Carl L. Becker

It comes from a biography of Otis published in 1823, where it is the biographer's own summary.

The slogan itself, No Taxation Without Representation, first turns up as a printed headline in a London magazine in 1768 as far as historian J.L. Bell has been able to trace it.

The colonists made the same point many times, just in other words.

On March 2, 1765, Parliament passed the Stamp Act to take effect on November 1.

In May, Virginia instructed its delegates to propose it.

Across the colonies, towns, counties, and provincial bodies adopted their own statements calling for independence.

The historian Pauline Mayer counted some 90 of these other declarations between April and July 1776.

Congress took the step in stages.

His goal is less to identify every historical force behind the revolution as to delve into the minds of the men who led it.

Spalding rejects the approach of earlier scholars of the founding like Carl Becker, who infamously thought that asking, quote, whether the natural rights philosophy of the Declaration of Independence is true or false is essentially a meaningless question.

While he's not heedless of context, he is also careful not to slip into the historical fallacy that denies the actors of our great national drama any agency.

So again, his point is agency.

... that there, there is, uh, uh, there's such a great level of degree of content.

You know, uh, this reminds me of the famous sayings, uh, over 100 years ago, uh, Carl Becker.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.