is a term carefully defined and explained by Hannah Arendt (evil is banal)in her book
On Revolution. Essentially it is this. And since my response to a former diary that is expiring was so long I thought it better to just make a new diary of it.
The first settlers arriving in the New World were seeking religious freedom and they really felt as if they were coming to the "Promised Land" identifying with the Israelites as Moses had led them out of Egypt. Even on the ships before landing many groups drew up covenants or constitutions if you will.
When they built their communities they had meetings,decided laws, punishments, rights,etc. Gradually as there were more communities each one selected an eager and knowledgeable person from their community to go to meetings with selected persons from other communities. (Are you seeing now how it began?) Then out of these persons selections were made to go to larger bodies of representation to discuss common difficulties and solutions.
So the first settlers had great experience in democracy in a total sense,direct democracy as Switzerland even today operates. They also developed experience in representative democracy, in setting it up and working out its problems. The representatives were selected to express the wishes of the settlers from their home community. (Not financially powerful lobbyists.)
These first settlers were mostly prosperous, educated,landed,religious and involved. (It was before the great wave of immigrants fleeing Europe to freedom and riches.These were not educated and represented the downtrodden masses. They had different ideals,aspirations,and behavior.)After the Revolutionary War (wrongly titled says Arendt)the business of drawing up a Constitution began. Well,now you see how the past experience fed into this endeavor. I think it was Massachusetts that had a state constitution that offered a viable model for them to go by. And then the hammering out ensued. Being from Pennsylvania I know William Penn developed an excellent one for Pennsylvania that was fair to all religions and to the Native American Indians. And Ben Franklin was there from Philadelphia where it was drawn up to lend his experience.
Arendt says that the term revolution has been wrongly defined by what happened during the French Revolution. Blood in the streets and violent uprisings by its citizens.
Arendt says the absolutely unique,unprecedented revolution was in the settlers beginning to draw up constitutions to govern themselves. They were a well educated sample. Jefferson calls this the pursuit of happiness which was a term colloquially used at that time. In one of his letters he expresses this drawing up of a constitution in a new world of freedom the happiest time of his life. Can you just imagine how that felt? To be in a new land without precedent? To draw up laws that would rule its people? Exciting beyond belief! Now that was freedom! It was called by many "the pursuit of happiness". So the framers of the Constitution went back to the grass roots of the people for feedback as to what it should contain. One major problem was that there could not be a room big enough to hold all the people, so the problem of representation among states had to be figured out.Much of the behind the scenes dealing is described by Gore Vidal in his book Burr about Aron Burr who shot Alexander Hamilton in a duel and was wrongly vilified for it.
So the real revolution was this unique,once in history drawing up of rules of law to live by. The great problem they faced,that Moses did not, was that God did not give the laws. They made them. And this leads to complications that we are dealing with today because the historical process is not understood. The Pursuit of Happiness refers to the involvement of each and every citizen in determining its own laws of living and agreeing to uphold them. Their consuming participation. And the joy they experienced in holding their fate in their own hands and being in communion with other men with whom they were in solidarity. This is the definition of the Pursuit of Happiness. It has nothing to do with making money and buying stuff.
If God gives them then there is no end. But if a group of men on a ship coming to the New World draw them up,then what happens after they are all dead? And they understood this problem. If man makes the laws,then the laws are bound by those men,at least as long as they are living and in some sort of power to enforce them. The Constitution seemed to get around all this. Now it has become a sort of Bible,an idol of worship which it was never meant to be.
And this is what the Religious Right has divined and wishes to change.