If the radicals in Britain were slow to accept the need for American independence, those ‘Friends of America’ who opposed the policies of the British government in the American colonies between 1765 and 1782, but who did not proceed from this stance to a radical political critique of British politics, took even longer to recognize and support the case for the secession of the colonies from the British Empire. These political thinkers, whose views on America may be described as ‘liberal’, had to come to terms with separation from the American colonies rather than achieve their preferred solution of reform of British governance in America and reconciliation with the colonists inside the British Empire. Their attitudes were therefore characterized by sympathy for the colonists and, later, acceptance of the necessity of American independence, rather than the enthusiasm for and envy of American republicanism displayed by British radical thinkers. Their support for the colonists, however, distinguishes their stance as ‘liberal’, as opposed to the stance of those to be discussed in chapter 3, whose views on America are described as ‘conservative’ because they rejected the colonists’ case for independence and found it almost impossible in this period to accept that a successful republic could or would emerge in America.

This chapter focuses on the views on America expressed by Edmund Burke, the Earl of Chatham, the Duke of Richmond, Charles James Fox and David Hartley, all leading liberal commentators on the American crisis, who argued for conciliating the colonists. They were no more uniform in outlook, however, than the radicals discussed in chapter 1. All but Chatham were members of the parliamentary group associated with the Marquis of Rockingham. They can all loosely be described as holding such moderate Whig views as a commitment to the principles associated with the Glorious Revolution of 1689 – a constitutionally limited monarchy, whose power was checked and balanced by the weight of aristocracy and property, represented in Parliament, and religious toleration. Most parliamentarians of the later eighteenth century, including those described here as ‘conservatives’, also held such views, particularly on the balance of the constitution.