How and why did the colonist use the english system of rights to help them form there goverment!?

Question

hiii! im doing a 5 paragraph essay
for world cultures.

and i need the answer to that question.
although its needs to be in the from of a thesis
statments.please help.
thank you :D

Answer 1

~The why should be easy. The oppressive government that the rebels so vociferously condemned was the most free and egalitarian government on the planet at the time and it was, prior to the Treaty of Versailles, the only government they knew. Given that 1/3 of the colonists opposed the revolution and 1/3 didn't take sides, not too many changes - other than the elimination of a monarch - were going to be accepted.

The how is a little more complicated. You are going to have to do a little research into British Parliamentary law and the evolution, composition and structure of British government as it existed in 1787. Then you are going to have to read the US Constitution to find the comparisons. Once that is done, you will have to do a little research into British common law and particularly the Courts of Chancery and see how the common law of Great Britain was presumed to apply to the precedentless common law of the US.

Any discussion of the Bill of Rights by the Framers and Founding Fathers will give you more information than you can handle. The Federalist Papers would be a good starting point, especially if you read the anti-federalist comments of Cato and Brutus as well. Or you might want to read some of the reports of the Constitutional Convention. If all else fails, use your text and the materials you teacher assigned.

That is how you find your answer. You teacher would be upset with me if I did it for you and I know you would feel guilty and worthless if I helped you cheat on your homework and you accepted the help.

Answer 2

The colonists used the English system of rights because it was the system they knew. Most American colonists were English and most of the colonies existed as English settlements with colonial governments that answered to Parliament and the crown.

American colonists used a bicameral legislature just as Parliament in England did, and it was along the same lines: colonial senates were aristocrats just as the House of Lords in Parliament, with the difference being that the colonial senate chambers by and large elected the governor of the state, while that did not happen in Parliament. The lower house of colonial legislatures was akin to the House of Commons where property owning men could vote for representatives to that house. Judges were appointed by the governors, just as judges were appointed by the king in England.

You have a lot of info there. It's up to you to make the thesis statement.

Answer 3

Ditto on what the other two have said. I can only add this...

REMEMBER that the American Revolution was NOT about independence for the first year. That's VERY important!

The colonists were fighting for what they saw as their rights as English subjects. They believed that they took their rights with them across the Atlantic when they colonized America. The British saw things a wee-bit differently.

For more information on this period, consider my blog...

http://americanfounding.blogspot.com