The Age of Revolutions An Introduction

Brief Timeline 1756-1763 French and Indian War 1765 Stamp Act; Stamp Act Congress 1766 Repeal of Stamp Act 1767 Townsend Acts 1770 Boston Massacre 1773 Tea Act; Boston Tea P. 1774 Coercive Acts 1775 Lexington and Concord 1776 Thomas Paine’s Common Sense; Continental Congress Declares Independence

Brief Timeline 1776 Britain takes NYC; Gen. Wash. victory at Trenton; New State Constitutions 1777 Saratoga, Am. victory 1778 Am.-French alliance 1780 Kings Mountain (Am.) 1781 Brits turned back at Cowpens and Guilford; Yorktown (Am.-Fr.); Articles of Confederation ratified 1783 Treaty of Paris 1787 Constitutional Conv. 1789 Washington inaugurated

Britain’s Mercantile Empire An Uneven Exchange Raw Materials (Furs, Fish, Grains, Timber, Sugar, Tobacco, Indigo, Tar) Manufactured Goods at High and Taxed Prices Emigrants: Often Poor, Unemployed, or Prisoners Labor

Rising Tensions From “A wise and salutary neglect” under Robert Walpole (Pr. Min. 1721-1742) to tightened control under George III (ruled 1760-1820) A habit of self-government through elected legislative assemblies versus lack of representation in England Surveillance state created by military presence and exacerbated by Quartering Act of 1765

Series of tax hikes 1764 Sugar Act, slashed taxes on sugar but imposed new tax on wine, coffee, and spices 1765 Stamp Act. Only official ‘stamped’ paper could be used, even if manufactured in colonies. Repealed 1766. 1766 Townshend Acts, taxed glass, lead, paint, paper, tea. Used revenue to pay royal governors, disrupting balance of power in colonies.

Why tax the colonies? To pay off the Seven Years’ War (French and Indian War) To pay for military presence in colonies To even out disparity between what British residents paid in taxes and what colonists paid

Colonial Responses Nonimportation agreements (aka boycott of British cloth and tea). Instead: Spinning bees to create homespun Liberty Tea Major mode of political dissent, largely enacted by women The “industry and frugality of American ladies” enabled “the political salvation of a whole continent.” Boston Evening Post, 1769

Conflict Escalates Sam Adams and James Otis Jr. circulate letter against ‘taxation without representation’. Violent incidents, such as Battle at Golden Hill, 1770 Boston Massacre, 1770, first casualties of Revolution

The Boston Massacre

1772 Committee of Correspondence Conflict Escalates 1772 Committee of Correspondence 1773 Boston Tea Party 1774 First Continental Congress 1775 Lexington and Concord Then...

John Trumbull, Signing of the Declaration of Independence

Additional Resources America: A Narrative History textbook (borrow from Ms. Conrad) Revolutions podcast, episodes 2.1-2.15 PBS The American Experience episodes pre-1800 billofrightsinstitute.org/foundingdocuments/ America The Story of Us (History channel) episode on American Revolution