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The intellectual and political leaders in the 1760s–1770s closely read history to compare governments and their effectiveness of rule.<ref>Colbourn, ''The Lamp of Experience'' (1965)</ref>  They were especially concerned with the history of liberty in England, and were primarily influenced by the "country" party in British politics, which roundly denounced the corruption surrounding the "court" party in London. This approach produced a political ideology called "republicanism", which was widespread in America by 1775. "Republicanism was the distinctive political consciousness of the entire Revolutionary generation."<ref>Robert Kelley, "Ideology and Political Culture from Jefferson to

The intellectual and political leaders in the 1760s–1770s closely read history to compare governments and their effectiveness of rule.<ref>Colbourn, ''The Lamp of Experience'' (1965)</ref>  They were especially concerned with the history of liberty in England, and were primarily influenced by the "country" party in British politics, which roundly denounced the corruption surrounding the "court" party in London. This approach produced a political ideology called "republicanism", which was widespread in America by 1775. "Republicanism was the distinctive political consciousness of the entire Revolutionary generation."<ref>Robert Kelley, "Ideology and Political Culture from Jefferson to

Nixon," ''American Historical Review,'' 82 (June 1977), 536</ref> Pocock explained the intellectual sources in America:<ref>Pocock, ''The Machiavellian Moment'' p 507</ref>  

Nixon," ''American Historical Review,'' 82 (June 1977), 536</ref> Pocock explained the intellectual sources in America:<ref>Pocock, ''The Machiavellian Moment'' p 507</ref>  

:"The Whig canon and the neo-Harringtonians, [[John Milton]], [[James Harrington]] and [[Algernon Sydney|Sidney]], [[John Trenchard (writer)|Trenchard]], [[Thomas Gordon (writer)|Gordon]] and [[Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke|Bolingbroke]], together with the Greek, Roman, and Renaissance masters of the tradition as far as [[Charles de Secondat, baron de Montesquieu|Montesquieu]], formed the authoritative literature of this culture; and its values and concepts were those with which we have grown familiar: a civic and patriot ideal in which the personality was founded in property, perfected in citizenship but perpetually threatened by corruption; government figuring paradoxically as the principal source of corruption and operating through such means as patronage, faction, standing armies (opposed to the ideal of the militia), established churches (opposed to the Puritan and deist modes of American religion) and the promotion of a monied interest—though the formulation of this last concept was somewhat hindered by the keen desire for readily available paper credit common in colonies of settlement. A neoclassical politics provided both the ethos of the elites and the rhetoric of the upwardly mobile, and accounts for the singular cultural and intellectual homogeneity of the Founding Fathers and their generation."

:"The Whig canon and the neo-Harringtonians, [[John Milton]], [[James Harrington]] and [[Algernon Sydney|Sidney]], [[John Trenchard (writer)|Trenchard]], [[Thomas Gordon (writer)|Gordon]] and [[Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke|Bolingbroke]], together with the Greek, Roman, and Renaissance masters of the tradition as far as [[Charles de Secondat, baron de Montesquieu|Montesquieu]], formed the authoritative literature of this culture; and its values and concepts were those with which we have grown familiar: a civic and patriot ideal in which the personality was founded in property, perfected in citizenship but perpetually threatened by corruption; government figuring paradoxically as the principal source of corruption and operating through such means as patronage, faction, standing armies (opposed to the ideal of the militia), established churches (opposed to the Puritan and deist modes of American religion) and the promotion of a [[monied interest]]—though the formulation of this last concept was somewhat hindered by the keen desire for readily available paper credit common in colonies of settlement. A neoclassical politics provided both the ethos of the elites and the rhetoric of the upwardly mobile, and accounts for the singular cultural and intellectual homogeneity of the Founding Fathers and their generation."

Americans above all feared the corruption generated by a royal court, with its favoritism, grasping ambition, bribery, patronage, lavish luxury and disregard of civic virtue. They watched anxiously so that these evils could be scotched immediately should they appear in America—a watchfulness that persists into the 21st century.

Americans above all feared the corruption generated by a royal court, with its favoritism, grasping ambition, bribery, patronage, lavish luxury and disregard of civic virtue. They watched anxiously so that these evils could be scotched immediately should they appear in America—a watchfulness that persists into the 21st century.