What Are The Causes Of The American Revolution In The Mid-Nineteenth Century
The world was aglow with change during the mid-nineteenth century. Revolutions, both political and industrial, were in full force by the late 1840’s throughout much of continental Europe and the United States. In 1848, the ‘Spring of Nations’, or ‘Springtime of the Peoples’, consumed France, Austria, Hungary, Russia, Denmark, Poland, and many nation-states within what is now present-day Germany and Italy. With nationalist movements at the core, the peoples of Europe--in almost one singular voice--sought not only independence from the oppressive monarchies of Europe, they fiercely desired a sense of self, or nativism, as had been the underlying cause of the French and American Revolutions several decades earlier. While many bore patriotic banners to pursue these xenophobic endeavors, a significant number immigrated away from mainland Europe to the safety of Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United States (again, to name a few).
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Years of oppression at the hands of the British, secular policies and a potato blight--or ‘Great Famine’ as many historians would call it--crippled an otherwise proud society. Thus, the ratio of Irish immigrants seeking refuge in the United States--as compared to their mainland counterparts--was nearly 1:1 during the same period (as identified in the previous paragraph and sources cited). The matter of Irish immigration was not new. Many had transited to Scotland in prior centuries; and a subsequent number found their way to plantations in the “New World” vis-à-vis exiles from the English crown following unsuccessful rebellions. While several clans amongst the neighboring Scots suffered similar expulsions—with tens of thousands banished following the failed Jacobite rebellions during the eighteenth century—any realistic comparisons to the Irish would short-sight centuries of political and religious oppression sustained by the Irish courtesy sitting English
Years of oppression at the hands of the British, secular policies and a potato blight--or ‘Great Famine’ as many historians would call it--crippled an otherwise proud society. Thus, the ratio of Irish immigrants seeking refuge in the United States--as compared to their mainland counterparts--was nearly 1:1 during the same period (as identified in the previous paragraph and sources cited). The matter of Irish immigration was not new. Many had transited to Scotland in prior centuries; and a subsequent number found their way to plantations in the “New World” vis-à-vis exiles from the English crown following unsuccessful rebellions. While several clans amongst the neighboring Scots suffered similar expulsions—with tens of thousands banished following the failed Jacobite rebellions during the eighteenth century—any realistic comparisons to the Irish would short-sight centuries of political and religious oppression sustained by the Irish courtesy sitting English