The Common Cause

When the Revolutionary War began, the odds of a united, continental effort to resist the British seemed nearly impossible. Few on either side of the Atlantic expected thirteen colonies to stick together in a war against their cultural cousins. In this pathbreaking book, Robert Parkinson argues that to unify the patriot side, political and communications leaders linked British tyranny to colonial prejudices, stereotypes, and fears about insurrectionary slaves and violent Indians. Manipulating newspaper networks, Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Franklin, and their fellow agitators broadcast stories of British agents inciting African Americans and Indians to take up arms against the American rebellion. Using rhetoric like domestic insurrectionists and merciless savages, the founding fathers rallied the people around a common enemy and made racial prejudice a cornerstone of the new Republic.

In a fresh reading of the founding moment, Parkinson demonstrates the dual projection of the common cause. Patriots through both an ideological appeal to popular rights and a wartime movement against a host of British-recruited slaves and Indians forged a racialized, exclusionary model of American citizenship.

"In this pathbreaking book, Robert Parkinson argues that to unify the patriot side, political and communications leaders linked British tyranny to colonial prejudices, stereotypes, and fears about insurrectionary slaves and violent Indians. Manipulating newspaper networks, Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Franklin, and their fellow agitators broadcast stories of British agents inciting African Americans and Indians to take up arms against the American rebellion. Using rhetoric like "domestic insurrectionists" and "merciless savages," the founding fathers rallied the people around a common enemy and made racial prejudice a cornerstone of the new Republic"--
Robert G. Parkinson is associate professor of history at Binghamton University.
Persuasively explains the intensely racialized nature of citizenship in the newly independent U.S. and the long-standing problems posed by the exclusion of Americans of indigenous or African heritage from the 'common cause of the Revolution.--Publishers Weekly

Deeply researched and powerfully argued.--U.S. Intellectual History Book Reviews

Parkinson's scholarship shines with his attention to very specific details.--Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History

Several aspects of Parkinson's work are particularly impressive, but what stands out is the sheer ambition of the task he has successfully brought to fulfilment.--The English Historical Review

Parkinson has captured something of the panicked and often explicitly racially demonizing culture of the revolutionary period with this new and valuable take on familiar sources relevant to the field of early American studies.--American Quarterly

Parkinson's balance between patriotism and prejudice injects The Common Cause with a certain timeliness in an age in which questions of journalistic accuracy, rhetoric, and representation are heavy on the minds of American readers.--H-Net Reviews

[A] sophisticated, textual analysis . . . [revealing] much about the nature and legacy of the American Revolution.--William and Mary Quarterly

[Takes] a fresh look at the Revolutionary War and the communication of strategies of the founding fathers.--Eric Coller, Binghamton University

Convincingly demonstrates that race and racism were not afterthoughts to the rhetoric of equality of rights but were deeply integrated into the founding years of the United States.--Journal of American History

Clear prose and logical structure make it a joy to read. . . . Parkinson's impressive analysis . . . will force future scholars to engage with his uncomfortable argument that American independence rested on racism and ethnocentrism.--Common-Place

Brilliant, timely, and indispensable. . . . Parkinson writes with authority on military, political, social, and cultural history, reconstructing the story of this critical period as it actually unfolded, with everything happening at once.--Annette Gordon-Reed, New York Review of Books

Engrossing. . . . A must-read for anyone interested in the American Revolution and issues of race.--Library Journal, starred review

Even as he builds on the existing scholarship about the Revolution, Parkinson recasts our understanding of the Revolutionary War and its lasting impact.--Virginia Magazine of History and Biography

One of the most significant studies in of the Revolution in years. It sweeps the entire war; connects cultural, military, and political concerns; contains the best survey of American newspapers during this period; and argues persuasively that fear of blacks and Indians formed the psychic center of the new nation. Highly recommended.--CHOICE

Wonderfully written and deeply researched. . . . Reveals a very different and much darker picture of the revolution. . . . Full of illuminating insights about familiar events.--William and Mary Quarterly