The Great Uprising. By James C. Bennett. National Review, March 25, 2013.
Review of 1775: A Good Year for Revolution. By Kevin Phillips. New York: Viking, 2013. 656 pp.
Bennett:
Shelley
described George III in 1819 as “an old, mad, blind, despised, and dying king,”
an example of “rulers who neither see, nor feel, nor know, / But leech-like to
their fainting country cling.” This would not have been a fair description of
the George III of 1775, who was sane, sober, and dedicated to his work — yet it
was a perennially accurate description of a governing paradigm that has always
failed. Many ruling classes will blindly adhere to existing policies, doubling
down on the very features that make them disastrous, and reach for coercion
where reason and persuasion can no longer serve.
Kevin
Phillips has written a timely and useful portrait of the beginning of the end
of the first British Empire and the mercantilist system that guided its rulers.
The story he tells is a fascinating one for people interested in that era, but
it has contemporary relevance as well. It is a case study for those of us
seeking to understand the rapidly approaching end of the failing institutions
of our own era: big bureaucratic government, labor unions, and crony
corporations. Just as George III did, our rulers cling to power and seek to
intensify the very features that are causing their downfall.
