{"product_id":"declaring-independence-why-1776-matters","title":"Declaring Independence: Why 1776 Matters","description":"On the 250th anniversary of American independence, with the history of our founding a political battleground, this study of the ideas and battlefield sacrifices of 1776 by a Pulitzer Prize–winning scholar could not be more timely.\nAt the beginning of 1776, virtually no one in the colonies was advocating independence: Americans based their grievances against Parliament on their rights as British subjects. By the end of 1776, independence was on every patriot’s lips. The many tyrannies of a king had made an independent republic necessary. In Declaring Independence, Edward J. Larson gives us a compact, insightful history of that pivotal year. He traces a narrative arc that runs from the inspiring appeals of Paine’s Common Sense in January; through the soaring ideals of midsummer, when the Continental Congress grounded independence in the self-evident truths of human equality and individual rights, and the states wove revolutionary principles of republican government and the rule of law into their new constitutions; to Paine’s urgent pleas of December, when “the times that try men’s souls” required Americans not “to shrink from the service of their country.” Dramatic military clashes also punctuate the year: the British evacuation of Boston forced by the brilliant maneuvers of Washington’s Army; the Battle of Long Island, a costly defeat that opened New York to British occupation; and the desperate year-end victory of a threadbare American army at Trenton.\nCombined, these ideals and the sacrifices remind us why, on this anniversary and at this political moment, 1776 matters to all of us. 8 pages of illustrations\u003cbr\u003eASIN: 1324078979\u003cbr\u003eVSKU: BVV.1324078979.VG\u003cbr\u003eCondition: Very Good\u003cbr\u003eAuthor\/Artist:Larson, Edward J.\u003cbr\u003eBinding: Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eNote:\u003c\/b\u003e Any images shown are stock photographs and product may differ from what is shown.  \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eCondition Notes\u003c\/b\u003e: Book has little sign of wear or use  \u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Blue Vase Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43714078507069,"sku":"BVV.1324078979.VG","price":14.55,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0589\/4225\/9261\/files\/1324078979-0.jpg?v=1790285804","url":"https:\/\/www.bluevasebooks.com\/products\/declaring-independence-why-1776-matters","provider":"Blue Vase Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}