The Marketplace of Revolution: How Consumer Politics Shaped American Independence

Widely scattered up and down the Atlantic coast in the eighteenth century, the American colonists had very little in common. How did this far-flung group develop a national identity with shared principle and goals in order to organize themselves to fight, and win, against a far mightier enemy, the British Empire? T. H. Breen, a professor of American history at Northwestern University, offers an intriguing answer in his latest book. Breen argues that it was the colonists' desire for the stream of British manufactured goods flooding their daily lives that created their common identity as consumers. As the British imposed their harsh taxes and other punitive actions, colonists from New England to the Carolinas shared a sense of outrage and indignation resulting in boycotts and, ultimately, political revolution. Wonderfully written, The Marketplace of Revolution offers fascinating new insights into the onset of the American Revolution.