Developing an American Identity

Vocabulary terms covering the cultural continuities, social changes, and abolition of aristocratic institutions that shaped the emergence of an American identity following the War for Independence.

J. Hector St. John Crèvecoeur

Author of Letters from an American Farmer (1782) who described the American as a "new man, who acts upon new principles" and must entertain new ideas and form new opinions.

"Founding fathers"

The leaders who declared independence, fought a war to achieve it, and created a new system of government, whose influence became the core of an evolving American identity.

George Washington's Precedents

Actions such as his Farewell Address and his two-term tradition as president that demonstrate the enduring relevancy and influence of the founding fathers on American political identity.

Abolition of Aristocratic Titles

The post-Revolution legal reform wherein state constitutions and laws prohibited legislatures from granting titles of nobility and ended old institutions originating in medieval Europe.

Primogeniture

The medieval European feudal practice granting the first-born son the right to inherit his family's property, which was barred from recognition by American courts following the Revolution.

Confiscation of Loyalist Estates

The wartime seizure, subdivision, and sale of large landholdings belonging to Loyalists to raise money for the war, which further weakened whatever aristocracy existed in colonial America.