Colonial Self-Government & The Great Awakening: Fifth Grade Social Studies
During the eighteenth century, the American colonies nurtured traditions of legislative self-government under British salutary neglect, while the First Great Awakening ignited a spiritual revolution that challenged traditional authority.
The Seeds of an Independent Political Spirit
By the mid-eighteenth century, the Thirteen Colonies had lived under British rule for over a century, yet they functioned with an astonishing degree of day-to-day political freedom. Three thousand miles of stormy ocean separated London from America; an order written by the King or Parliament took two to three months to cross the Atlantic aboard a wooden sailing ship. Because the British Crown was occupied with European wars and domestic turmoil, British prime ministers practiced an informal policy known as salutary neglect (healthy neglect)—deliberately leaving the American colonies alone to govern their own local affairs, build their own economies, and elect their own legislatures, as long as raw materials and trade profits continued flowing back to London.
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| THE STRUCTURE OF COLONIAL GOVERNMENT |
| |
| THE BRITISH CROWN |
| | |
| v |
| THE ROYAL GOVERNOR |
| Appointed by King; held veto power & military |
| | |
| +------------------------+------------------------+ |
| | | |
| v v |
| [ GOVERNOR'S COUNCIL ] [ ELECTED ASSEMBLY ] |
| Upper House; prominent Lower House; elected by |
| colonial aristocrats free property-owning men. |
| appointed by Governor. Held **Power of the Purse**|
| (Taxes & Governor's Pay!) |
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The Three Varieties of Colonial Charters
The Thirteen Colonies operated under three distinct governmental structures based on their original founding charters.
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| THE THREE TYPES OF COLONIAL CHARTERS |
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| Charter Category | Colonies Included | How Government Operated |
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| Royal Colonies | VA, NY, MA, NH, | Direct Crown control; King |
| | NC, SC, GA, NJ | appointed governor and council;|
| | | elected lower assembly |
| Proprietary Colonies| PA, MD, DE | Owned by individual proprietors|
| | | (William Penn, Lord Baltimore);|
| | | proprietor appointed governor |
| Charter / Self- | CT, RI | Most democratic! Colonists |
| Governing Colonies | | elected BOTH houses of legis- |
| | | lature AND their own governor! |
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Freedom of the Press: The John Peter Zenger Trial (1735)
One of the most foundational court trials in American legal history occurred in New York City in 1735, establishing the sacred principle of freedom of the press.
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| THE JOHN PETER ZENGER TRIAL (1735) |
| |
| 1. THE ACCUSATION: John Peter Zenger, a German immigrant printer, |
| published the *New-York Weekly Journal*, printing articles accusing |
| corrupt Royal Governor William Cosby of rigging elections and theft.|
| 2. SEDITIOUS LIBEL: Cosby threw Zenger in jail for seditious libel. |
| Under English law at the time, criticizing a royal government |
| official in print was a crime, EVEN IF THE CRITICISM WAS 100% TRUE! |
| 3. ANDREW HAMILTON'S DEFENSE: Legendary Philadelphia lawyer Andrew |
| Hamilton defended Zenger. He admitted Zenger printed the words, but |
| demanded that the jury judge whether the words were TRUE. |
| 4. THE VERDICT: The jury boldly defied the royal judge and declared |
| Zenger NOT GUILTY! The verdict established that truth is a complete |
| defense against libel and that citizens have a right to criticize |
| corrupt government officials in print. |
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The First Great Awakening: A Spiritual Earthquake (1730s-1750s)
During the 1730s and 1740s, a powerful religious revival swept across all thirteen colonies from Maine to Georgia, known as the First Great Awakening. Prior to this awakening, church services were often formal, cold, and intellectual affairs where ministers read dry, theological manuscripts in monotonous voices. The Great Awakening transformed religion into an intense, emotional, personal experience that swept away old denominational barriers.
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| LEADERS OF THE GREAT AWAKENING |
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| Revivalist Preacher | Preaching Style and Historical Impact |
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| Jonathan Edwards | Brilliant Northampton, MA philosopher; preached |
| (1703-1758) | *"Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God"* (1741); |
| | sparked weeping, fainting, and spiritual rebirth |
| George Whitefield | Charismatic English evangelist; the "Marvel of the |
| (1714-1770) | Age"; toured all 13 colonies; preached outdoors to |
| | crowds of 30,000 with a theatrical, booming voice |
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George Whitefield: America's First Celebrity
George Whitefield (pronounced WHIT-field) was an open-air preacher whose booming voice was said to carry over a mile. When traditional ministers locked their church doors against him, Whitefield took his pulpit into open meadows, city squares, and forests. Tens of thousands of people rode horses for miles to hear him preach. Even the skeptical, scientific Benjamin Franklin in Philadelphia was so spellbound by Whitefield's magnetic eloquence that he emptied his entire pockets—gold, silver, and copper—into the collection plate!
"Old Lights" Versus "New Lights"
The Great Awakening fractured colonial churches into two rival camps:
- Old Lights: Traditional, conservative ministers who condemned the wild emotional shouting, weeping, and outdoor preaching as dangerous religious anarchy.
- New Lights: Passionate revivalist preachers who championed personal spiritual rebirth, emotional singing, and the belief that any ordinary person could understand God's Word without relying on an aristocratic minister.
The Democratic Legacy of the Great Awakening
While the Great Awakening began as a religious revival, its ultimate historical consequence was political: it served as an unintended training ground for the American Revolution.
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| HOW THE REVIVAL IGNITED REVOLUTIONARY IDEAS |
| |
| 1. SPIRITUAL EQUALITY: Preachers proclaimed that all souls are equal |
| before God—rich planters, poor farmers, women, and enslaved people. |
| Colonists reasoned: If we are equal in the eyes of God, why should |
| we bow to kings and royal governors on Earth? |
| 2. CHALLENGING AUTHORITY: Taught ordinary citizens that they had the |
| moral right to question and break away from corrupt ministers. It |
| was a small mental step to question a corrupt British Parliament! |
| 3. THE FIRST SHARED NATIONAL EXPERIENCE: The revival was the very first|
| cultural event that touched people in ALL thirteen colonies |
| simultaneously, breaking down provincial rivalries and forging a |
| shared identity as a unified American people! |
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Exercises and Solutions
Exercise 1: Explaining the Legal Precedent of the 1735 John Peter Zenger Trial. In 1735, New York printer John Peter Zenger was tried for seditious libel for criticizing Royal Governor William Cosby. Explain how defense attorney Andrew Hamilton overturned traditional English libel law, and analyze why this trial is celebrated as the foundation of American freedom of the press.
Solution 1: The 1735 trial of John Peter Zenger fundamentally transformed American jurisprudence by establishing truth as an absolute legal defense against charges of libel. Under prevailing seventeenth-century English common law, the legal crime of "seditious libel" did not depend on whether a published statement was true or false; in fact, the British legal maxim was "the greater the truth, the greater the libel." The law maintained that publishing truthful criticisms of government officials was even more dangerous than lies because truth was more likely to provoke public outrage and incite rebellion against the Crown. When Zenger was arrested for printing articles exposing Governor William Cosby's corruption and stolen election ballots, the royal judge instructed the jury that they were only allowed to decide whether Zenger physically printed the newspapers; the judge reserved the right to determine whether the words were criminal. However, defense attorney Andrew Hamilton delivered a revolutionary argument directly to the jury: he asserted that printing the truth can never be a crime in a free society. Hamilton argued that citizens have a natural right to expose the abuses of tyrannical rulers, insisting that the jury had the moral authority to judge the truth of the accusations. The jury agreed, defying the royal judge and acquitting Zenger. This landmark verdict shattered crown censorship in the colonies, emboldened colonial newspapers to openly scrutinize royal governors, and laid the direct philosophical foundation for the protection of freedom of the press in the First Amendment of the United States Constitution.
Exercise 2: Analyzing the Political Consequences of the First Great Awakening. The First Great Awakening of the 1730s and 1740s was primarily a religious revival. Explain how this spiritual movement inadvertently fostered democratic attitudes, challenged aristocratic authority, and prepared the American colonists for the political revolution against Great Britain thirty years later.
Solution 2: The First Great Awakening served as a powerful democratic catalyst that psychologically and culturally prepared the American colonists for the political revolution of 1776. Prior to the revival, colonial society was deeply deferential and hierarchical: ordinary farmers were conditioned to bow before educated, wealthy elites and accept the authority of church and royal officials without question. The revivalist preachers—most notably George Whitefield and the "New Lights"—completely upended this social pyramid. By preaching that every human soul is spiritually equal before God, the revival dismantled aristocratic privilege. Whitefield preached that salvation was a deeply personal emotional conversion open to anyone—including poor tenant farmers, women, and enslaved Africans—without needing the validation of elite, university-educated ministers. When conservative "Old Light" churches attempted to silence revivalist preachers, ordinary believers voted with their feet, splitting away from established state-supported churches to found independent Baptist and Methodist congregations governed democratically by their own members. This religious rebellion established a profound precedent: if ordinary colonists possessed the moral and intellectual right to judge and dismiss an ordained minister of the Gospel, they realized they also possessed the right to judge, challenge, and overthrow a corrupt royal governor or British monarch. Furthermore, because George Whitefield toured every colony from New Hampshire to Georgia, the Great Awakening was the very first shared cultural experience in American history, uniting thirteen previously disconnected, suspicious colonies under a common set of values and a shared sense of American identity.