Bolingbroke Archives - Journal of the American Revolution

Posted on March 16, 2023March 14, 2023

Thomas Jefferson and the Conditions of Good History: Writing About the American Revolution

Thomas Jefferson has a Thucydidean, or fact-based, approach to the praxis of history. Evidence of that approach appeared early in his life, in his Literary Commonplace Book. There, Jefferson, quoted Henry St. John, Lord Bolingbroke (1678–1751), who wrote of history, rightly practiced. For history to be authentic, Jefferson, continuing to copy Bolingbroke, added that “these […]

by M. Andrew Holowchak

Posted on September 22, 2021September 21, 2021

Lord Bolingbroke: A Tory Thinker that Jefferson Truly Admired

Jefferson scholars all knew that Thomas Jefferson often disparaged the label “Tory” in his political writings. For Jefferson, being called a Whig would signify approval, while being called a Tory was quite derogatory and damaging. There were, however, one or two Tory thinkers that Jefferson truly admired, and Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke seems […]

by Haimo Li

Posted on July 12, 2021July 11, 2021

The Bolingbrokean Constitutional Argument in John Adams’s 1766 Clarendon Letter

As part of the debate over the constitutionality of the Stamp Act, John Adams wrote a series of letter to the Boston Gazette discussing the nature and duties of the British government. He signed these letters “Clarendon” rather than using his own name.[1] In his January 27, 1766 “Clarendon” letter Adams penned this line: Were I to […]

by Haimo Li

Posted on July 14, 2020July 14, 2020

An American Bolingbroke: John Taylor of Caroline’s Republican Opposition, 1792–1794, Part 2 of 2

Henry St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke, in the first half of the eighteenth century, and John Taylor of Caroline in the 1790s, both feared that once power had been secured by an unpatriotic faction it might employ a standing army to effect the destruction of the republic. Additionally, Taylor was among those who felt that the […]

by James A. Cornelius

Posted on July 13, 2020July 12, 2020

An American Bolingbroke: John Taylor of Caroline’s Republican Opposition, 1792–1794, Part 1 of 2

From 1792 to 1794, John Taylor of Caroline, a senator from Virginia, was engaged in a heated party struggle between Jeffersonian Republicans and Hamiltonian Federalists over the implementation of the latter’s new economic program. Taylor, despite being largely unknown by non-specialists today, has been called by Gordon S. Wood “the conscience of the Republican party” […]