Liberal British commentators on America between 1792 and 1820 rejected the brew of resentment, contempt and fear that constituted the conservative British attitude towards the new United States of America. Instead, they applauded the new republic for successfully limiting the power of the executive in government and for demonstrating that such a state could ourish politically and prosper economically, and they suggested that it had a vital role to play internationally. ey were more critical of American society and intellectual achievements, though, and, unlike radical writers, they were unwilling to be persuaded by the American example that popular sovereignty was a phenomenon to be emulated in Britain or elsewhere in the world. ey needed the American example to sustain their own particular political mythology, and they believed that America’s role in the world was to take up the British mantle of spreading liberty throughout the globe, but they did not wish to see Britain follow the American model of widely representative government, which was a totem to liberty rather than a pattern to be followed.