This interpretation of early American history argues that 1676 was a cataclysmic year of Indian resurrection and civil war in America, which actually postponed American independence for 100 years.

The colonial experience of Americans was not one long march toward independence. Sixteen hundred seventy-six was a cataclysmic year of Indian insurrection and civil war in America, when the colonies lost their "autonomy" after King Philip's War and Bacon's Rebellion. Stephen Webb makes clear how the forces unleashed in 1676 revolutionized the relationships between the adolescent colonies, the imperial government in London, and the embattled Algonquin and Iroquois Indians, and shows how the political institutions that evolved in the colonies in the next three hundred years reflected this experience.