Class #8 (Homework for 11/3)

Here is the famous "Crying Indian" video, if you want to watch it with the music. For an example of the "anti-racism as a maneuver to establish sophistication or superiority" theory I gave, see here. I should say that I support the political views of the speaker, but I think the way she presents her views indicates an elitist attitude that has a very loose relation to anti-racism. (Note on second video: "Redneck" is an insult that means a rural or uncultured person.

Reading: Red Jacket (214-16), Tecumseh (216-18), Apess (482-88), Black Hawk (570-74), Boudinot (577-80), Emerson (585-88)

Questions: Tady, Ted, Teresa, Ting Ju, Vincent, Viola, Winnie

Answers:
Sharon = 71. Indicate several of the techniques Red Jacket uses to gain control of the "means of representation" in English. Would any of these be relevant to Taiwanese aboriginal groups writing in Mandarin?
Sherry = 72. Indicate several of the techniques Tecumseh uses to establish a "Pan-Indian" rhetoric. Would any of these be relevant to Taiwanese aboriginal groups?
Sydney = 73. The Norton editors tell us that Apess' "Indian's Looking Glass" has unusual stylistic features which make it more like an oration than an essay. Indicate some of them. Then, discuss how Apess challenges the opposition of "black" and "white" that he finds at the core of the English language.
Tracy = 74. Would you say Apess' position is closer to that of cultural separationists like Pontiac, Red Jacket, Tecumseh, and Black Hawk, or that of cultural assimilationists like Occam and Boudinot? Give evidence for both views of him.
Zoe = 75. Give evidence to support Schmitz's claim (quoted on 571) that Black Hawk's autobiography is "a Sauk history advocating a Sauk politics."
Ken = 76. Why is the Cherokee Phoenix published in two languages? What does Boudinot mean when he says it is a "national newspaper"? And what is the meaning of the title?
Meg = 77. Why do you think Emerson considers the letter to Van Buren a "scream" or "shriek" (586) that "oversteps the bounds of decorum" (587) with a "burlesque character" (588), instead of a "thesis" (586)? Give evidence from the letter.
Natalie = 78. Why do you suppose that the literary style of Indian writers like Occam, Apess, and Boudinot stay more closely to the precise or "neoclassical" style of writers like Hamilton, Jefferson, and Franklin, rather than reflecting the more imaginative or "romantic" style of writers like Emerson, Thoreau, and Hawthorne?

Class #7 (Homework for 10/27)

Reminder: Please buy Connecticut Yankee at NTHU bookstore by the end of 十月.
Reminder: Please post your group answer to the Emerson comparison in the interior comments. Two similarities, two differences, and whether you prefer Emerson to the other writer in style/ideas.
Reminder: Please read my responses to answers 51-60 in the interior comments.
Reminder: 十一月十七日 will be the midterm exam session, 九十分鐘. Please email my assistant Ms. Chen to indicate when you are available to meet for a 九十分鐘. class session on either 十一月十九日 or 十一月二十日. Please try to indicate as many available times as possible.

Reading: Norton Headnotes (17, 206-07, 570); Aboriginal Creation Stories (17-24); Williams (87-96); Franklin (226-30); Freneau (415-18); Pontiac (207-09); Occam (209-12)

Questions: Carol, Emma, Iris, Ken, Letitia, Meg, Natalie, Peggy, Qian Yu, Rea

Answers:
Zoe = 61. Give us a brief history of government policy toward Taiwanese aboriginals during these two periods: Qing dynasty (1680s-1890s) and Japanese occupation (1890s-1940s). Brief!
Joy = 62. Give us a brief history of government policy toward Taiwanese aboriginals during these two periods: KMT military rule (1940s-1980s), and the present era (1980s-2000s). Brief!
Alyssa = 63. Suppose you are the chief or elder of an aboriginal tribe living in U.S. territory in the 1800s, as described on 17. What are the advantages and disadvantages of collaborating with the Bureau of American Ethnology to record your tribe's stories and legends? A different question... do you agree with the Norton editors' choice to place the creation stories before Columbus in our book's chronology? Why or why not?
Caleigh = 64. One of the major distortions of Euro-American views of American Indians is that they are bloodthirsty savages. But another is that they are gentle and pure; in some way we may consider these two views to be actually the same, where the Indian is seen as a primitive child rather than a political or moral agent. What evidence do you see of political hierarchy or power in the Iroquois and Pima creation stories? Can you interpret this to have any particular significance to the situation of those tribes during the time these stories were transcribed?
Clara = 65. Compare Williams' concept of "lump" on 89 to the "quantity of earth" on 19 and the "greasy earth" on 22. How are they similar and different? Do you see evidence of any aboriginal cultural influence on Williams, or do you believe the exchange is only taking place in one direction?
Crystal = 66. Who are the savages of North America, according to Franklin? What words or techniques does he use to indicate this? Is this essay consistent with your earlier impression of Franklin or not? Explain.
Esther = 67. Why do you suppose all the Indians in this poem are dead? I mean from an ideological standpoint, not their physical cause of death. Next, if I say that Freneau is using them as a poetic or symbolic "resource," what is his purpose for doing so? In other words, what point is he trying to make?
Jane = 68. The Norton editors discuss a difficulty in reading early texts written by American Indians; many were actually edited, transcribed, or composed by Euro-Americans. Of Pontiac's speech, they write, "Neither the accuracy of the date nor the authenticity of the speech can be documented with any certainty." And consider what you learn about the man who composed it on 18 (Francis Parkman). How does this change our approach as readers? Do you think Pontiac's speech should be in the anthology? Why or why not?
Jenny = 69. Compare Pontiac's speech to the Euro-American "jeremiad" of Bradford/Winthrop/Edwards/Emerson/Thoreau/etc. How is it similar and different? Next, what does his three part division of literature (the Delaware's prophetic "dreaming" versus the "hieroglyphic" carving of the prayer versus Pontiac's oratory) tell us about the political life of the Ottawas/Delawares?
Lucille = 70. What do you think of Occam's 補習班 ? Just kidding, that's not a real question. My real question is, how would Occam react to this article? (Read this paragraph on Wikipedia if the context is not clear from the article.)

The Yankee Has Arrived!

Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court is now available at the NTHU bookstore for the reasonable price of $170NT. We won't be reading it until December, but please buy a copy now because I think they will ship them back to Taipei soon if they are unsold.

Class #6 (Homework for 10/20)

Good work this week! As I said, I have noticed that you are more confident discussing narrative fiction than you are discussing poetry or "non-fiction" speeches and essays. Maybe you have more experience - you analyze from habit ?

Please consider the two new poll questions. I can't believe we have read 20 different authors already, but then again we are one-third finished with our reading for this semester. I do appreciate how much effort you are putting into the class. I think you will find that the harder you study now, the easier it will become at the end of this term, and also next term. Many of the concepts we are discussing now are "foundational." By the way, if you want a measure of how highly esteemed the so-called American Renaissance canon is, look at the numbering of the pages in your Norton Anthology. We arrive at Emerson on page 488, having marched all the way from the year 1492 to the year 1836 (1.42 pages per year). But for us to get to the year 1862, we must read all the way to page 1220 (28.2 pages per year). From 1862 to 2004 takes us to page 2874 (11.6 pages per year). So you can see how disproportionately the 1840s and 1850s decades are represented.

As for the last poll, the "Panic" question was quite popular and generated some interesting results. Like all good questions, I think both answers are essentially correct; panic sometimes generates more cautious responses and sometimes generates more radical ones. The "Enlightenment" question was less popular, perhaps because the wording was so long and complex. But it is good to see that there are a variety of viewpoints in the class.

I have one follow-up to today's discussion. A number of you mentioned the concept of "American Dream" in your comments last week, which I did not discuss today. My first comment about "American Dream" is that you can see this is not a new concept; every writer we discuss has a sort of American Dream, all the way back to Columbus, Winthrop, etc. The very essence of "America" is that it is a dream, not really a historical place and time (like "North American continent" or "United States"), but instead an ideological concept. Indeed you can read Shakespeare's Tempest or Thomas More's Utopia and see an American Dream from someone who has never even set foot on American soil. Something that is fascinating about Mexican literature is that it has a very similar "American Dream" until the military defeat to the U.S. in the 1840s. Thereafter the dream for Mexico is to become a version of "America" that is different from or better than the U.S. But we notice that these concepts of the American Dream evolve over time. Not only that, but multiple concepts of the American Dream may compete against one another at the same time; clearly Bradford and Morton had different dreams! The Civil War of 1861-65 is a perfect example, as both sides believed they were defending the American Dream and completing the American Revolution. All the same, it seems to me when you all use the phrase "American Dream," you refer more specifically to an updated version of the dream you find in Franklin and Crevecouer. Meaning that the American Dream is for an immigrant from any nation to come to U.S. America and gain a comfortable social and economic position by means of hard work. So I just want to point out that we can refer to "American Dream" as a general concept, but also more specifically to this one type of "American Dream."

Reading Assignments

• Finish Norton Headnote (440-449)
• Emerson biography (488-92) and his "Self Reliance" (start on bottom 532 to "the right of every man" on top 540, "Man is timid and apologetic on middle 541 to "what is called death" on middle 542, "But now we are a mob" on top 543 to "in their speculative views" on top 545, "2. It is for want of self-culture" on middle 546 to end on top 550)
• O'Sullivan's "Annexation" (handout; extras available in green basket... try "History of Texas" on Wikipedia if you want a background reference, specifically sections 5-9 of that webpage)
• Thoreau biography (825-29) and his "Resistance to Civil Government," usually called "Civil Disobedience" (start on 829 to "or thinking at all" on middle 842, "No man with a genius" on bottom 843 to end on 844)

Questions

Lucille, Caleigh, Esther, Sydney, Crystal, Jane, Jennie, Alyssa, Zoe

Answers

• 51. (Ting Ju) The first one always seems to be the theoretical question! OK so, a famous critic named Harold Bloom has argued that literature develops through a kind of "patricidal" or Oedipal conflict where the younger writer tries to destroy or overtake the older writer. He calls this "the anxiety of influence." So for instance, Virgil must overtake Homer, Dante must overtake Virgil, Milton must overtake Dante, Blake must overtake Milton, etc. etc. Emerson's theory on 533, 539, and 547 is somewhat similar. On 445-47 you see a very different theory of literary development expressed. How would you describe this theory? And how can you relate it to Franklin's "junto" and to the political or economic structure of 19th-century American life?
• 52. (Rea) I want you to do some research and find at least two essays from the past 25 years that call for a "Taiwanese national literature." Then choose a representative quotation of about one paragraph from both essays and post these for your answer.
• 53. (Iris) It has been said that Emerson is inspired by the Southwestern humorists; for instance, the "transparent eyeball" derives from a fascination of Southwestern humorists with gauging out or removing eyeballs! Compare "Self-Reliance" to "Big Bear." The first half of this task is easy... find thematic similarities. The second half is more difficult task... find linguistic/stylistic similarities.
• 54. (Joy) Contrast Emerson to one or more of the following: Winthrop, Smith, Franklin, Crevecouer, Jefferson, Hamilton, Irving, Hawthorne (your choice)
• 55. (Peggy) Give some theories as to how O'Sullivan's Irish ethnic background may affect his views in the "Annexation" essay.
• 56. (Letitia) Compare O'Sullivan's concept of "manifest destiny" (top of 2nd page) to Emerson's concept of "self-reliance."
• 57. (Emma) Why does O'Sullivan think that Mexican sovereignty in Texas and California is "artificial" (middle of 3rd page), whereas American sovereignty is "natural"?
• 58. (Teresa) How is it possible that O'Sullivan favors a war with Mexico and Thoreau doesn't favor it when the logic of popular sovereignty on the 3rd page of "Annexation" seems to be precisely that of "Resistance to Civil Government" on 829-30?
• 59. (Qian Yu) Do you agree with Thoreau's principle "that government is best which governs least" (829)? Explain. Do you think it is actually possible to, as he urges, "wash [your] hands" (834) of participation in injustice, in the year 2009? Explain.
• 60. (Viola) The Norton editor notes on 828 that Thoreau's essay was a "crucial influence" on both Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King Jr. The similarities are obvious, but I want you to analyze some of the differences between Thoreau's form of "resistance" and that of Ghandi and King.

Class #5 (Homework for 10/13)

Please notice the new polls on the right. I was considering one about the U.S. baseball playoffs, but we have many other matters to discuss. You will see an extension of the Tuesday 10/6 discussion in the entry below (#4.5). I am trying an experiment to use the poll as a tool for extending philosophical discussion, to reduce your workload this week, so you will see questions about Revolutionary Panic and European Enlightenment. So comment replies on those topics are not required, but they are encouraged. (Soft power!)

Ah, but first we can learn something from baseball. As a Yankees fan, I am often accused by other Americans of supporting the "capitalist-nihilist" position in the Enlightenment poll. But this is false. The Yankees are an instance of "aesthetic-nihilism";  their business apparatus only serves their will to power as a baseball team. I think. Further, we can learn a lot about Americans by considering this hatred that many have of the Yankees. Aren't Americans the preeminent capitalists in the world? Why do they hate the wealthiest and most powerful team? Why this contradiction? Why this support for the "underdog" team? The Boston Red Sox, fittingly for the city's Puritan roots, are the best expression of American ideology. They represent the "underdog," yet their financial strength is nearly equal to that of the Yankees. "At least they're not the Yankees" is the Boston fan's explanation. And the Yankees, the imperialistic team, are then also the international team, because they are the first team that people in the imperial domain of the U.S. become familiar with; the word "Yankee" stands for Americans in general. And this is also true to many newer U.S. immigrants. So we have a strange phenomenon. The Yankees are the team of the most powerful members of U.S. empire, but also the least powerful. The Red Sox and the other teams operate in the middle, and therefore they claim to be more "American." Strange. The true explanation of my Yankees affiliation is regional as I was born in New York and my father grew up several streets from the old Yankee Stadium (his parents the first generation immigrants, Jews from Eastern Europe). I must give this as a sort of "apology" for being a Yankees fan when I talk to other Americans even though the Yankees are by far the most popular team in the U.S. overall. This is strange indeed; it has the appearance of the "self-denying" form of U.S. power. Interestingly, the third most popular team, the Atlanta Braves utilize aboriginals as a symbolic resource.

Reading assignment as follows.

• Norton headnote 431 - 440 ("An American Renaissance?," "American Literary Nationalism," "The Economics of American Letters")
• Irving biography + "Rip Van Winkle" (453-466... but you can skip the introduction on 455 and the concluding note on 466)
  
• Hawthorne biography + "My Kinsman, Major Molineux" (589-605)
• "The Big Bear of Arkansas" (very short biography of the author, T.B. Thorpe, available here)
  

Questioners as announced are Qian Yu, Ting Ju, Jennie, Alyssa. I include also Joy and Emma because they still "owe me" from last week. And I must add Sharon, Sherry, Tracy, and Jane because I miscounted.

• 41. Lucille You see on 431-32 a discussion of the so-called "American canon problem." Like a religious community, a political nation seeks a body of "holy texts" to define its identity. (We have already read some of these; the best example of an American holy text is the "Declaration of Independence.") You may see the present Norton Anthology similarly, as a collection of texts that seek to define American identity in a certain way. As the headnote indicates, during the 1800s many people desired a specifically American literature, but they did not deem most of the fiction and poetry that Americans were actually writing during this time to be adequate; for instance Irving was held in high esteem but deemed inferior to British writers, Hawthorne was generally disregarded, and Thorpe was considered a low culture entertainer, like today's television. At the beginning of the 1900s, when the U.S. was undeniably a world power, the first "canon" of American literature was created, but as the Norton editor indicates, most of the authors in this canon were unread or unappreciated during their own lives! This early 1900s canon emphasized the U.S. as a dynamic and creatively vital nation driven by a vision of democratic equality. It was then revised many times; the current edition of the Norton is particularly concerned to be pluralistic, inclusive, multicultural, etc. The literary canon for secondary and university study is a politicized issue in the U.S., but I would not say highly politicized at present. I am certain that the canon of Chinese/Taiwanese literature is more highly politicized in Taiwan at present. Discuss the "Taiwanese canon problem" and draw comparisons.
  
• 42. Zoe  Why do you think Irving chose to adapt this particular story from the German folk tradition mentioned on 454 and 466. In other words, what is its "American" meaning? You may consider, for instance, what happens while Rip is asleep. How would you make a Taiwanese adaptation of this story?
  
• 43. Tady  Let us consider the misogynistic (anti-female) undertone of the story; Rip even takes "a drop of comfort" when he learns his wife is dead! Given what you learn about the U.S. literary market on 437, why do you think Irving may want to insist that women are irrational?
  
• 44. Vincent  Compare Hawthorne's handling of the theme of rebellion or revolution to Irving's.
  
• 45. Ken  Give us some background information on the ritual of "tarring and feathering" in British political life.
  
• 46. Meg  Compare Hawthorne's handling of the theme of humor or laughter to Thorpe's.
  
• 47. Winnie  "The Big Bear of Arkansas" originally appeared in a magazine called Spirit of the Times. Because we have no Norton headnote, give use some background on this magazine, as well as on a similar publication called the Crockett Almanac. Who was the reading audience? Why were these magazines and these kinds of stories ("Southwest Humor") so popular in the 1830s-1850s? Is there any Chinese or Taiwanese equivalent to these stories and/or to the Doggett character?
  
• 48. Ted  Analyze the story's narrator. What is his relationship to the reader? What is his relationship to Jim Doggett (the bear hunter)? Do you believe Doggett's/Thorpe's educational theory (to "gain information by asking and listening," 83-84), or is there actually a different educational theory operating here? Do you find any similarity between Thorpe's fictional technique and Irving's?
  
• 49. Natalie  What is Doggett doing when he's "sitting down... from habit" (91)? What are his "inexpressibles" (92)? Many critics consider this to be the punchline to Doggett's story and Thorpe's story, and indeed the main point of both. And, speaking of what is expressible and inexpressible, point us to a few of the unique characteristics of the language Doggett uses in his description of the bear hunt, of Arkansas, and of the region that was more generally called the frontier or "Old Southwest."
• 50. Carol  Why does Doggett "love" the bear "like a brother" (87), and what does this tell us about the Old Southwest? What would Crevecouer think of this story? Some critics say that the bear can be a symbol for aboriginal people. Why do they say this, and do you agree?
  

Class #4.5

Good class today. I always need more time than I have available; I guess that means I am not a revolutionary. I need a "push"! In particular, I enjoyed our comparison of concepts of revolution. I hope this will be useful as we go forward... if you feel frustrated or confused, like everything is too complicated, remember... we have 26 meetings of this class remaining. Gradual perfection on the Franklin plan is still possible. Ha ha.

• Star Wars series in 10 minute bits (I can't believe the copyright lawyers haven't taken this down!)
• Contemporary re-use of the "tea party protest" (ironically, another anti-radical "rebellion" manipulated by powerful interests)
  

I can't believe I didn't see this question from last week's blog. It's so smart! Rea writes:

 In the headnote it’s mentioned that “the first newspaper was appeared in 1704, and by the time of the Revolution there were almost fifty papers and forty magazines” (156). I wonder what the role of these media played during the not-mentioned 70 years. Who are the major audience of these media? How strong their voices were and what proportion of people in American at that time was literate? In my anticipation, there were little people who were literate; therefore, the media were, in some way, controlled by them. If this was true, was the outcome of the revolution truly “public”? I would like to know whether my theory is correct or not.

 I gave a preliminary answer at the end of class, and you can see how this relates to the broader concepts we discussed. In the Enlightenment/Rationalist/Modern European political theory, every person is a writer and a reader because every person can create knowledge. Society is artificially composed of the collaboration and/or competition between these people to create and apply their knowledge. In PreModern/Medieval Europe, the only sources of knowledge are the monarch, the academic authorities (interpreters of Greek philosophy, principally Aristotle), and the religious authorities (interpreters of the Bible... and in truth these last two are a single intellectual class, which is affiliated with the monarchies!). Traditional knowledge is considered to be belong only to some people (a central language of power - Latin, like its equivalent Mandarin), and the content of this knowledge is always the same. What is its content? Well, its content basically says that on heaven all can be equal but on earth there are people who naturally will/should control power and information (the Christian synthesis: "Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's"). It's a big circle. Even if the circle "overturns" in revolution, you have a new ruling dynasty with a very similar ideology.

During the PreModern/Medieval era, the centers of learning in the West were the Islamic kingdoms, where human reason was taken to be a force for good in the universe. (We tend to forget this now!) Literacy and knowledge were highly concentrated in Europe; in truth Europe was intellectually dead. With the European "Renaissance" you have the re-adoption of the true content of ancient Greek & Roman learning and knowledge, but more importantly of the true spirit... this means that new knowledge is possible, new political forms are possible. And new languages... consider the invention of new non-Latin languages that we see come to flower in Cervantes (Spanish), Shakespeare (British), Dante (Italian), and Rabelais (French). Another important development is the invention of the printing press in Germany by Gutenberg. Of course the press had already been invented in China, but in Europe its usage spread much more rapidly and its political character changed more rapidly. We can see how the printing press, together with the new science of a "rational universe" and the new political philosophy of an "artificial" society created by human agents that approximated rational natural/physical laws, could threaten the traditional power of the monarchs and the Catholic church. (We must also consider how the age of exploration and trade, the early colonialism of Columbus, Cabeza de Vaca, Smith, etc. created the "volatility" and interchange that made these shifts possible.)

 Now where does America come in? Literacy in the "vernacular languages" (that is, languages newer than Latin, as mentioned previously) developed most rapidly in England, because England was the nation with a political and economic system (and geographic position) most favorable to the emergence of capitalism. But literacy would develop even more quickly in Britain's American colonies. The printing technology in America was worse and the transportation problems were greater, but we may say that the incentive to read and write was greater, because political and economic "volatility" on the outskirts of the British empire made it possible to realize the Modern political theory of political subjects creating their own destiny. You want to be able to read and write because you have the ability to conduct small scale business and small scale politics without an imperial authority over-ruling you (it is too distant, and in the commercialistic British system too disinterested). I simplify, of course. This is not necessarily how British-Americans viewed their life at the time. Many believed in a "natural" or cyclical process of revolution or change; they believed they were returning to be more like the primitive British or perhaps the primitive Christians/Jews or perhaps the primitive Romans. But we may say in hindsight that the underlying structural conditions encouraged the growth of Modern tendencies in their politics.

So Americans are readers and writers. And the American printing network has a unique character; it is radically decentralized unlike the one in England. This, along with the high literacy (perhaps 40% of all people in the northeast - even some women, remember Ann Bradstreet - perhaps more like 5% in the southeast - but that includes the slaves, so still 20% of the creoles), makes the system itself democratic in character even if the messages transmitted in the system are not. Once the printers were radicalized against the British rule by the Stamp Act, the system of printing and distribution becomes a kind of revolutionary network, one of the first areas in which British, Dutch, German, Scotch, etc. "creoles" living under the British empire begin to imagine that they were / could be be a union with common interests. The printers, of course, are also aligned with commercial interests, with the merchants and small bankers of New England in particular (i.e. Boston and the far northeast region). And New England has the highest literacy of all. So it becomes the revolutionary core, and the challenge is then to motivate others to join. First, to motivate those who control the agricultural centers in the Southeast. Second, to motivate the lower social classes who do not hold their own farms or their own capital. Neither of these groups has any special motivation to resist British power.

Here we see the broadening of revolutionary rhetoric in Jefferson and Paine, men whose thinking has a somewhat more radical character than that of the Boston men like John Adams, Samuel Adams, Hancock, etc., and their conservative allies in the southeast and middle states like Madison, Franklin, Washington, Hamilton. Once the door is opened, once a revolutionary panic has been declared, all creoles (and perhaps even some blacks and aboriginals) can be united temporarily by the "broad" or "plastic" concepts like liberty, freedom, etc. The decentralized nature of the printing network encourages this. Thus when the revolution is successful and the creole ruling class (those who hold land and capital; those who actually wanted this "revolution" to defend their rights as British subjects) want to re-establish their power, to re-centralize their power, the printing network is now actually a source of irritation. Because the printing network is still decentralized. It can still transmit more "radical" sorts of messages to a broader public. One of these radical messages is that any man who has basic reading skills can be a political participant, and if this man has no land or capital, he can be freely given land on the western frontier. So now any (white) man can become one of Crevecouer's virtuous farmers. This is the true political message of Thomas Jefferson. This is what he means by "all men created equal," an idea actually more radical than that of the Congress or the eventual political Constitution.

So you see, Rea's excellent question is anticipates our entire class discussion!

Other details that we were unable to discuss... what about the specific editorial changes made by the revolutionary Congress to Jefferson's Declaration? Sherry and Jennie offer some very good theories in the previous blog comments. Jennie, for instance, observes that Jefferson's accusation against the British king for causing the African slave trade is deleted because for the American creoles, "blaming the British on this point is blaming themselves too." The logic here is so ludicrously absurd and hypocritical that it deserves mention, given that this is the founding political document of the most powerful country in the history of the world. How could it be the British king's sole fault that British-American agriculturalists and merchants practice slavery? The deletion is made not only for persuasive or rhetorical reasons, but also for practical reasons... the American creoles in the southeast want to continue to practice slavery! And the ones in the northeast want to continue to benefit financially from it! Jefferson himself is a slaveholder when he writes this document! This is an example of the door swinging wider than he can control; the Declaration will be used for 230 years thereafter as proof that African-Americans should have equal political and economic rights. Now you may ask why a southeastern man, a slaveholder like Jefferson, was asked to author this document representing the revolutionary philosophy of the northeastern merchants. The first reason is because he was a southeasterner and would give the appearance of a broader political coalition. The second is because somewhat like Paine he had a true writing genius for expressing modern political thought in simple terms.

You can also see Jefferson's somewhat more radical cast of mind with his use of "expunge" the British government at the bottom of 342. The Congress changes it to "alter" the British government, as Jennie points out. This is an important difference. As you see by reading Hamilton's first issue of the "Federalist," it isn't even clear that the revolutionary class wanted to alter the government. They liked the British government in theory, but they thought it was corrupt in practice. So they wanted to create their own Britain. Perhaps even their own British "empire"; I see Hamilton's use of the term on 347 as a kind of slip or mistake. Usually he uses happy words for power like "energy" and "vigor" to conceal that he is re-interpreting the revolutionary panic toward his specific interest, along conservative lines.

Jennie also points out that even after the revolution, the main cultural twin and economic ally of the U.S. is Britain. So why antagonize them unnecessarily (thus "he, he, he, he")? There would even be a second war between the U.S. and Britain from 1812-1815, a kind of offshoot of Britain's war with Napoleon, but also a war over territorial and commercial control of U.S. lands and shipping routes. And Americans would "hate" the British until the end of the 1800s. But they were still the main cultural and economic center for the U.S.; almost like the relationship between ROC and PRC in some ways (perhaps in reverse?). Another notable difference... see how the Congress inserted a long religious addition on the right column of 346 ("the supreme judge of the world") which is entirely absent in Jefferson's original. Because as I have said, he is essentially a secularist or modernist when it comes to religion; a radical. The limit of his radicalism is his philosophy about the aboriginals and the blacks, which we will encounter later in the course. Jefferson's idea of all (white) men being (more or less, relatively speaking) political and economic equals would soon become true in practice as well as theory.