The American Experiment (2026) s01e03 Episode Script

[birds chirping]
[Flake] When I first got to the Senate,
we went on a little field trip
and viewed some of the documents
of the founding, you know.
[dreamy music playing]
Declaration of Independence.
The Constitution.
I tell you, it hits you then,
the gravity of where you are
and what you're about to undertake.
When I would give tours
in the Capitol late at night,
it was always great to go
in the Capitol Rotunda.
It was completely quiet.
Nobody there
at 11 o'clock at night or later.
And to see those wonderful portraits,
the signing
of the Declaration of Independence,
the landing of the Pilgrims,
and Pocahontas.
But the one
that I would always take them to last
was the depiction of George Washington
resigning his commission.
[music continues]
That says everything
about what we should be about
and what leadership and civic virtue is.
I was fortunate
to be the other senator from Arizona,
the primary senator being Senator McCain.
And to hear him over and over,
his mantra was always
that we should serve a cause
greater than our own self-interest.
[McCain] I didn't go to Washington
to go along to get along
or to play it safe
to serve my own interests.
I went there to serve my country.
[crowd cheering]
[Flake] The further we get away
from significant wars America has fought…
and so many have sacrificed their lives…
it's easier to forget that…
the great sacrifice so many have made
for us to have what we have today.
[music fades]
[dramatic music playing]
[Chervinsky] Crossing
the Delaware and Trenton is not
a massive strategic victory.
It doesn't turn the tides of the war.
- [gunshots]
- [shouting]
But it is essential because it allowed
independence to continue as a concept.
It allowed the war to continue.
It allowed the army to survive
and Washington's command to survive.
[McDonald] The soldiers
who previously had probably been thinking
that they were going to just walk home
with their heads hung down
now won a great victory.
Now were willing to contemplate
reenlisting in the Continental Army,
giving this fighting force
another chance to succeed another day.
[Carp] But the Americans
knew from the outset
that if they were going to have success
in their rebellion against Britain,
they were gonna need friends.
The French, who hated the British,
looked like
a particularly attractive set of friends.
[dramatic music continues]
[Nichols] The problem for the Americans
is that they don't really have a navy.
The entire 13 colonies
are strung along a seaboard,
which makes logistics difficult.
The Americans wanted battleships,
and they wanted a French army.
The French are initially not sure
what they're going to do
about this American rebellion.
They're happy
that the British are facing this problem,
but the French need to be convinced
that this is going to be a viable cause.
The idea of formal recognition
of the United States' independence,
that's a big step, right?
That means there's going to be war
between Britain and France.
And so the Americans send
Benjamin Franklin over to Paris
to try and negotiate
for a formal alliance.
- [upbeat music playing]
- [voices murmuring]
[Cornell] By that point, Franklin has been
the oldest figure in American politics
since the Paleolithic era. [chuckles]
[Carp] Benjamin Franklin had
a reputation on a number of fronts.
As a civic leader,
as a newspaper printer,
as a scientist,
as a politician.
He's very well-known.
He's very avuncular.
He's good at getting along with people.
There's an appeal about him
that people recognize immediately.
He's very clever.
In this world, nothing is certain
except death and taxes.
There never was a good war or a bad peace.
When colonial delegates agreed
to sign a Declaration of Independence,
Benjamin Franklin said,
"This is where we all must hang together,
or we're going to hang separately."
"We're doing something treasonous."
[Carp] Unlike many
of the founding fathers,
Benjamin Franklin came
from quite humble beginnings.
He was the son of a tallow chandler.
He starts out life
as an apprentice to his brother,
who was a newspaper printer.
But then he runs away
from his brother's employ,
runs away from Boston,
and moves to Philadelphia,
where he begins to make his way
as a newspaper printer.
[Burns] Franklin was able to get
a couple of partners
and buy a newspaper in Philadelphia,
which was called the Pennsylvania Gazette.
It was the New York Times of the day.
The first editorial cartoon ever published
in an American newspaper
was the "Join, or Die" cartoon.
[Hagist] When he tries to make a case
for unification of the American colonies,
he looks to an American symbol,
the rattlesnake,
a potentially powerful creature,
native to North America.
But if you chop it up into pieces,
it is powerless.
[Harris] There was a level of,
dare I say with admiration,
arrogance… [chuckles]
…in terms of challenging
the American people to have the courage
to actually believe in and sign on
to this notion
about what our nation could be.
[thunder roaring]
[music fades]
[Berkin] Europeans considered Franklin
one of the leading scientists of the era,
and he was a member of the Royal Society
for his experiments with electricity.
He was certainly a man of many talents.
He also was an extraordinary diplomat.
[voices murmuring]
[Feldman] Benjamin Franklin would become
America's ambassador to France
when it was absolutely necessary
to convince the French
to support the American Revolution.
[dramatic orchestral music playing]
[Georgini] Benjamin Franklin,
when he first sets off
for the court of Versailles,
is a celebrity par excellence,
and he knows it.
[McDonald] He understands
that as an American,
he is never going to keep up
with the fashions of French court society.
So he doesn't even try.
He dresses himself
as this rustic from the wilds of America,
you know, wearing a coonskin cap.
The French adored him.
Women called him "mon cher papa,"
'cause he was already older
than most women who sat in his lap.
Franklin does more than any other person
to ingratiate the people of France
to the idea of the American Revolution.
But the French weren't convinced
that the Americans could actually win.
- [music fades]
- [soft drumming]
This is happening while simultaneously
the British have a new offensive plan.
[Philbrick] As William Howe
pursues Washington into New Jersey,
General Burgoyne leads an attack
from the north, from Canada,
down Lake Champlain to Fort Ticonderoga,
which the Americans captured
several years earlier.
And Burgoyne succeeds
in taking Ticonderoga.
[Keagle] Fort Ticonderoga is a key fort.
They had expected
a bloody siege of the fortifications,
and like that, they've captured it.
Not without a shot.
The Americans put up resistance.
They're firing cannons at the British.
So the capture of Ticonderoga
gives the British this boost of morale.
[Philbrick] When Washington receives
this news, he's in New Jersey,
and he's stunned.
The stroke is severe indeed
and has distressed us much.
[Philbrick] Everyone had told him
that Fort Ticonderoga was untakable.
Now if Burgoyne and his army
link up with General William Howe
and get to Albany
and take the Hudson River,
they will have sealed New England off
from the rest of the colonies.
If they can do that,
they have basically won this war.
[Hagist] The only obstacle
between Burgoyne and Albany
is a place of difficult terrain
called Saratoga.
[dramatic music continues]
The Americans recognize this
as a defensible location.
It's the place to stop the British troops.
[music fades]
[dramatic music playing]
[Philbrick] The Battle of Saratoga
is really a couple of battles.
The first one,
of Freeman's Farm, begins by accident.
A Virginia backwoodsman
named Daniel Morgan
leads a group of Virginia riflemen.
They sort of stumble upon the British…
and this unleashes some of
the most devastating fighting of the war.
- [gunshots]
- [dramatic music playing]
[shouting]
[McDonald] The British
take a lot of casualties.
It then settles
into more entrenched positions.
American forces flood in.
[shouting]
[swords clatter]
[Keagle] The Americans overwhelming
some of the British fixed positions.
American numbers are strong,
and the British are forced to surrender.
[Taub] General Burgoyne
surrenders his army,
winning the Americans
and the Continental Army
the Battles of Saratoga.
- [music fades]
- [crow cawing]
[somber music playing]
[McMaster] The victory of Saratoga
is immensely important.
- [men shouting]
- [gunshots]
Saratoga communicated to the world,
"Hey, these colonials
might have a chance."
[Carp] It's good news for Franklin
because now he can turn to the French
and say, "We can defend
this independence that we have declared."
"We can stand strong in the field.
All we need is your help."
[music intensifies]
The French say, "This American uprising
can actually succeed."
And so now we can come in
with the full power and weight
of a declaration of war,
of an open avowal of this cause
against our old enemy, the British.
[upbeat music playing]
France recognized American independence
and became a full-fledged ally.
[voices muttering excitingly]
[McDonald] This is an incredible boost
for American morale.
This is largely viewed
as a major turning point
of the American Revolution.
The French are coming in by sea,
but it can take months
to cross the Atlantic.
[music surges]
[music fades]
[gunshots]
[McDonald] Meanwhile,
the British capture Philadelphia,
the capital of the United States.
In many European wars, that's game over
when you capture your enemy's capital.
[distant shouting and gunshots]
Fortunately for America,
our capital could be
wherever the Continental Congress was.
[Carp] The Continental Congress,
they know the British are coming,
so they leave
and end up in York, Pennsylvania.
By this point, the Congress realizes
that there needs to be
a governing plan for America.
There needs to be some laws laid down
for how money is going to be raised,
how decisions are going to be made.
[intense violin music playing]
[Feldman] After the Declaration
of Independence went into effect,
what had been colonies of the Crown
suddenly became
13 different independent states.
In the Declaration, they said
they wanted to be
the United States of America,
but they didn't yet have in place
the rules or principles
by which those 13 independent states
could become one.
[Breyer] The question was,
can we get the people
of these 13 colonies, actually,
in practice, to govern themselves?
A rather new idea at that time,
but maybe we can do it.
It will be an experiment.
[Carp] John Dickinson first lays out
a draft of the Articles of Confederation
in 1777.
[Cornell] The Articles of Confederation
is America's first effort
to create a constitutional government,
and it's created
in the midst of the American Revolution.
No one wants another Parliament,
but they don't quite know what they want.
[Feldman] Since they hated being ruled
over by a parliament that was far away,
from their perspective,
the solution was to be ruled locally.
But they'll cooperate on some things,
like national defense.
[woman] Each state retains
its sovereignty,
freedom and independence.
The said states hereby severally enter
into a firm league
of friendship with each other,
for their common defense,
the security of their liberties,
and their mutual and general welfare.
And it turns out this central government
had almost no real authority.
It couldn't regulate commerce.
It couldn't pay the country's debts.
[Bilder] They don't put taxing power,
and they maintain a kind of
"we would like you to contribute" model.
[Rasmussen] They'd say,
"Virginia, send this much."
"Delaware, please send this much."
Once one state refuses
to live up to its end of the bargain,
the others will do the same.
[Bilder] People like George Washington
don't think it has enough power
to sustain the United States.
[Coe] How do you even run an army
if you can't tax people?
And Washington keeps saying,
"We need uniforms, we need supplies,
and we need training."
The Continental Congress
was frustrating as hell.
The logistics support was paltry at best.
[intense music continues]
[Cornell] It'll take a miracle
to get them through that winter.
[music fades]
[Carp] Washington is forced to retreat
from Philadelphia in late 1777.
[distant shouting]
But he doesn't want to go far, right?
He wants to make sure
the British feel some pressure from him.
[Keagle] In early December, Washington
establishes the Continental Army
in its winter encampment at Valley Forge.
[Chervinsky] It was close enough
that they could keep an eye
on the British Army,
but far enough they wouldn't be attacked,
at least not without significant warning.
- [distant howling]
- [wind blowing]
In theory, it made sense as a location.
[Taub] But the winter at Valley Forge
turns into an absolute nightmare.
[men coughing]
[McDonald] One of the first things
that Washington did
when around 12,000 soldiers
arrived at Valley Forge
was to order the men
to build huts out of logs.
[ice cracking]
[Nichols] Valley Forge
is a miserable place.
It's a frozen camp.
The men are sleeping in close quarters
without proper sanitation.
The army, which has been
surprisingly healthy hitherto,
now begins to grow sickly
from the continued fatigues
they've suffered this campaign.
I am sick, discontented, and out of humor.
Poor food, hard lodging, and cold weather.
I can't endure it.
Why are we sent here to starve and freeze?
[Keagle] The hardships are not solely
about the climate and the conditions,
but about the failures
of the Continental Army
and its logistical support to be able
to get what was needed to the soldiers.
[Holton] 2,000 of them died.
And they died mostly from disease.
It was smallpox, typhus,
typhoid, and dysentery.
[dramatic music playing]
[Chervinsky] So that winter
ended up being the worst
because the army was not functioning
as it should have.
[Nichols] Washington is basically
just trying to survive day by day
to figure out
what they're going to eat in the next hour
and avoid freezing to death.
I do not know from what cause
this alarming deficiency
or rather total failure
of supplies arises.
But unless more vigorous exertions
and better regulations
take place in that line and immediately,
this army must dissolve.
[McDonald] Meanwhile, there are soldiers
who have the job of foraging
out in the countryside,
getting supplies
for the main contingent of soldiers.
And one of those soldiers
is Joseph Plumb Martin.
I had to travel far and near,
in cold and in storms by day and by night.
And at all times to run the risk of abuse
if not injury from the inhabitants
when plundering them of their property.
[McDonald] He knew that if he took
the corn of one family,
they would have less to eat.
The fact that he was so concerned
about how his actions
would have an impact on their lives,
I think that really endeared him to them.
And that was gonna be
a key to our victory.
Because the longer this war went on,
the more the British acted
in a heavy-handed way
toward American citizens,
the more Americans were going to look
at the Continental Army as us,
and the British Army as them.
[music fades]
[Keagle] Over the winter at Valley Forge,
having the army concentrated
with these soldiers
is an opportunity
for Washington to do a better job
in unifying how they are organized.
[somber march playing]
[Chervinsky] That's when
he turns to training.
[Chapman] The Continental Army had become
a much more disciplined army
at Valley Forge.
Fire!
Washington could recognize talent.
He saw real potential in these people.
And he puts together a staff
that is extraordinary.
These are young men.
Untested, but brilliant.
And the staff would put together
an analysis of the Continental Army,
and it would become a kind of template
as Washington's army
became increasingly professionalized.
One of those officers under his command
is a very bright and charismatic man
named Alexander Hamilton.
[somber march continues]
[Feldman] Alexander Hamilton
was the illegitimate fourth son
of a Scottish laird…
[birds singing]
…raised in total poverty in the Caribbean.
[upbeat string music playing]
We literally do not even know
his birthday.
That is how poor he was as a kid.
[Chernow] This boy is 14 years old,
and he has to support himself.
And he goes to work as a lowly clerk
in a trading house on St. Croix.
He was extremely ambitious,
but must have wondered how he would find
his way out of this island.
[Freeman] His first letter
that we know of,
he wrote, quote, "I wish there was a war."
That's a way for ambitious people
to raise themselves from their station.
[Cornell] The merchants
on the island realize
that they have
this prodigy in their midst,
and they take up a collection to send him
to the mainland for his education.
So he comes to North America
just with a few letters of introduction.
He does not know a soul.
[Freeman] Hamilton ultimately goes
to King's College in New York,
and then suddenly you have
the revolution brewing.
He joins a military effort in New York,
and the most important thing
that happens to him early on
is that he becomes Washington's aide.
He works at Washington's side,
translating what he wants
into commands or into documents.
[Coe] Washington really values
Alexander Hamilton.
It is certainly a father-son relationship.
Hamilton is fatherless,
and Washington has no children.
[upbeat music continues]
[Cornell] It was really
a perfect combination
because George Washington
had superb judgment
and Alexander Hamilton
had a brilliant and creative mind.
[faint military commands]
Hamilton was actually creating
his philosophy
based on what he was seeing on the ground.
He notices that all the American farmers
are selling their produce to the British
who have occupied Philadelphia.
Why? Because the Continental Congress
had mismanaged the currency.
The Continental currency was worthless,
so the farmers
were selling to British gold.
So Hamilton begins to develop this idea
that the basis of military power
is fiscal power.
[Freeman] Hamilton goes
through the Revolution
getting to know George Washington,
and Washington grows
to like and trust him.
That's really important.
He is also seeing the ways
in which a less centralized government
really doesn't work well.
Hamilton is saying, "Okay,
whatever comes next, that ain't it."
"We can't have that government.
It has to be stronger."
[upbeat music continues]
[music fades]
[Philbrick] By that spring,
Washington and his men
at Valley Forge get the word that France
has entered the war on their side.
[upbeat music playing]
[McDonald] Volleys of musketry
are fired in celebration.
[cannons blasting]
[Philbrick] With France now in the war,
the British realize
that a enemy navy is on its way.
They now have to abandon Philadelphia
to the Patriots
and march across New Jersey
back to New York
before the French navy arrives.
[cheerful music playing]
The British shifted to the South
in the middle of the war.
They basically had accepted
a stalemate in the north,
but said, "We'll see what we can do
in the South. Can we capture Savannah?"
"Can we capture Charleston?"
[somber music playing]
[Carp] So the idea is that hopefully
they can get these colonies to declare
allegiance to the British Crown.
[McMaster] The British strategy
was predicated on the idea
that there are many Loyalists in the South
and the British army
could take advantage of that
and then regain control of the colonies
from the South.
[Keagle] But the British consistently,
as they often do,
overestimate Loyalist support.
- [gunshot]
- [groans]
[Jasanoff] Instead,
they're getting picked at and shot at
all the time by the militias,
one after another, after another.
[Carp] A lot of engagements we see
are smaller engagements
among these various militia groups,
and there's not as much discipline
as what Washington was trying to instill
in the continental troops.
- [gunshots]
- [shouting]
The war in the South
carries on a brutality
as civilians are targeted,
raids on cities, individual settlements.
[men roaring]
[McDonald] Many Patriots and Loyalists
who had formerly been neighbors
would face one another on the battlefield.
[Jasanoff] They can divide
even family members.
In fact, Benjamin Franklin's son, William,
he is known in the war
for raising militias on the British side
that will wreak havoc against Patriots.
[Berkin] Franklin disowned him
and would not speak to him.
His son reached out to him,
and Franklin, not interested.
Oh, my sister, how horrid is this war.
Brother against brother,
and the parent against the child.
'Tis pity the little time
we have to spend in this world.
We cannot enjoy ourselves and our friends,
but must be devising means
to destroy each other.
[Clinton] This was not
just a straightforward war
between the American colonists
and the British Crown.
This was a war
and a sense of confusion and uncertainty
even within
a lot of the American population itself.
- [dramatic music playing]
- [shouting]
[Philbrick] It's American
against American.
It is brutal. It is ugly.
It's the most disturbing theater
of the war.
[music fades]
[birds tweeting]
By 1781, it's all on the verge
of potentially falling apart.
[military drums rattling]
The American people are getting sick
of this war that never seems to end.
Recruitments are down.
There's no money to pay for the army
to defend America's freedom.
There's a mutiny.
That could have been
the end of everything.
[drums continue]
[Chapman] George Washington is trying
to figure out how to end this war.
He can't see
how they're going to continue to survive.
The army continues to lack supplies,
continues to lack momentum.
[Keagle] French forces
had come to America,
but it had not gone well.
There's miscoordination
between the forces,
and this creates an enormous
amount of animosity
between Americans and the French.
[Philbrick] By this point,
Washington's got the French on his side,
but the French navy
has spent all its time in the Caribbean
defending its sugar islands
and showing little interest
in what really matters
from Washington's perspective.
[drumming ends]
And the French are becoming
so disaffected with this war
that is going on much longer
than they ever anticipated
that if it doesn't go well,
they're going to abandon America.
So the Americans are running out of time.
[dramatic music playing]
At this point,
General Cornwallis is the leader
of the British army in the South.
[Chapman] The British left Cornwallis
to do the hard part
of conquering South Carolina
west of Charleston.
[McDonald] Down in Virginia, Cornwallis,
acting on orders from his superiors,
has moved his army
to the Yorktown peninsula
to try to turn that into a deepwater port
for the British navy.
I'm not a great military tactician,
but one piece of advice
I'm confident in giving
is don't move your army to a peninsula.
It's never a good idea.
[Taub] The Comte de Rochambeau
is a career French soldier.
He is at the forefront
of French military thinking.
When the French dispatch
General Rochambeau's force
to North America,
they are there
to augment the Continental Army.
Rochambeau is under strict instructions
that he is to answer to Washington.
But keep in mind
that Rochambeau has much more
military experience than Washington.
[dramatic music continues]
It's Rochambeau that convinces Washington
that the key campaign for 1781 will be
to march both of their armies together
down to Virginia to attack Cornwallis.
[music intensifies]
At the same time,
a large French naval force
is on its way to the Chesapeake.
The British send their fleet
down from New York
to remove the French fleet.
[Philbrick] What will transpire
is known as the Battle of the Chesapeake.
[cannons fire]
It's a battle between the British navy
and the French navy,
in which no Americans participated.
But it would be
the most important naval battle
in the history of the world,
one could argue, given its consequences.
- [cannons shooting]
- [intense music playing]
[Ellis] The French win.
The British navy is forced to retreat.
[McDonald] Cornwallis looks
through his spyglass.
What he sees on the horizon
is to him quite horrifying.
He sees naval vessels,
but they're not British.
Instead, they're French.
[intense music continues]
[Philbrick] Soon, Washington
and Rochambeau
and their armies arrive from the north.
[somber music playing]
[McDonald] At times, this combined force
stretches many miles.
[Philbrick] They make their way
out the peninsula
where Yorktown is located,
surround Cornwallis's forces.
Now it will become
what the Europeans regard
as an old-fashioned siege.
Washington has
never really won a siege before.
Rochambeau has fought
more than half a dozen of them.
[Chapman] It is something that the French
are extremely proficient at.
[Philbrick] What you do
is you create a line,
and you move in closer and closer
until you take the enemy.
[Freeman] Hamilton, driven by ambition,
is desperate to have a moment of glory
on the battlefield.
[Chernow] He knew that
after the Revolutionary War,
the political laurels
would not go to the person
who had written the letters
for George Washington,
but somebody who had been the hero
on the field of battle.
So he kept lobbying Washington
for a field command.
At the Battle of Yorktown, Hamilton
finally gets the moment of field command
that he has long dreamed about.
[Chapman] Alexander Hamilton led
part of what's called the Light Division,
and the Light Division is basically
handpicked soldiers from each regiment
who can basically lead a bayonet attack.
- [footsteps tapping]
- [distant shouting]
The Rhode Island Regiment
is one contingent of that Light Division.
And it is a mixed unit
of Black and white men,
which was rare
during the Revolutionary War.
[upbeat flute plays]
More African Americans
served on the British side
than on the Patriot side.
Maybe about anywhere from 15 to 20,000,
versus on the Patriot side,
maybe anywhere from five to nine thousand.
[birds tweeting]
[distant military commands]
[Philbrick] Washington was
with the men all the way through.
Washington would fire
the first American cannon
to start the siege.
Fire!
[cannon fires]
[shot echoes]
[Hagist] In just a matter of two months,
this British army went from being
a strong thorn in the Americans' side,
in this strong position, to being trapped
in a situation
that very rapidly became untenable.
[Philbrick] The siege has reached a point
that there are two key British redoubts
that need to be taken
if Yorktown is going to fall.
They call them
redoubt number nine and ten.
[Chernow] In order to have
the element of speed and surprise,
instead of bombing that fortification,
they decided that they would take it
with fixed bayonets.
Which was a very daring
and gutsy thing to do.
[Chapman] The French are to take
redoubt number nine.
The Americans are
to attack redoubt number ten.
In charge is Hamilton,
leading the 1st Rhode Island Regiment.
It's an evening attack.
- [shouting]
- [somber music playing]
- [shouting continues]
- [guns shooting]
[Hagist] No gunpowder, no bullets
for the American side, just the bayonet.
- [gunshot]
- [man screams]
- [grunts]
- [screaming]
- [thump]
- [grunts]
[screaming]
[Keagle] It's a rough way to be wounded
and even a rougher way to die.
[grunts]
[men shouting]
[grunts]
[screams]
I commanded an attack
upon one of the enemy's redoubts.
We carried it in an instant
and with little loss.
There will be certainly
nothing more of this kind.
[Chernow] This instantly transformed
Alexander Hamilton
into a battlefield hero.
[Philbrick] They've taken away
all the cover
that has been made available
to the British forces.
[cannons fire]
Now the Americans and French
are able to fire unmercifully
upon the British inside Yorktown.
By this time, Cornwallis
is in a literal cave in the bank
overlooking Yorktown.
[victorious music playing]
[Hagist] There's nowhere else
for the British to go.
The British raise up a flag of truce
and eventually surrender
to the French and American forces.
I have the honor to inform Congress
that a reduction of the British army
under the command of Lord Cornwallis
is most happily effected.
This operation has filled my mind
with the highest pleasure and satisfaction
and had given me
the happiest messages of success.
[music fades]
[somber piano music playing]
[McDonald] The story goes
that at the time,
the band was playing a song
called "The World Turned Upside Down."
[footsteps clattering]
[Jasanoff] It really does seem
like the world has turned upside down
when these disorganized Patriots
have managed
to get one of the biggest military powers
in the world to surrender before them.
[Philbrick] We Americans
look back on the war
and see it as it begun with the militiamen
at Lexington and Concord.
- [gunshots]
- [shouting]
And then it was
a series of stepping stones…
- [gunshots]
- [grunts]
…almost to ultimate victory at Yorktown.
But it wasn't that way at all.
- It was messy.
- [grunts]
Time and time again,
we could have lost
everything at one specific battle.
Washington would look back
on the eight years of war and say,
"Looking at this,
this is such an improbable event
that we have won this thing."
"If you don't believe in God… [chuckles]
…this will prove it to you."
"I mean, there was no way
this should have gone the way it did."
"But it did."
[somber music continues]
[Jasanoff] The Prime Minister of Britain,
a fellow called Lord North,
finds out about Yorktown,
and he just takes it really hard.
[Philbrick] A witness described, it says,
"If a musket ball hits him,
this is it, we are over."
[Jasanoff] King George III
is known as kind of a madman,
but it is popularly believed
that the loss in America triggered
the first of what would end up being
many bouts of insanity.
[Philbrick] The British
still can't believe
that they've lost
to this provincial colonial rabble.
[Al Gore] The American Revolution
was really and truly a key turning point
for all of human history.
The very idea
that people could be free
to say whatever they wanted
and to share in the decision-making
that affected their lives,
it was thrilling all over the world.
That inspiration
that people could be free,
that's what our founders
gave not only to us,
but put in the hearts of men and women
all over the world, and it's still there.
[music fades]
[Jasanoff] Hashing out
the terms of the peace
actually took well over a year
to work this thing out.
This is the Treaty of Paris,
signed September 3, 1783.
This is the document
that ends the Revolutionary War.
[soft orchestral music playing]
[Philbrick] The British recognized
the sovereignty of the United States
over the territory from Maine,
which was part of Massachusetts then,
down to Georgia.
[McDonald] Britain also ceded
this very valuable land
to the west of the 13 colonies.
Absent from the negotiations
are Native nations
that had a right to be there.
They divvy up the map
as if it was a game of Risk
with Native nations not at the table.
The terms of the Treaty of Paris were
not formally provided to Native nations.
We found out about it
from the parceling out the land
and imposing lines across tribal nations.
That wasn't our war.
That wasn't our fight.
Our interest was preserving what we had.
Cherokees aligning with the British
makes perfect sense.
Our relationship with Europeans
was always built on our survival
because we had a government-to-government
relationship with the Crown.
We had treaties. We had agreements.
But when the British abandoned us
as they were losing the Revolutionary War,
we're left in the rather awkward position
of dealing with a new American government
that, of course,
did not forget which side we were on.
[DuVal] Creek Chief Alexander McGillivray,
sitting firmly in Creek country,
gets a copy of the treaty, and it says
the Creek homeland
now belongs to the United States.
Native nations haven't agreed to this.
They weren't a party to the treaty
and they're going to fight it.
[Jasanoff] If you're
a Native American nation,
and you're on the frontiers of the US,
or within the boundaries of the US,
you're in for a very rough time.
[Hoskin] And so the march
across the continent really begins
with the conclusion
of the Revolutionary War,
marching across tribal lands.
Westward expansion happens quickly.
[music fades]
[Washington] Some Black Patriots
get their freedom
if they had fought with the Americans.
But for most enslaved people,
the real decision would come
at the Treaty of Paris.
And even though the agreement was
that these people
would be returned to their owners,
the British said, "We are not going
to give them back to the Americans."
These people had been their allies.
[Jasanoff] Time and again
at the end of the war,
even when there's American pressure
on them to do otherwise,
British commanders actually stand
by those promises of freedom
to the runaways.
[gentle music playing]
And they end up evacuating
thousands of them
out of the United States into Canada…
and are given the possibility
of making new lives in British domains
while their counterparts
in the United States will remain enslaved
generation after generation
after generation.
We fought.
We struggled. We were here.
We helped build this country.
But even freedom and liberty,
those concepts were mostly
for white men with property.
A lot of people were not included
in the ideals of freedom
during the American Revolution.
[music fades]
[dramatic music playing]
As the Treaty of Paris
was being negotiated,
Washington was made to wait it out.
And the soldiers
were also waiting it out with him.
[Nichols] Washington has camped
with most of the Continental Army
in Newburgh, New York.
And there is a foul mood
in the American military.
Congress, once again,
is behind in paying them,
in provisioning them.
Many of them are ready to go home.
Rumors start to spread through the troops
that maybe now that the war is over,
this thing called the Congress
just isn't up to the job.
And so this talk about,
is it time for a coup?
[McDonald] There was a plan
that we should march
upon the Continental Congress
to intimidate the Congress
and making good on the demands
of the officers of the army.
[dramatic music continues]
[Treanor] Officers hold a meeting
at the end of the Newburgh encampment.
And then the door opens.
And Washington,
in his full military regalia,
marches to the front of the room.
Nobody anticipated him being there.
And he reads a speech
we know as the Newburgh Address.
I have never left your side one moment,
but when called from you on public duty
as I have been the constant companion
and witness of your distresses.
[Treanor] He talks about
how they will have abandoned
all the honor that they have won
in this war if they do this thing,
if they march on Congress.
[Washington] Let me entreat you,
gentlemen,
on your part not to take any measures,
which viewed in the calm light of reason
will lessen the dignity
and sully the glory
you have hitherto maintained.
The speech is poorly received,
which has never happened before.
They are angry.
And Washington then pauses.
He didn't quite read, so he pulls out
his spectacles out of his breast pocket.
[McDonald] In the 18th century,
eyeglasses were
a sign of infirmity and old age.
To see George Washington
putting on a pair of glasses,
something that no one
except his closest aides had ever seen,
was a truly affecting sight.
[Treanor] And he says,
"I have grown gray in your service."
"And now I've grown blind."
Immediately,
the entire Continental Army Officers Corps
is reduced to tears.
[Coe] They see that he's aged,
and he talks about how physically hard
this has been for him too,
and how he's lost a lot.
And that makes him understand
that they have lost a lot too.
[music intensifies]
He was dealing with the frustrations
that they're dealing with.
And all he could say is,
"We're almost there."
"I am just as desperate to go home
as you are."
And that's it.
The Newburgh Conspiracy is dead.
[triumphant music playing]
There are moments in the Revolution,
like the Newburgh Conspiracy,
where it could have
collapsed in on itself.
And Washington made sure
that that didn't happen.
So many of the important things
he did for American democracy
were immense acts of self-restraint.
[triumphant music continues]
And then he does something
that in the 18th century
is almost unthinkable.
- [music fades]
- [bird shrieking]
[Ellis] When the war is over,
he goes to Annapolis
to surrender his commission and his sword.
[gentle music playing]
[Nichols] He says to the Congress,
"My duty is done.
I've completed the task you gave me."
"I would like to hand you back
my commission as an officer."
You just didn't do that.
If you were a victorious general
with an entire army at your back,
you certainly didn't walk in and say,
"Thank you. I'd like to go home now."
The model is
a new nation needs a new emperor.
And he is the obvious choice.
He really didn't want power.
That's what's so special.
The early Americans
offered Washington the crown,
said, "You can be king."
Now I got to ask you,
how many people do you know
that would say no to being king?
[Bradburn] He doesn't become
a military dictator.
He ends that revolution
in a way that Oliver Cromwell didn't,
that Napoleon didn't,
that Stalin doesn't,
Pol Pot doesn't,
the Castro brothers don't.
So many republics
who won their independence
end up with military dictators
and strongmen
because the legislative process
was incompetent.
[triumphant music playing]
[Wyden] George Washington was somebody
who could have had
vast amounts of additional power,
could have had
king-like stature in America,
was adored by so many.
And basically he said,
"Hold on here. I never said
I was going to do this forever."
"I'm going to go back to the farm."
What it says is
there's a model for leadership.
There's a model for the executive.
[McDonald] Washington understood
that in many respects,
his glory came not from the times
when he accepted positions of power,
but the times when he returned
those positions of power
to the people who had entrusted him
with those in the first place.
[Coe] King George reportedly said
when he learned of this,
"If this is true, George Washington
would be the greatest man in the world."
[Ellis] The character of one person
has saved the Revolution.
We become a republic
because Washington refuses to be king.
[McDonald] So General Washington,
arguably the most powerful man in America,
voluntarily became citizen Washington.
[music surges, fades]
- [birds singing]
- [water splashing]
[Coe] There was a lot of concern
about what would happen
after George Washington
went home to Mount Vernon.
Everyone was aware
that in the absence of Washington
as a leader,
that they could face instability.
But I don't think
that they knew the limits
and how quickly
the Articles of Confederation
would fail to rise to the moment.
[gentle music playing]
[Pence] The first shot they took
at organizing a government
was the Articles of Confederation.
But it became clear
to the founding generation
that that was an inadequate document.
[Nichols] The United States
are not united.
There's still
a collection of several states.
Congress is trying
to get 13 fractious colonies
to get along with each other,
and it's not working.
[gentle music continues]
[Levin] Americans did not
think of themselves
as a single cohesive society.
[music intensifies]
They thought of themselves
as very divided,
and divided
along some very complicated lines.
There were religious divisions.
There were economic divisions
that ran very deep.
The North was very commercial
and focused on manufacturing and trade.
[Whaley] One of the great debates
is what are we going to do about slavery?
And for some people, that question is,
"Why would we do anything about slavery?"
For other people it is, "How can we find
a way to end this practice?"
[music continues]
[music ends]
At the same time,
the economy is really bad
after the Revolutionary War ends.
[upbeat string plucking]
This is the worst
economic downturn in American history
other than the Great Depression.
[Berkin] Before the war ended,
New England farmers realized
that anything they can grow,
they can sell.
So they take out mortgages
from wealthy men in their state
in order to have the money
to expand their farming.
[rooster crows]
And they are doing great.
[music speeds up]
And then the war ends.
And there's no army to feed,
British or American.
These men are left with mortgages
that they have to pay,
regardless of the changed conditions.
[upbeat music continues]
The men who hold the mortgages say,
"We don't care what your problem is."
"If you don't pay your mortgage,
you forfeit your land."
[Klarman] Taxes are going up at this time
because the states
have become indebted in fighting the war,
and they have to pay those debts.
So you've got a severely burdened economy,
and now you're asking
individual citizens to pay higher taxes.
So you have this huge problem.
Thousands of American farmers
are going bankrupt.
And back then, if you were bankrupt,
you ended up in debtor's prison.
So that's not doing anybody any good.
[music fades]
[Nichols] This situation is untenable.
And a farmer in Western Massachusetts
named Daniel Shays decides
to lead a march to the courthouse.
[upbeat march playing]
[Berkin] Daniel Shays was,
in fact, a revolutionary veteran.
[McDonald] It wasn't just one guy.
It was a major grassroots movement
against the new government
of Massachusetts.
[men shouting]
[Keagle] The same revolutionary farmers
who took up arms against the British
are now saying, "Well, you know,
maybe it's time for another revolution."
- [shouting]
- [upbeat march continues]
[Berkin] Farmers armed with staves,
and some of them had guns.
They marched on the courts.
[Carp] Nearly 1,000 of them showed up
outside of the courthouse
in Western Massachusetts
and announced that they were not going
to be paying anything.
[upbeat march continues]
[Nichols] Next, Shays and his men
are going to march on an armory
in Springfield, Massachusetts.
This thing starts to pick up speed.
[McDonald] The only way to put down
a rebellion like that was by force.
That's what the merchants
in Boston and Salem believe.
[Hogeland] Massachusetts didn't have
an army to put that down,
and the federal government
didn't have an army.
[Klarman] So the creditors and merchants
who had enough money,
they actually raised a private army
to suppress Shays' Rebellion.
[upbeat march continues]
[shouting]
[Berkin] The private army squashed them.
But the fact that American citizens,
many of them veterans,
had risen up against the government
scared the bejesus out of people.
[Klarman] I mean, how close could you get
to civil war?
[heavy drumming]
We have a lot of correspondence suggesting
if this is what
republican government means,
then maybe we need
to restore the monarchy.
[shouting]
[Hogeland] It was spreading
around the states.
This was terrifying to people with money
who were the traditional governing class.
[Bunch] There was concern that
this fragile American experiment
would end very quickly.
[music fades]
[Chernow] Shays' Rebellion
had a particularly profound effect
on Hamilton.
He would always feel
that the main threat
to the new government would be anarchy,
that you needed a strong executive
to prevent anarchy.
[Feldman] Hamilton could foresee
the United States becoming an empire,
and almost uniquely among the founders,
he liked the idea.
[upbeat music]
He believed first
that you had to become rich,
grow your economy, build a military,
use that military
to enforce your right to trade,
and get richer again.
And Hamilton was
one of the most passionate human beings
probably ever to walk the earth.
[Berkin] Hamilton is very loud,
very early out there wanting
a stronger national government.
New governments
emerging out of a revolution
are naturally deficient in authority
and require that every effort
should be made to strengthen,
not to undermine the public confidence.
He's Hamilton,
so he did it loudly and aggressively.
He wrote letters to important people
essentially saying,
"Here's my 15-part plan for what I think
should happen to the government."
He's that guy. We all know that guy.
He was that guy.
[Feldman] Alexander Hamilton had known
James Madison a little bit
when they were serving
in the Continental Congress,
but they hadn't yet formed
a close relationship.
That was partly
because Madison and Hamilton
were radically different people,
from radically different backgrounds,
from radically different states,
with extremely different interests.
[music surges]
[Freeman] But they become partners
in wanting a stronger national government.
[music fades]
[soft flutes playing]
[Berkin] James Madison…
[high-pitched] He had a squeaky voice.
[pitch lowers] And they called him
"Little Jemmy."
[Feldman] Madison had talked
about becoming a lawyer
and reading books to study for the law,
but he never did become a lawyer.
[birds singing]
He was a complete failure as a soldier,
and his migraine headaches
kept him out of the war.
But the revolution gave Madison
a sense of purpose,
because suddenly a new country
was gonna come into existence,
and it was going to need
institutions, rules, and legislature.
And those were things where his talents
seemed like they might really enable him
to make a contribution.
[soft flutes continue]
[Flake] My great-grandfather
is James Madison Flake.
My great-great-great-grandfather
is James Madison Flake,
so our family has
venerated James Madison for a long time.
Madison assumed
not simply civic virtue or altruism,
or that everyone would be good,
but that their own ambitions
could check others' ambitions.
James Madison hoped that we wouldn't have
to rely on people's good graces
or their own inner goodness,
but that that ambition would lead them
to protect not just themselves,
but the institution that they represent.
He was brilliant and so prescient.
[Feldman] Madison was cautious by nature.
Hamilton was impetuous by nature,
and he always wanted to go
for the biggest possible solution
to every problem you could imagine.
But each of them was convinced
of the absolute necessity
of doing something radical
to change the Articles of Confederation.
[Nichols] Shays' Rebellion really shows
the weakness of the national
and state governments.
And so the founders,
people like Madison and others,
decide that they have to meet.
[soft flutes continue]
[Chernow] The Constitutional Convention
was an extraordinary event,
not just in American history,
but in human history.
[dramatic music building]
Very often a government would be formed
in the midst of violence and chaos.
- [men shouting]
- [swords clanging]
Hamilton said, "Let us for once prove
that a system of government
can be created by reflection and choice
rather than by accident and force."
[Treanor] The Constitutional Convention
is going to take place
at Independence Hall in Philadelphia.
That is where the Congress met.
That's where the Declaration is signed.
It is hallowed ground.
[music surges, fades]
[bells tolling]
[Feldman] The delegates
to the Philadelphia Convention
were selected state by state.
They were going to travel to Philadelphia.
They were going
to spend at least a summer there.
They were charting a course
that had never happened before.
[Levin] How do we hold together?
How do we not fall into civil war?
This was really the question
they came to Philadelphia to answer,
and it was not obvious
that they were going
to arrive at an answer.
[Clinton] They had been through so much
just to get to the point
where they could then ask themselves,
"What do we do now?"
How do we take this independence,
which we have obtained,
and turn it into a new nation?
[music surges]
[Blunt] Franklin makes the point,
he says, "You know, when you bring people
together in a group
to get the benefit
of their collective knowledge."
"You also bring into the room
all of their prejudices,
all of their opinions."
[Bunch] The Constitutional Convention
was really an attempt to say,
"Let us not lose what we fought for.
Let us create a nation."
In some sense, all of American history
is just a spinning out of the conflicts
that were either articulated or submerged
at the Constitutional Convention.
[Bilder] Everything turned
on what happened that summer.
Could a government based
on the people without a king survive?
Or was this just a temporary experiment,
a fluke of history?
[Rosen] The stakes could not be higher.
Some of them feel
the convention can't fail.
This is the last chance
for America to act as a nation.
- [men screaming]
- [music intensifies]
[music fades]
[upbeat piano music playing]
[deep intense drumming]
[drumming intensifies]
[music fades]