Daniel J. Boorstin on the Glorious Revolution and the American Revolution (1965)

I still encounter people who can't, or won't, grasp that 1776 was the outworking of 1688. The Northern Ireland ingrained worldview - where every single thing is perceived only by how it applies to our two competing nationalisms - is a mental prison. Apparently it's a psychological condition called belief perseverance.

There's going to be a lot of it this year – 1688 was loyalty, 1776 was disloyalty. Wrong and wrong again. 1688 and 1776 were both about liberty.

Here's yet another evidence, from Daniel J. Boorstin. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1974 and was the Librarian of Congress from 1975-1987.

"... The continuity of American history is impressive. It should not be obscured by any supposed “revolution.” To many thoughtful colonists the War for Independence seemed but a logical sequel to British history of the previous century and a half. 

From a British Whig point of view, it was a second civil war, a fight to extend and localize in America the principles of the Glorious Revolution of 1689. And it provided the basis for a secessionist tradition which shook the new nation in the 19th century. The struggle for a new nation was not to be completed until 1865 or after ..."

- from The Americans: The National Experience (1965).

• Boorstin also gave the BBC Reith Lectures in 1974, which are on iPlayer here.