This manuscript privileges gender as both analytical tool and investigated object to argue for its causative role in American independence. It posits the political doctrine of virtual representation that Britain’s Parliament evoked to assert sovereignty over America in the 1760s generated a transatlantic debate over who and what constituted a freeborn Englishman, a figure at the center of power in the British Empire. For American Whigs the concept both denied to them their gendered prerogative to consent to legislation and arrested the male maturation process that they deemed critical to achieving masculine autonomy. Denied access to traditional avenues of power provided by property ownership and family mastery America men began emphasizing more readily obtainable categories of identity such as sex and gender to claim access to rights. This discursive shift produced a gender frontier that prevented reconciliation and allowed for the coherence of an American identity necessary for separation.

该手稿将性别作为分析工具和被调查对象的特权，以争辩其在美国独立中的原因。它提出了关于虚拟代表制的政治学说，英国议会在1760年代宣称要对美国行使主权，引发了关于谁和什么构成一个即将出生的英国人的跨大西洋辩论，这个人是大英帝国权力的中心。对于美国辉格党来说，这个概念既拒绝了他们同意立法的性别特权，又逮捕了他们认为对实现男性自治至关重要的男性成熟过程。由财产所有权和家庭掌控提供的传统权力渠道被剥夺了机会，美国男人开始强调更容易获得的身份类别，例如性别和性别，以主张获得权利。