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Period: to
American Revolution
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The Albany Congress
It should be noted here that the good intentions of colonial leaders only went so far. Though these petitions were offered, repeated attempts to organize the colonies met with jealous resistance. In June of 1754, representatives from seven colonies met with 150 Iroquois Chiefs in Albany, New York. The purposes of the Albany Congress were twofold; to try to secure the support and cooperation of the Iroquois in fighting the French, and to form a colonial alliance based on a design by Ben Franklin. -
French and Indian War
Do not know date.The English and the French battled for colonial domination in North America, the Caribbean, and in India. The English did ultimately come to dominate the colonial outposts, but at a cost so staggering that the resulting debt nearly destroyed the English government. It was that debt that caused the escalation of tensions leading to the Revolutionary War. -
Proclamation
The King and his council presented the proclamation as a measure to calm the fears of the Indians, who felt that the colonists would drive them from their lands as they expanded westward. Many in the colonies felt that the object was to pen them in along the Atlantic seaboard where they would be easier to regulate. No doubt there was a large measure of truth in both of these positions. -
Sugar Act
This hurt the British West Indies market in molasses and sugar and the market for rum, which the colonies had been producing in quantity with the cheaper French molasses.The First Lord of the Treasury, and Chancellor of the Exchequer Lord Grenville was trying to bring the colonies in line with regard to payment of taxes.The act also listed more foreign goods to be taxed including sugar,certain wines,coffee, pimiento, cambric and printed calico, and further, regulated the export of wood and iron. -
The Stamp Act
The Stamp Act was passed by the British Parliament on March 22, 1765. The new tax was imposed on all American colonists and required them to pay a tax on every piece of printed paper they used. Ship's papers, legal documents, licenses, newspapers, other publications, and even playing cards were taxed.The money collected by the Stamp Act was to be used to help pay the costs of defending and protecting the American frontier near the Appalachian Mountains (10,000) troops were to be stationed on. -
The Quartering Act
The Quartering Acts were used by the British forces in the American colonies to ensure that British troops had adequate housing and provisions. -
Declaratory Act
In 1765, the Stamp Act was repealed. Were the problems finally resolved? You could imagine a better world, a life free of unreasonable laws for the Colonies, but no. The problems continued. The British Parliament passed the Declaratory Act, and this made it impossible for any Colonial assembly to pass any binding law. The Declaratory Act only made it clear that there were more acts where it came from and that future acts would be no better than the ones they had. -
The Townshend Act
The purpose of the Townshend Acts was to raise revenues among the colonies and use them to pay the salaries of judges and governors to enable them to have colonial rule independence. It was also to promote compliance of the 1765 Quartering Act and establish the right of the British Parliament to tax colonies. Resistance met the Townshend Act which led British troops to reside in Boston in 1768. This ended with the Boston Massacre in 1770. -
Boston Massacre
The Boston Massacre was a street fight that occurred on March 5, 1770, between a "patriot" mob, throwing snowballs, stones, and sticks, and a squad of British soldiers. Several colonists were killed and this led to a campaign by speech-writers to rouse the ire of the citizenry. -
The Tea Act
American colonists could buy no tea unless it came from that company. Why? Well, the East Indian Company wasn't doing so well, and the British wanted to give it some more business. The Tea Act lowered the price on this East India tea so much that it was way below tea from other suppliers. But the American colonists saw this law as yet another means of "taxation without representation" because it meant that they couldn't buy tea from anyone else without spending a lot more money. -
Boston Tea PArty
Angry and frustrated at a new tax on tea, American colonists calling themselves the Sons of Liberty and disguised as Mohawk Native Americans boarded three British ships (the Dartmouth, the Eleanor, and the Beaver) and dumped 342 whole crates of British tea into Boston harbor on December 16, 1773. Similar incidents occurred in Maryland, New York, and New Jersey in the next few months, and tea was eventually boycotted throughout the colonies.
