Grievance #12 of the Declaration of Independence
What happens when military power and government power get combined?
In Grievance #12 of the Declaration of Independence, Dr. C.C. Borzilleri explains why colonists were alarmed when British military leaders gained increasing control over colonial government during the imperial crisis.
In 1774, Thomas Gage became both royal governor of Massachusetts and Commander in Chief of British forces in North America. To colonists, placing civil and military authority in the hands of one person violated key Enlightenment ideas about limiting power and preventing abuse.
The concern wasn’t just about one official. It was about a larger principle: governments need checks and balances so no single authority can dominate the people.
Colonists feared that combining military and political power threatened their ability to consent to the laws and systems governing them.
This is Part 12 of our 27-part series breaking down every grievance that led to the American Revolution, building toward Independence Day.
0:00 Today’s grievance brings us to Boston
0:01 once again, in the midst of the rising
0:03 tensions of the Imperial Crisis. He is
0:05 affected to render the military
0:06 independent of and superior to the civil
0:09 power. In 1774, Thomas Gage takes on the
0:12 position of royal governor in addition
0:14 to his role as commander-in-chief of
0:16 British forces in North America. Both of
0:18 these powerful positions were appointed
0:20 by King George III, and not subject to
0:22 any election or the public will.
0:24 Centralizing the power of the civil
0:25 government under the governorship into
0:27 the same office as the military
0:28 authority under the commander-in-chief
0:30 title was a direct violation of the
0:32 Enlightenment ideals about separating
0:34 sites of power to avoid corrupt abuses.
0:36 In the Imperial Crisis, this was another
0:38 example of the British monarchy coming
0:40 up with a possible solution that
0:41 actually just reinforced the colonists’
0:43 concerns. We often think about the
0:45 separation of powers as it concerns the
0:46 three branches of American government,
0:48 legislative, executive, and judicial.
0:50 But separating powers to avoid their
0:51 uses and abuses spans to include
0:54 operations of the military as well.
0:55 Under the American Constitution, for
0:57 example, the president needs
0:58 congressional approval to declare war.
1:00 The executive can’t just use the
1:01 military at will to carry out whatever
1:03 it wants to do. This prevents the
1:04 military from monopolizing the use of
1:06 force to their own ends.
1:08 But in Thomas Gage’s position as both
1:10 governor and commander-in-chief, neither
1:12 checks nor balances could prevent
1:14 unilateral decisions coming from Gage or
1:16 his Imperial compatriots. And the threat
1:18 to the public, to their ability to
1:20 consent to the rules and structures that
1:22 were used to govern society, was exactly
1:24 what came to bear throughout the
1:25 colonists’ protests.
