 to 1825. During his long diploma ...
* Founders Online, a searchable database of over 184,000 documents authored by or addressed to George Washington, John Jay, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams (and family), Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, and James Madison
* The Papers of Benjamin Franklin at Yale University
Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...
* The Papers of James Madison at the University of Virginia
The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia, United States. It was founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson and contains his The Lawn, Academical Village, a World H ...
* The Papers of Thomas Jefferson at Princeton University
Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...
* The Selected Papers of John Jay at Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...
* The Washington Papers at the University of Virginia
See also
* Signing of the United States Declaration of Independence
* Signing of the United States Constitution
* History of the United States Constitution
* Timeline of drafting and ratification of the United States Constitution
* Journals of the Continental Congress
* Adams Memorial – proposed
* Benjamin Franklin National Memorial
* Jefferson Memorial
* James Madison Memorial Building
* George Mason Memorial
* Washington Monument
The Washington Monument is an obelisk on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., built to commemorate George Washington, a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father of the United States, victorious commander-in-chief of the Continen ...
* Memorial to the 56 Signers of the Declaration of Independence
* American Descendants of Slavery
* Father of the Nation
* List of national founders
The following is a list of national founders of sovereign states who were credited with establishing a state. National founders are typically those who played an influential role in setting up the systems of governance, (i.e., political system ...
* Rights of Englishmen
The "rights of Englishmen" are the traditional rights of English subjects and later English-speaking subjects of the The Crown, British Crown.
In the 18th century, some of the Patriot (American Revolution), colonists who objected to British ...
* Founderism
* List of original members of the Society of the Cincinnati
* Films about the American Revolution
* Plays and musicals about the American Revolution
* Television shows about the American Revolution
Notes
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* Ellis, Joseph, ''Founding Fathers : the Essential Guide to the Men who Made America'' (Encyclopædia Britannica, 2007)—the introduction states: "The following 10, presented alphabetically, represent the 'gallery of greats' that has stood the test of time: John Adams, Samuel Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, John Marshall, George Mason, and George Washington. There is a nearly unanimous consensus that George Washington was the Foundingest Father of them all."—The book has short bios of 46 "founding Fathers" (and mothers)
online
* Fischer, David Hackett. ''African Founders: How Enslaved People Expanded American Ideals'' (2022
excerpt
also se
online review
* Flower, Milton Embick,
John Dickinson, Conservative Revolutionary
', University Press of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia (1983)
*
excerpt
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* Gilhooley, Simon J. ''The Antebellum Origins of the Modern Constitution: Slavery and the Spirit of the American Founding'' (Cambridge University Press, 2020).
* Graebner, Norman A., Richard Dean Burns, and Joseph M. Siracusa. ''Foreign affairs and the founding fathers: From confederation to constitution, 1776–1787'' (Praeger, 2011).
* Green, Steven K. (2015). ''Inventing a Christian America: The Myth of the Religious Founding.'' Oxford University Press.
* Harris, Matthew; Kidd, Thomas, eds. (2012). ''The founding fathers and the debate over religion in revolutionary America: a history in documents''. (Oxford University Press).
*
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* Koch, Adrienne (1961).
Power, Morals, and the Founding Fathers: Essays in the Interpretation of the American Enlightenment
'. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
* Kostyal, K. M. (2014). ''Founding Fathers: The Fight for Freedom and the Birth of American Liberty''
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* Moreland-Capuia, Alisha. "The Role of Fear in the Founding of the United States: A Historical and Philosophical Perspective." in ''The Trauma of Racism: Exploring the Systems and People Fear Built'' (Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2021) pp. 13–33.
* Newman, Richard S. ''Freedom's Prophet: Bishop Richard Allen, the AME Church, and the Black Founding Fathers'' (2008)
online
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* Trees, Andrew S.
The Founding Fathers and the Politics of Character
', Princeton University Press (2005)
* Unger, Harlow Giles. ''First Founding Father: Richard Henry Lee and the Call to Independence'' (2017)
* Unger, Harlow Giles. ''Dr. Benjamin Rush: The Founding Father Who Healed a Wounded Nation'' (2018)
* Unger, Harlow Giles. ''Lion of Liberty: Patrick Henry and the Call to a New Nation'' (Da Capo Press, 2010).
* Unger, Harlow Giles. ''Thomas Paine and the clarion call for American independence'' (Da Capo Press, 2019).
* Unger, Harlow Giles. ''John Marshall: The Chief Justice Who Saved the Nation.'' (Da Capo Press, 2014).
* Unger, Harlow Giles. ''John Hancock: Merchant King and American Patriot'' (John Wiley & Sons, 2000).
* Valsania, Maurizio. ''The French Enlightenment in America: Essays on the Times of the Founding Fathers'' (U of Georgia Press, 2021).
Journal articles
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* Burnard, Trevor. "The Founding Fathers in Early American Historiography: A View from Abroad." ''William and Mary Quarterly'' 62#4 (2005), pp. 745–7
online
* Dreisbach, Daniel L. ''Reading the Bible with the Founding Fathers'' (2017
online review
* Mason, Matthew. "A Missed Opportunity? The Founding, Postcolonial Realities, and the Abolition of Slavery." ''Slavery & Abolition'' 35.2 (2014): 199–213.
* Newman, Richard S. and Roy E. Finkenbine. "Black Founders in the New Republic" ''William and Mary Quarterly'' (2007) 64#1 pp. 83–9
online
* Previdi, Robert. "Vindicating the Founders: Race, Sex, Class, and Justice in the Origins of America," ''Presidential Studies Quarterly'', Vol. 29, 1999
* Squiers, Anthony. "The Apotheosis of the Founding Fathers and Signs of Filial Piety." in ''The Politics of the Sacred in America: The Role of Civil Religion in Political Practice'' (2018) pp: 75–96.
External links
Founders Online: Correspondence and Other Writings of Seven Major Shapers of the United States
Meet the Framers of the Constitution
National Archives
The Federalist Papers
The Avalon Project, Lillian Goldman Law Library, Yale University
Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...
Signers of the Declaration of Independence
National Archives
Signers of the Declaration: Individual Biographies
(PDF), National Park Service
The Fates of Signers of the Declaration of Independence: Debunking the Myths
published June 28, 2005
"What Would the Founding Fathers Do Today?"
''American Heritage'', 2006
Were the Founding Fathers 'Ordinary People'?
PolitiFact
{{DEFAULTSORT:Founding Fathers Of The United States
1910s neologisms
Age of Enlightenment
American Revolution
Patriots in the American Revolution
Political leaders of the American Revolution
American revolutionaries