EJ Dionne Doesn't Know What the American Revolution Was About...

Because, if he did, he'd know that if we were back in Boston in 1773, he'd be a Tory.

The American Revolution was not merely directed against monarchy. In the 169 years that the Thirteen Colonies existed, not a single monarch ever set foot in any one of them. No monarch ever made himself personally noxious to the American people.

What the American Revolution attacked was arbitrary authority, those "multitudes of new offices" that act beyond the scope of any public consent. That we have an elected Congress does not instantaneously legitimize whatever that Congress may decide to do. That is what the Founders understood, and what the Tea Party understands: that any government becomes illegitimate the instant that the people so decide.

The levels of taxation do not matter if the people no longer wish to pay them. Vague, self-serving remonstrances about measures for "the public good" do not matter if the people consider them contrary to their their own good. Popular rule does not mean merely elections, it means a government in the role of a servant, not a parent. As soon as those in office start believing they know the public good better than the public, then they have exceeded their brief, and it is the right and duty of the people to alter or abolish said offices.

Because a little Revolution every now and again is a healthy thing.