CGC Journal - JUNE 2025
We're Building a Co-learning Community of Empathetic Societal Change Agents
JUNE 2025 | ISSUE 23
America’s Three Revolutions
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Current Events - America’s Three Revolutions
Emily’s Corner - Taking the Step, in Conversation
Talking With Kids - Watching educational movies with our kids
Recommended Resources - Mike - Juneteenth: Faith & Freedom; Emily - The Great Debaters
CGC 3-LESSON MINI COURSE INCLUDED (FREE FOR PAID SUBSCRIBERS).
America’s Three Revolutions
By Mike Green
[Listen to the audio as you read]
Almost daily I hear the mantra that “America is great.” And it makes me wonder, if we just keep repeating that America is great, generation after generation, does it really make it so? Or does the repetition cause us to just stop questioning the premise?
Admittedly, I was raised to believe that I live in a great country, despite its flaws, which were evident in my daily experience. Nevertheless, I was taught to love America. I was taught to revere the founding fathers of America and honor the founding documents, like the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
I was taught the Pledge of Allegiance and I can sing the words of the Star Spangled Banner (the first of the four stanzas anyway). And like most of the robotic Americans doing the same thing, I had almost no understanding of the history of the pledge, the flag, the national anthem and the deep well of white supremacy in which all are rooted.
This is a standard paradigm for most of America’s citizenry and its immigrants. The idea that we are a “great America” is ingrained in the fabric of our society and feeds our national narrative. In the 2024 presidential election, we heard all three of the presidential candidates’ superficial rhetoric about the greatness of America’s past. And Donald Trump reminded us repeatedly that only he can “make America great again.”
The symbols that represent that idea of national greatness (flag, pledge, oaths, song) evoke a sense of sacredness and honor for many millions of Americans…and many immigrants who arrive here with hopes for a better life.
Yet, if we dig just beneath the surface of superficiality, we find no credible evidence that warrants such devout devotion. Moreover, we would find it difficult, if not impossible, to defend a posture of national greatness when faced with a line of serious critical inquiry. Our children aren’t knowledgeable enough to ask such probing questions. Most all of us were taught the same superficial narratives that schools and churches teach and preach to children about the greatness of America today … and media and politicians reinforce.
While many scholars have done deep quality research to reveal truths that have been hidden and ignored, most of us have simply never done our own homework. And since so few have ever challenged the national narratives that are ubiquitous across America, we are seldom faced with a need to fully understand why most Americans consider this country to be the greatest on earth. We just accept that premise to be true. We don’t seek the actual truth that hides in plain sight.
If asked, few Americans would know very much about the nearly 200 countries on earth to which they can compare America, or when this continent got its name, or who named this place which we call home … or what it was called before receiving its Italian name from a German mapmaker in France.
So why are we so emotionally invested in the idea that America is the greatest?
America’s First Revolution
If we were questioned about our knowledge of America’s three revolutions (yes, three), many of us will likely stumble through rudimentary recitations of whatever we can remember about the American Revolution, a war that we can seemingly only see through a lens of a great victory over tyranny that led to freedom. That lens gets cloudy when we look to understand the role of Black people in a war between Anglo-Saxons in Britain and British Anglo-Saxons in America.
But the role of Black African people was a central consideration in the war between British Americans and the British government. Can we look into this historical fact?
America’s Second Revolution
And many Americans will likely stumble through whatever recollections we can recall about the Civil War, a presumed unfortunate internal revolution by southern states that seceded from the Union … about which we can never utter any honest criticism.
We seldom think about the fact that a segment of the White population of the United States (an all-white national citizenry) launched an armed revolution against their own government. But the revolutionary spirit is what motivated the British American Anglo Saxon colonists to launch a fight against their own government 86 years earlier in a successful effort to become their own sovereign nation.
That was precisely the goal of the Confederacy…to become its own sovereign nation and retain the right to enslave Black people in perpetuity. It should be noted that Britain had outlawed slavery more than a generation prior to the American Civil War.
And here again, the role of Black African people was central in the reason for the war and in determining its eventual outcome. Can we talk about this historical fact?
America’s Third Revolution
And finally, when asked about America’s third revolution, most Americans will have to admit they’ve never heard of such an event … despite the fact that the federal government proclaimed it to be the “most important” of all the revolutions in American history… even more important than the first revolution (American Revolution of 1775-83).
Here, once again, we find Black Americans at the core of a monumental historical revolution in America. In fact, the most famous King that America has ever known led America’s third revolution, the Negro Revolution. Yet, most have never heard of it, do not teach this truth in our schools, nor preach this truth from our pulpits.
Americans do not hear this truth because there is a conscious effort to suppress it. Can we elevate this truth to be heard across the nation?
So, while we stand tall with our hands over our hearts when we hear the national anthem, and we attach the Italian-named American flag to our homes and our vehicles, and display it inside our civic organizations, schools, libraries and even in our churches, it seems reasonable to wonder why do we have so little knowledge about the nation we proclaim to love and are so quick to tell everyone is the greatest on earth. Is it? Really?
What makes America so great?
How has the American government treated the indigenous peoples it “discovered” when the British first arrived … or when they first established their own sovereign nation? How has the United States treated Black people on this continent throughout the historical record, from the founding of the United States to this present day?
If America is great, we must ask … for who?
And why has there been a constant unceasing effort to change a nation that proclaims itself to be so great? Let’s take a deeper look.
The First American Revolution: Can we see the truth?
The history textbooks portray the American Revolution in glowing terms. Numerous films have been made about it. Ken Burns is even releasing his own version of the first American Revolution later this year. We all think we have some knowledge of this momentous event. But whichever version you’re exposed to, the same point is made: the outcome of the American Revolution was great. A new nation was born. Freedom was won. Liberty at last. But, for who?
As Americans, we’re taught to see the first American Revolution only in the light of good winning over evil. But there’s more to the story, isn’t there?
In 1775, British Americans revolted against their own king due to a list of grievances. They weren’t fighting for “freedom,” as is taught to American school children and reinforced by media, politicians, and Christian pastors. They already had the freedom to build their own cities, determine their own laws, battle the indigenous peoples in numerous wars, and confiscate their lands. They had already built institutions of higher education (colonial colleges) and enslaved 90 percent of the half-million Black people in America. That’s seems like a lot of freedom. They were fighting to become their own sovereign nation. That’s far different than enslaved Black Africans escaping in pursuit of freedom.
George Washington was the first American president. But before he assumed leadership of a newly declared sovereign nation in 1776, he led a military coup against his own king (George III) which we refer to as the American Revolution.
Our history books don’t teach us to look at George (the British military officer) as serving George, the king of England. Yet, 20 years prior to the American Revolution, George (the British officer) launched a battle against France which led to the first WORLD WAR known as the Seven Years War (Americans call it the French and Indian War, a misnomer). That world war was triggered by the battle that George, the British officer, lost to the French on American soil in 1754.
The Seven Years War was the first world war to span two hemispheres and four continents. It involved numerous nations (at least 14) allied on both sides with Britain and France. It lasted seven years (1756-1763), thus the name.
So, why is this important to know? Because what happened after the seven years was the catalyst for the American Revolution. And while the American Revolution was presented as quest for freedom, the question is: freedom for who?
At the end of the Seven Years War, King George won. And the French conceded a ton of land, which is how British Americans became stricken with sudden wealth syndrome. The British Americans were now in charge of nearly half of the North American continent.
Britain was nearly bankrupt due to the war. So, King George turned to the newly land-rich British Americans, requiring them to pay taxes that could help rebuild the wealth of the crown. This angered the British Americans and they opposed every tax King George put on them. The resulting outcry and riots led to repeals of the various taxes by King George … except tea.
Then the outcry of “no taxation without representation” became the rallying cry for the FIRST American Revolution. And they created for themselves a White America in 1776 (white citizens only) led by the other George.
There’s much more to this story; and many questions are raised like:
Why was the United States established as a whites-only citizenry?
Were America’s Founding Fathers white nationalists / white supremacists?
Why did thousands of free and enslaved Black men fight with the British as Loyalists while several thousand Black men also fought with the Americans as Patriots?
What is the “Book Negroes?”
Why did Francis Scott Key write this third stanza in his poem, “In Defence of Fort McHenry” which is now the United States’ national anthem?
Their blood has wash’d out their foul foot-steps’ pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave,
From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave;
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O’er the land of the free, and the home of the brave.
Is it “improper ideology” to see the truth and ask relevant questions? President Donald Trump’s executive order 14253 orders his appointed ideology enforcers to:
“… take action, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law, to ensure that all public monuments, memorials, statues, markers, or similar properties within the Department of the Interior’s jurisdiction do not contain descriptions, depictions, or other content that inappropriately disparage Americans past or living (including persons living in colonial times), and instead focus on the greatness of the achievements and progress of the American people or, with respect to natural features, the beauty, abundance, and grandeur of the American landscape.”
What does “inappropriately disparage” actually mean? Would it be inappropriate to accurately state that a dozen U.S. presidents have enslaved humans and considered them their property?
Can we have a productive dialogue about what we see in American history and how past conditions were passed down to become current conditions in our society today? Can we ask the same question today that was asked of every state joining the Union: What will you do with Black people living among you? If this was the quintessential question that branded each state as it joined the Union, shouldn’t it be the central question we look at when studying the founding of this country?
We look back at our nation’s history in our new CGC Mini Course, “Improper Ideology: America’s Hidden History.” Each of the 3 lessons in the mini course dives into each of the three American Revolutions. And we ask questions you will not hear in schools or churches or in media and political messaging. These questions reveal hidden truths. And those truths raise another question: Why are they hidden?
We will include a lesson in each of the monthly CGC Journals, free for paid subscribers. Lesson 1 can be downloaded here. Note: If you prefer to receive all three lessons without waiting for them to arrive in your monthly CGC Journal subscription, enroll directly in the course and request an expedited delivery.
Download our CGC Mini Course “Improper Ideology: America’s Hidden History” Lesson 1 below.