Editing Noah Webster (section)

==Career==
Webster lacked clear career plans after graduating from Yale in 1779, later writing that a [[liberal arts education]] "disqualifies a man for business".<ref>Kendall, p. 54.</ref> He taught school briefly in Glastonbury, but due to harsh working conditions and low pay, he resigned to study law.<ref>Kendall, p. 56.</ref> While studying law under future [[U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice]] [[Oliver Ellsworth]], Webster also taught full-time in Hartford—a grueling experience that ultimately proved unsustainable.<ref>Kendall, p. 57.</ref> He quit his legal studies for a year and lapsed into a [[clinical depression|depression]]; he then found another practicing attorney to tutor him, and completed his studies, and passed the bar examination in 1781.<ref>Kendall, pp. 58–59.</ref>

With the [[American Revolutionary War]] still ongoing, Webster was unable to find work as a lawyer. He received a master's degree from Yale by delivering an oral dissertation to the graduating class. Later that year, he opened a small private school in western Connecticut, which initially succeeded but was eventually closed, possibly due to a failed romance.<ref>Kendall, p. 59-64</ref> Turning to literary work as a way to overcome his losses and channel his ambitions,<ref>Kendall, p. 65.</ref> he began writing a series of well-received articles for a prominent New England newspaper justifying and praising the American Revolution and arguing that the separation from Britain would be a permanent state of affairs.<ref>Kendall, pp. 65–66.</ref> He then founded a private school catering to wealthy parents in [[Goshen, New York]] and, by 1785, he had written his speller, a grammar book and a reader for elementary schools.<ref>Kendall, pp. 69–71.</ref> Proceeds from continuing sales of the popular blue-backed speller enabled Webster to spend many years working on his famous dictionary.<ref>Kendall, pp. 71–74.</ref>

Webster was by nature a revolutionary, seeking American independence from the cultural thralldom to Europe. He aimed to create a utopian America, free from luxury and ostentation, and a champion of freedom.<ref>Rollins (1980) p. 24</ref> By 1781, Webster had an expansive view of the new nation. American nationalism was superior to European nationalism due to the perceived superiority of American values.<ref>Ellis 170</ref>

{{Blockquote|America sees the absurdities—she observes the kingdoms of Europe, disturbed by wrangling sectaries, or their commerce, population, and improvements of every kind cramped and retarded, because the human mind like the body is fettered 'and bound fast by the chords of policy and superstition': She laughs at their folly and shuns their errors: She founds her empire upon the idea of universal toleration: She admits all religions into her bosom; She secures the sacred rights of every individual; and (astonishing absurdity to Europeans!) she sees a thousand discordant opinions live in the strictest harmony ... it will finally raise her to a pitch of greatness and lustre, before which the glory of ancient Greece and Rome shall dwindle to a point, and the splendor of modern Empires fade into obscurity.}}

Webster dedicated his ''Speller'' and ''Dictionary'' to providing an intellectual foundation for American nationalism.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.noahwebsterhouse.org/discover/noah-webster-biography.htm|title=Noah Webster Biography {{!}} Noah Webster House and West Hartford Historical Society {{!}} West Hartford, Connecticut (CT)|website=www.noahwebsterhouse.org|access-date=January 27, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161105000628/http://noahwebsterhouse.org/discover/noah-webster-biography.htm|archive-date=November 5, 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref> From 1787 to 1789, Webster was an outspoken supporter of the new Constitution. In October 1787, he wrote a pamphlet entitled "An Examination into the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution Proposed by the Late Convention Held at Philadelphia", published under the pen name "A Citizen of America".<ref>Kendall, Joshua, ''The Forgotten Founding Father'', pp. 147–49</ref> The pamphlet was influential, particularly outside New York State.

In political theory, Webster emphasized widespread property ownership, a key element of Federalism. He was also one of the few early American thinkers who applied the theories of the French theorist [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau]] in America. He relied heavily on Rousseau's ''[[The Social Contract|Social Contract]]'' while writing ''Sketches of American Policy'', one of the earliest, widely-published arguments for a strong central government in America. He also wrote two "fan fiction" sequels to Rousseau's ''[[Emile, or On Education]]'' (1762) and included them in his Reader for schoolchildren. Webster's Reader also contains an idealized word portrait of Sophie, the girl in Rousseau's ''Emile,'' and Webster used Rousseau's theories in ''Emile'' to argue for the civic necessity of broad-based female education.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Harris |first=Micah |date=2024-09-01 |title=Noah Webster and the Influence of Rousseau on Education in America, 1785–1835 |url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/732277 |journal=American Political Thought |language=en |volume=13 |issue=4 |pages=505–527 |doi=10.1086/732277 |issn=2161-1580|url-access=subscription }}</ref>