Bailyns third proposition suggest two general patterns prevailing amongthe many thousands of migrants: one group came as indentured servants, anothercame to acquire land. Surprisingly, Bailyn suggests that those who recruitedindentured servants were the driving forces of transatlantic migration. Thesecolonial entrepreneurs helped determine the social character of people who cameto preindustrial North America. At first, thousands of unskilled laborers wererecruited; by the 1730s, however, American employers demanded skilled artisans.
Finally, Bailyn argues that the colonies were a half-civilizedhinterland of the European culture system. He is undoubtedly correct to insistthat the colonies were part of an Anglo-American empire. But to divide theempire into English core and colonial periphery, as Bailyn does, devalues theachievements of colonial culture. It is true, as Bailyn claims, that highculture in the colonies never matched that in England. But what ofseventeenth-century New England, where the settlers created effective laws,built a distinguished university, and published books? Bailyn might respondthat New England was exceptional. However, the ideas and institutions developedby New England Puritans had powerful effects on North American culture.
Although Bailyn goes on to apply his approach to some thousands ofindentured servants who migrated just prior to the revolution, he fails to linktheir experience with the political development of the United States. Evidencepresented in his work suggests how we might make such a connection. Theseindentured servants were treated as slaves for the period during which they hadsold their time to American employers. It is not surprising that as soon asthey served their time they passed up good wages in the cities and headed westto ensure their personal independence by acquiring land. Thus, it is in thewest that a peculiarly American political culture began, among colonists whowere suspicious of authority and intensely anti-aristocratic.
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