Undead History: Shays’ Rebellion, Debt Crises, and America’s “First Civil War”
Debt is in the headlines and on our minds constantly. The collective student loan debt for Americans is $1.5 trillion dollars. Across the country, many are still reeling from the foreclosure crisis of 2008, while others turn to crowdfunding to pay for lifesaving medical procedures and stave off bankruptcy.
Debt was also one of the first major tests of the newly founded United States. In 1786, three years after the Revolutionary War and a year before the Constitutional Convention, many farmers in Massachusetts found themselves deeply indebted to various lenders and struggling to pay their taxes. They faced the threat of being locked up in debtors’ prisons for failing to repay loans, foreclosure on their properties, and seizure of their assets. Some appealed to the state for relief, but the state supported the lenders, in part because it was itself in debt to them: many lenders had bought government bonds that helped fund the Revolution.
But many of these Massachusetts farmers were veterans of the Revolutionary War. They had fought a massive conflict in part predicated on questions of fair taxation. So when they felt their new state government had betrayed them, they took up arms again, led by a man named Daniel Shays. One of their most significant actions was to blockade courthouses…
