Prof Kathleen (Kathy) Burk

speaker

78 appearances 1 recordings 1 series first heard Jul 2026 last heard 5 Jul

Prof Kathleen (Kathy) Burk’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 1.

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Talking History with Patrick Geoghegan · 250: The US Declaration of Independence · 5 Jul 2026 podcast

Well, it depends on who you're talking about in Britain, of course, because during the whole period, the United Colonies had support in Britain.

And there was quite a liberal group, both outside and inside Parliament, that supported the Americans, or at least supported an easier way of holding, of treating the Americans.

Of course, the British were a bit surprised, shall we say, when they heard of the Declaration, which took a while.

And they were already...

embodied and engaged in conflict, in a sense, with both the French and the Spanish.

And therefore, indeed, the years thus far in the 18th century, they've been at war with France for 49 of them.

And a declaration of independence in Britain, which means even more of a problem, means it is going to be more of a problem with us elsewhere.

because I don't know whether Stephanie and Elijah agree with me, but it seems to me that the reason, one of the main reasons there was a Declaration of Independence was because the United Colonies were going to need help, ideally France if they could, and if they couldn't face them as a united, as a sovereign state in a sense, they weren't going to get help because no country was going to give help.

aid to what could be seen as a rabble.

Well, there's a couple of things, if I may say.

First of all, in terms of the rhetoric, I think we have to remember that Jefferson could be very verbose, and a lot of the—well, not a lot, but some of the significant phrases—

were actually added by Franklin and the other members of the committee.

And also that there were dozens of independence things.

This was not the only one.

And a lot of the phrases came from writings of a man called George Mason.

So I think that although it sounds like it's Jefferson, of course it is.

He's the first draft.

But they took out a quarter of it, in fact.

took out the whole section on slavery and so forth.

Mostly, attacks beforehand had been on the ministers.

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