538
PARTISAN REVIEW
their duty." He also went even further, linking the survival of the young
American republic to the success of revolutions abroad. A positive out–
come of the French Revolution was crucial to prevent the young
American nation from devolving into a conservative, English-style system.
Successful foreign revolutions were essential, Jefferson wrote to George
Mason, to further America's "liberating mission abroad" as well as "to pro–
tect liberty at home."
For Abraham Lincoln, too, the meaning of the American Revol ution
was its universal, enduring promise of freedom and equality. After his elec–
tion in 1860 Lincoln observed that the Revolution "was not the mere
matter of separation of the colonies from the motherland" but rather the
message contained in the Declaration of Independence "which gave liber–
ty not alone to the people of this country, but hope to all the world, for
all future time."
The French were no different: they also had believed in the universal–
ity of their Revolution. The Declaration of November 19,1792 promised
fraternity with all oppressed people. It was France's sacred duty to help "all
the peoples who wish to regain their freedom." But two restorations of the
monarchy, two empires, and the pretensions and responsibili ties of colo–
nialism snuffed out most of France's revolutionary ardor, leaving her to
draft a conservative, republican constitution in 1875.
Still, modern revolutionary leaders around the world have often
turned to the two great sister revolutions for inspiration and guidance,
finding in French and American foundational documents universal ideals
of freedom and equality, a radiant Enlightenment promise ofjustice for all.
American and French revolutionary institutions supplied models for the
creation of democratic governments in other lands. The sister revolutions
offered modern revolutionary leaders a script to follow-war ofliberation,
consti tutional convention, bill of rights, the creation of poli tical parties–
and also warned of dangerous shoals to avoid-terror, extremism, reaction.
Revolutions, hypothesized the Spanish philosopher Jose Ortega y
Gasset, "are not constituted by barricades, but by states of mind."
Although a vast number of factors contribute to revolutionary momen–
tum-from class conflict to famine-the intellectual, Gasset insisted, "is
always to be found in the center of the revolutionary stage." The intellec–
tual, a student of history, never ignores the past. Indeed, for over two
centuries, the sister revolutions provided a revolutionary tradition, a
"usable past," and practical guideposts for modern insurgents. Over and
over again, modern revolutionaries, such as Frederick Douglass, Lenin, Ho
Chi Minh, and Nelson Mandela, conceived their own revolutionary pro–
jects within the frameworks of the sister revolutions.
