The Road to Revolution

1. The Road to Revolution 19 September 2010

2. Big Questions to keep in mind • Was the American Revolution inevitable? Could a compromise have been reached? • Which side was responsible for pushing events toward a military confrontation? • To what extent was colonial resistance justified? To what extent were the actions of Parliament justified?

3. Chapter 5 Assignment—Where we’re going • What was the relative importance of intellectual, political, and economic factors in creating and sustaining a colonial resistance movement?

4. Our question for now:How did the Great War for Empire change the relationship between England and its American colonies?

5. Britain’s American Empire, 1713

6. Britain’s American Empire, 1763

7. The Growing Power of the British State, 1690-1780

8. The Great War for Empire—Summary of Consequences • French out of Canada and lands west of Appalachian Mountains • Spanish out of Florida • Britain dominates all of western N. America… and is in lots of DEBT!!! •  New taxes • Salutary neglect (trade and colonial self-government)  imperial authority and direct rule of Parliament

9. How did the Great War for Empire change the relationship between England and its American colonies? • Revealed sharp cultural differences between American colonists and British people • Exposed weak authority of British royal governors and officials • In theory, had lots of power • In reality, had to share it with colonial assemblies

10. Legacies of War • Revenue Act (1762): tightened up collection of trade duties—no more bribing, colonists • Royal Navy to seize American vessels carrying supplies from mainland to French West Indies (Why?)

11. Legacies of War • Fundamental shift in military policy: Peacetime deployment of 10,000-man army • Why?? • King George III wanted military commands for friends • Feared rebellion by French residents of Canada • Feared Indian rebellions (remember Pontiac?) • Feared colonists’ loyalty may falter • “The main purpose of Stationing a large Body of Troops in America is to secure the Dependence of the Colonys on Great Britain” -William Knox, treasury official

12. Legacies of War

13. Legacies of War • National Debt • Higher import duties and excise levies (sales tax) at home first • American colonists paid only 1/5 the amount of annual taxes as did British taxpayers…

14. Legacies of War • British opposition parties—to higher taxes and government intrusion • Country Party • Radical Whigs • Demanded Parliament be made more representative of property-owning classes • Radicals like John Wilkes called for end to rotton boroughs—tiny electoral districts whose voters were controlled by wealthy aristocrats and merchants

15. What were the goals of British imperial reformers? • Increase tax revenues to pay for defense of empire • Expand tax and military bureaucracy • Increase trade from colonies to England (raw materials for industrial revolution and market for British manufactured goods)

16. George Grenville: Imperial Reformer • Prime Minister in 1763 • Revenue must come from America • Currency Act (1764): Extended ban on paper money  debts to British in silver and gold • Sugar Act (1764): Replaced Molasses Act of 1733: tariff on French molasses (Why?) • Sorry, John Hancock. Oh well, I guess you can keep smuggling and bribing.

17. Stamp Act (1765) • Stamps on all court documents, land titles, contracts, playing cards, dice, newspapers, broadsides, pamphlets, etc.… unless colonists paid for their own defense • No representative body to raise taxes for the colonies • Grenville to assert principle: “the Right of Parliament to lay an internal Tax upon the Colonies”

18. Quartering Act (1765) • At request of General Thomas Gage, British military commander in America • Colonial governments to provide barracks and food for British troops within their borders

19. Grenville’s Design for Reform Overview • Doctrine of parliamentary supremacy • Centralized imperial system in America • To function much like system in Ireland: British officials to run colonies with little regard for local assemblies

20. Colonists Object—Their Arguments • Sugar Act will wipe out trade with French islands • Taxes violate constitutional liberties of British people via trial without juries (vice admiralty courts) and taxation without representation • Vice admiralty courts discriminatory? • Direct vs. virtual representation (trans-atlantic merchants and West Indian sugar planters) • B.F. and Albany Congress of 1754—can colonies try another Plan of Union for the sake of representation? • Americans becoming “slaves” of Britain

21. Question: Prior to 1764-65, when did the colonists face an all-out attack on their governing institutions?How is this challenge different?

22. Protest and Rebellion • Patrick Henry, VA House of Burgesses • Lawyers James Otis, Sam Adams, John Adams • Stamp Act Congress (1765) *Reading • Sons of Liberty • Crown actions/mobs: merchants, apprentices, day laborers, unemployed sailors—young hooligans • Evangelical Protestants • Boycotts

23. Democracy and the Patriot Movement • “Nothing is wanting but your own Resolution, for great is the Authority and Power of the People.” –Rioter in NY • Gage: “Fire from the Fort might disperse the Mob, but it would not quell them.” Firing would result in “an Insurrection, the Commencement of Civil War.” • “What can a Governor do without the assistance of the Governed?” –Philadelphia customs collector

24. Compromise? 4 Parliamentary Perspectives 1. Grenville and allies: Imperial reform continue, whatever the cost • “The British legislature has authority to bind every part and every subject, whether such subjects have a right to vote or not.” -Chief Justice Sir James Mansfield

25. 2. Old Whigs: Repeal Stamp Act—America more important for trade than for tax $$ 3. British merchants and manufacturers: Repeal—boycott cutting deeply into exports 4. Former PM William Pitt and allies: Repeal—question over extent of Parliament’s powers (taxation vs. legislation)

26. PM Rockingham Compromises • Repeals Stamp Act • Reduces duty on French molasses (Sugar Act) • Declaratory Act (1766): Parliament’s “full power and authority to make laws and statutes…to bind the colonies and people of America”

27. More “Reform” • Townshend Act (1767) Duties on imports of paper, paint, glass, and tea • Revenue Act (1767): created board of customs commissioners in Boston and vice-admiralty courts in colonial cities • Restraining Act (1767): Suspended NY assembly • How are these acts similar/different?

28. British Troop Deployments, 1763 & 1765

29. Colonial Responses • Second boycott • Daughters of Liberty and “homespuns” • “Boston Massacre” • Committees of correspondence • Boston Tea Party

30. Trade as a Political Weapon, 1763-1776

31. What’s Next?

32. Philip Dawe, “Bostonians Paying the Excise-Man” (1774)

33. Philip Dawe, “Bostonians in Distress” (1774)