Political Patterns in Colonial New York City: The General Assembly Election of 1768

Abstract

;j, The importance of the American Revolution as a watershed in American history is illustrated by the frequent reevaluations to which it is subjected as historical viewpoints change. Though the military phase now arouses relatively little controversy, the political and social implications of the Revolutionary era have been debated by historians throughout much of the twentieth century. One of the most significant interpretations evolving out of this was the Beard-Becker class struggle thesis, which was gradually absorbed into numerous American history textbooks and which depicted a disenfranchised and discontented colonial majority under the aristocratic thumb of a landed and commercial ruling class. According to this thesis the revolutionists carried a two-edged sword, one side severing the ties to England and the other cutting the bonds placed about them by the American aristocracy. This view of colonial life at the time of the Revolution has been under steady assault for the past decade. Because restricted suffrage was so often cited as major proof of the undemocratic character of colonial society, those challenging this thesis have offered a spate of studies showing that the existence of a property qualification for voting did not necessarily exclude the ma-