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Twentieth-century historians, in particular the Polish-born scholar Lewis Namier, have revised many of these extreme judgments. It has now been established that the king was neither educated in arbitrary ideas, nor did he preside over a Tory revival. Ministers such as Bute, Grenville, Townshend, and North regarded themselves as Whigs. But by the 1760s and ’70s “Whig” and “Tory” were terms that had lost precise ideological significance, and the breakdown of these old partisan divisions undoubtedly contributed to ministerial instability at this time. There is little evidence that the king used corrupt influence to make Parliament accept his American policy. Indeed, it is unlikely that he initially even possessed an American policy; royal correspondence shows that he was rarely closely interested in American affairs before 1774. The colonists’ drift toward opposition and independence was probably caused as much by their distance from London and their increasing prosperity as it was by British fiscal measures.

But George III cannot be entirely exonerated. When he succeeded, he was only 22, immature, idealistic, and not well-educated. His appointment of his decorative favourite, Lord Bute, was a breach of the convention that monarchs should choose chief ministers possessed of political experience and proven abilities. In his dealings with other politicians George showed himself throughout his reign to be intransigent and obstinate, and he often confused his own personal feelings with the public welfare. He can scarcely be blamed for wanting to retain such an important part of his empire as the American colonies, but he can legitimately be criticized for insisting that the American war be continued after 1780, by which time it had become clear to his chief minister, Lord North, that Britain had lost.

Domestic responses to the American Revolution

Even at its outbreak in 1775 British attitudes to the American war were mixed. Many Protestant dissenters regarded the Americans as their brethren, for political and religious reasons. The City of London, and other commercial centres such as Glasgow, Norwich, and Newcastle, objected to the war because it disrupted highly profitable Anglo-American trade. Many British newspapers and cartoons adopted a pacifist and sometimes even a pro-American line. Other Britons believed, with George III, that rebellion against a monarch was sinful and that Parliament’s authority must be preserved. Conventional patriotism became stronger after 1778, when France, Spain, and belatedly the Dutch, allied themselves with the Americans against Britain.

The next two years proved profoundly difficult. Fears that the French would invade Ireland as a prelude to invading the British mainland led ministers to encourage the creation of an Irish volunteer force some 40,000 strong. The Irish Protestant elite, led by Henry Grattan, used this force and the French threat to extract concessions from London. In 1783 Ireland was granted legislative independence, though it remained subject to George III. Declining British fortunes abroad also revived the issue of parliamentary reform. By 1779 three different reform groups had emerged, all of whom favoured peace with America. The marquess of Rockingham and his parliamentary supporters (including his secretary, Edmund Burke) wanted to reduce official corruption and George III’s influence in government. Another group, led by Christopher Wyvill, a one-time Anglican clergyman, wanted a moderate reform of the representative system. Wyvill and some of his supporters played with the idea of a national association, an assembly of reformers from each county in Britain, that would exist parallel to Parliament and be superior to it in constitutional zeal. A third small group, led by Charles James Fox, a Whig MP, and by former Wilkite activists, wanted more extensive political reform, including the secret ballot and annual general elections. In 1780 they founded the Society for Constitutional Information, which was designed to build public support for political change through the systematic production and distribution of libertarian propaganda.