July 1, 2005

America's Unfinished Revolution

By GARY B. NASH

"Who shall write the history of the American Revolution? Who can write it? Who will ever be able to write it?" Thus wrote John Adams in 1815 to Thomas Jefferson. "Nobody," Jefferson replied from Monticello, "except merely its external facts. ... The life and soul of history must be forever unknown."

Not so. For more than two centuries, historians have written about the American Revolution, striving to capture the "life and soul" of which Jefferson spoke. We now possess a rich and

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