The ‘Deepest Piece of Cunning’

Episode von Fakultät für Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaften - Digitale Hochschulschriften der LMU von Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München · 21. Juli 2003

In May 1783, the officers of the Continental Army of the United States of America organized themselves into the Society of the Cincinnati. Soon after, the veterans organization became the focus of an elaborate conspiracy theory which falsely accused

the officers of trying to establish a hereditary nobility and subvert the young republic.

Over the course of the mid-1780s, prominent revolutionary politicans such as John Adams

and Elbridge Gerry joined in the outcry. The conspiracy theory became a major

political controversy, and even impeded efforts to reform the Articles of Confederation.

However, despite their frantic tone and lack of a factual basis, the accusations were not

merely a fringe phenomenon created by political crackpots. Instead, the conspiracy

theory was deeply embedded in American political culture. When the political and economic problems of the 1780s threatened to disrupt the republican experiment,

many revolutionaries looked for a threat that might explain the crisis. They found that

threat in the Cincinnati, whose military background, federal organization, and aristocratic trappings made them suspect.

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