Hello,
A new perspective on the World Socialist Web Site assesses the significance of our June 25 webinar, “The American Revolution and Its Place in History, 1776–2026”, which brought together leading historians to defend the revolutionary heritage of 1776 at a moment of mounting authoritarianism.
The webinar, the perspective observes, stands as the only serious discussion held with leading historians on the causes, implications and enduring relevance of the American Revolution during this 250th anniversary year. That it fell to the WSWS to organize it is a measure of the hostility of the entire political establishment and the official media to the democratic traditions of the United States.
From workers and youth, the response has been powerful. Viewership has now passed 3,000, and readers across the world have written in, many expressing enthusiasm at finding a defense of the American Revolution mounted from the left.
The discussion could not be more timely. The ongoing efforts by the Trump administration and the ruling oligarchy to establish a dictatorship, North explained, make the study of the revolutionary traditions of the United States a political necessity. The Declaration of Independence was revolutionary, he said, because “it indicted the existing social and political order and called for its overthrow in the most sweeping and universal terms.”
Throughout, the panel insisted on the Declaration’s living relevance. Adam Hochschild read its indictment of George III, who set the military “superior to the civil power” and had people “transported beyond seas” for “pretended offenses,” and observed that the charges read as if they “were written this morning.” Eric Lee pointed to a Supreme Court ruling handed down that same day stripping rights from immigrants, and to the organizers of the January 6 coup walking free while protesters at ICE detention camps face prison sentences of 30, 40 and even 50 years.
In his closing remarks, North argued that history matters because “it adds complexity to our understanding of the present,” and, quoting Lincoln, that things look most impossible “at the point in which the greatest change is in the offing.” Against the rampaging reaction of the corporate oligarchy, he drew a revolutionary optimism: “To be an optimist is to see not only the difficulties, but contained within those difficulties the possibility of renewal.” He predicted that “the America and the world of 2036 will look vastly different from the world of today.”
The fight over the meaning of 1776, North concluded, is a fight over “the political consciousness and perspective required for the future.” The defense of basic democratic rights, he argued, will not be carried through by any faction of the ruling class; the task falls to the international working class, and is inseparable from the fight for socialism. These are not matters of mere academic interest. They bear directly on the political struggles now unfolding.
We encourage you to read the perspective in full, watch the recording if you have not yet, and share both as widely as you can.
No comments:
Post a Comment