Liberty Generation

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Western Generations This box: view • talk • edit
Term	Period
Awakening Generation	1701–1723
First Great Awakening	1727–1746
Liberty Generation Republican Generation Compromise Generation	1724–1741 1742–1766 1767–1791
Second Great Awakening	1790–1844
Transcendentalist Generation Transcendental Generation Abolitionist Generation Gilded Generation Progressive Generation	1789–1819 1792–1821 1819–1842 1822–1842 1843–1859
Third Great Awakening	1886–1908
Missionary Generation Lost Generation Interbellum Generation G.I. Generation Greatest Generation	1860–1882 1883–1900 1900–1910 1900–1924 1911–1924
Jazz Age	1929–1956
Silent Generation Baby Boomers Beat Generation Generation Jones	1925–1945 1946–1964 1948–1962 1954–1962
Consciousness Revolution	1964–1984
Baby Busters Generation X MTV Generation	1958–1968 1963–1978 1975–1985
Culture Wars	1980s–present
Boomerang Generation Generation Y Internet Generation New Silent Generation	1977–1986 1979–1999 1988–1999 2000–2020

The Liberty Generation is that name given by Strauss and Howe in their book Generations to those Americans born from 1724 to 1741.

Their lifecycle drove many of them to the brink of madness. Raised in an era of spiritual upheaval and economic dislocation, Liberty children hardly knew the care and protection of close family life. The eldest arrived too late to partake in the first Great Awakening; the youngest too early to feel the nurture that welcomed a younger generation in the 1750s.

Still in their teens, this generation bore the full brunt of the French and Indian War, the colonies' last imperial struggle. They tasted bitterness and death, and learned a brutal coming-of-age lesson: Get what you can grab, keep what's yours, and never trust authority. Until their mid-forties, they cut an unparalleled swath of crime, riot, and violence through American history. Whatever their army, they always performed best as plucky warrior-bands such as the Green Mountain Boys in Vermont, the Paxton Boys in Pennsylvania, or the Liberty Boys in New York. Hit by the American Revolution in midlife, the Liberty Generation responded in characteristic frenzy, mixing heroism with treachery, scrapping with each other, and ending up distrusted by everyone. No other generation risked more for the Declaration of Independence. Nor did any other "turn Tory" in such massive numbers.

The name of the generation comes from Patrick Henry: "Give me liberty or give me death!" When his peers sang, they sang songs such as John Dickinson's The American Liberty Song or Mercy Warren's Massachusetts Liberty Song. When they acted, they organized as Sons of Liberty, planted liberty trees, and paraded around liberty poles.

Altogether, about 1,100,000 Americans were born between 1724 and 1741; 24 percent were immigrants and 19 percent were slaves at any point in their lives. Their typical grandparents were of the Glorious Generation; their parents, Enlightenment Generation and Awakening Generation. Their children were of the Republican Generation and Compromise Generation and their typical grandchildren were of the Transcendental Generation.