” By comparison, our forebears went from monarchal subjects in a hierarchal society to republican citizens in a comparative blink of an eye. Way radical. “
Feel free to argue your case against Kirk. The American revolution was to preserve existing rights against the encroachments, the usurpations, of the King. Rights that American colonials believed that they already had and that they had been practicing without interference for a very long time. These rights were already spelled out in the Bill of Rights of 1689, a document we forget because we tend not to look back into English political history. But this document was well known to American colonials.
The colonials had stated repeatedly their willingness remain British subjects if George III respected their rights. He didn’t, and so the American colonies seceded from the United Kingdom. Hamilton and few others wanted to establish a monarchy over here and make Washington a king. But Washington and the majority chose to build upon the Continental Congress that they had been operating under since before war erupted. The new government was an evolution and codifying of what had already been operating in the American colonies.
If you want a radical revolution then look to what happened shortly afterwards in France. Edmund Burke knew the difference between the two, supported the American effort and deplored the French. Burke’s writings on this are one of the reasons Kirk featured him in ‘The Conservative Mind’ and ‘Edmund Burke: A Genius Reconsidered’.
‘Russell Kirk was a leading figure in the post-World War II revival of American interest in Edmund Burke. Today, no one who takes seriously the problems of society dares remain indifferent to “the first conservative of our time of troubles.” In Russell Kirk’s words: “Burke’s ideas interest anyone nowadays, including men bitterly dissenting from his conclusions. If conservatives would know what they defend, Burke is their touchstone; and if radicals wish to test the temper of their opposition, they should turn to Burke.” Kirk unfolds Burke’s philosophy, showing how it revealed itself in concrete historical situations during the eighteenth century and how Burke, through his philosophy, “speaks to our age. “This volume makes vivid the four great struggles in the life of Burke: his efforts to reconcile England with the American colonies; his involvement in cutting down the domestic power of George III; his prosecution of Warren Hastings, the Governor-General of India; and his resistance to Jacobinism, the French Revolution’s “armed doctrine.”’
You lost all credibility with that whopper.
Cherish your kirk if you wish. My historians of the revolutionary era are Wood, McDonald, Bailyn, Stourzh, Jensen, Adair, Storing, and primary source documents .