Teacher Resources : Enewsletters : Education in America

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Before the American Revolution, education was a privilege accorded to the few. Gentlemen and ladies sought education as part of their social status. In fact, education was a sign of good breeding and genteel position. The wealthy hired tutors for their children or sent their sons to college. Adult men read the classics in Greek, Latin, and sometimes Hebrew. Gentlemen collected scientific information. There was, in fact, an explosion of information and exploration that made learning an exciting and engaging way of life for members of the wealthy class.

Most people in America and Europe, however, received only a rudimentary education. Apprentices were taught to read and cipher—skills necessary for any individual engaged in business. They spent the remainder of their training learning the hand skills of a successful blacksmith, carpenter, shoemaker, tailor, or other trade. A poor farmer might receive even less formal education. Education was directly related to an individual's station in society. Each person received only as much education as necessary to make them a contributing worker in society.

The American Revolution, however, marked a distinct change in American attitudes about education. That change was expressed in different ways by various members of our founding generation. It was Thomas Jefferson who, in an 1820 letter to William C. Jarvis, said:

"I know no safe depositary of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education."

This statement, and others like it, was a striking departure from the mid-eighteenth-century mindset. For America's founding generation, education became a civic duty. Before the Revolution Americans were ruled by a monarch. A citizen's duty to the monarch was obedience. After the Revolution, an American citizen's duty was to be a participating member of the republic. The role of citizen became an active one. Citizens of the American republic made decisions about the way in which they would be governed. They made decisions about their future. The American citizen needed to be enlightened and able to grasp the important issues of self-government.

Some prominent Americans doubted that common Americans could ever show the kind of "wholesome discretion" that would make them adequate rulers of their own country, but Jefferson and other key leaders held firm. The government of America rested in the hands and minds of individual American citizens.

All too often, we look at the American Revolution as a political and military event. It is, perhaps, easy to see the change in government and the defeat of the British army. This was not, though, the full extent of the revolution. The Revolution also marked a turning point in American social structure, economic systems, and the very purpose of education. Education was no longer the mark of privilege. It became the key to creating independent decision-making American citizens, the bedrock of the American republic.


This article was written by Dr. William E. White, Director, Educational Program Development, Department of Education Outreach, The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation.