Stewards of the Visual Exposition
The U.S. Has a Rich English History
The British were serious about the Stamp Act. The British appointed colonial businessmen to collect the taxes on behalf of England, but most refused to do the job out of fear of a growing opposition. In New York City, violence broke out as a mob burned the royal governor in effigy. All over the colonies, angry mobs shouted: "Liberty, Property, and NO STAMPS !"
In October 1765, the Stamp Act Congress convened in New York City, with representatives from nine of the colonies - NY, NJ, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Delaware, Maryland,
and South Carolina. The Congress prepared a resolution to be sent to King George III and the English Parliament. Specifically, the conclusions of this Congress were embodied in four separate papers (or letters) which were sent out accordingly: (1) A Declaration of Rights and Grievances; (2) a Petition to King George; (3) a Memorial and Petition to the House of Lords; and (4) a Petition to the House of Commons. The first document was the most important. It proclaimed that in return for their allegiance to the Crown, the colonists were granted "the undoubted rights of Englishmen, that no taxes be imposed on them but with their own consent" and asked for the repeal of the Stamp Act and the Acts of 1764. The Declaration emphasized that this right of representation is affirmed as "an ancient and inalienable right that cannot be infringed." Only colonial legislatures can tax colonial residents. [Avery and Abbatt, A History of the United States and its People: From Their Earliest Records to the Present Time (Vol. 5), pp. 63-64]. To defend their objections, they turned to a defense argument that Lord Coke used in 1609-1610 - 'Superiority of the common law over acts of Parliament.' In this argument, Coke claimed that "when an act of parliament is against common right or reason, or repugnant, or impossible to be performed, the common law will control it and adjudge such an act void." Because the Stamp Act offended the concept of consensual taxation, the colonists believed it to be invalid.
In March 1766, Ben Franklin and others appeared before Parliament to argue the American case. There was much debate and Franklin warned of a likely revolution in the colonies if the Stamp Act was enforced by the British military, which had already sought authorization to begin quartering and enforcing the Act. (The colonies refused to give the authorization). Parliament then rescinded the bill.
But while the colonists enjoyed a temporary victory, the damage was done. The political climate was changing. The relationship with Britain had become too strained. As John Adams would later write to Thomas Jefferson, "The Revolution was in the minds of the people, and this was effected, from 1760 to 1775, in the course of 15 years before a drop of blood was shed at Lexington." [National Archives]
On the same day that the Stamp Act was repealed, Parliament passed the Declaratory Act stating that it had total power to legislate any laws governing the colonies in all cases whatsoever. In August, violence broke out in NY between British soldiers and armed colonists as a result of the refusal of New York colonists to comply with the Quartering Act. In retaliation, King George suspended the NY legislature.
In 1767, Parliament passed the Townshend Revenue Acts, which imposed a new series of taxes on the colonists - on imports of such products as paper, tea, glass, lead and paints. Several months later, Samuel Adams began to circulate a letter calling for colonists to oppose taxation without representation and to begin to unite. One by one, the states began to endorse this letter. They began to urge their citizens to arm themselves. The more Parliament tried to raise revenue and suppress the growing unrest, the more the colonists demanded the charter rights they had brought with them a century and a half earlier.
On March 5, 1770, after a mob harassed British soldiers in Boston, the soldiers opened fire on them. This was known as the Boston Massacre and caused strong tensions with Britain. Later that year, King George agreed to repeal the Townshend Acts on all items except for tea and he would not renew the Quartering Act.
In May 10, 1773, Parliament passed the Tea Act, which placed a heavy import tax on tea and allowed the India Tea Company to have a monopoly to supply the colonies. Several months later, three ships loaded with tea arrived in Boston Harbor. A large group of colonists in Boston got together and decided they would demand that the Royal Governor of Massachusetts send the ship back to England but when he got wind of this, he ordered the ships to stay tight and not to leave until the tea taxes were paid. On December 16, colonists disguised themselves as Mohawk Indians, boarded the ships, and dumped all 342 containers of tea into the harbor. That was the infamous Boston Tea Party.
In retaliation for the destruction of the tea, an irate Parliament passed the first of a series of Coercive Acts (called "Intolerable Acts" by the colonists). The Boston Port Bill shut down all commercial shipping in Boston Harbor until Massachusetts paid the taxes owed on the tea dumped in the harbor and also reimbursed the East India Company for the loss of the tea. In May 1774, General Thomas Gage, commander of all British military forces in the colonies, arrived in Boston, became the new Royal Governor, ended colonial self-rule, and put Massachusetts under military rule. Britain sent more and more troops to subjugate the colonies and a new Quartering Act was enacted by Parliament. At this same time, colonists began to demand an inter-colonial Congress to unite the colonies so they could effectively put pressure on Britain to repeal the Coercive Acts.
From September 5 -24, 1774, the First Continental Congress met in Philadelphia. There were 56 delegates, representing every colony except Georgia. Attendants included Patrick Henry, George Washington, Samuel Adams, and John Hancock. The Continental Congress immediately declared its opposition to the Coercive Acts, declaring that they would NOT be obeyed. Furthermore, it asserted the rights of all colonists to "Life, Liberty, and Property." It authorized the formation of local militia, announced a boycott of English imports, placed an embargo on exports to Britain, and discontinued the slave trade.
On March 23, 1775, Patrick Henry delivered a speech at the Virginia Convention against British rule, stating:
"I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past.... Let us not deceive ourselves, sir. These (the acts imposed by King George and the British Parliament) are the implements of war and subjugation; the last arguments to which kings resort.... we have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne! In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free-- if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending--if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained--we must fight! When shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"
The following month, General Gage (aka, Governor of Massachusetts) was ordered by Britain to enforce the Coercive Acts and to suppress all "open rebellion" among the colonists using any force necessary. On April 18, General Gage ordered 700 British soldiers to Concord to destroy the colonists' weapons depot. That night, Paul Revere and William Dawes rode from Boston to warn colonists. Revere reached Lexington about midnight and warned Sam Adams and John Hancock who were hiding out there. "One if by land and two if by sea."
By dawn the following day, about 70 armed Massachusetts militiamen stood face-to-face to the advancing British guard on Lexington Green. An unauthorized shot was fired - "the shot heard around the world" - and thus began the American Revolution.
"The Revolution was effected before the War commenced", said John Adams. "The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people..... This radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people, was the real American Revolution."
On May 10, 1775, the Second Continental Congress convened in Philadelphia, and John Hancock was elected as its president. On June 15, the Congress unanimously voted to appoint George Washington as General and Commander-in-Chief of the new Continental Army.
We were now in a war for our independence, for the rights of man and the right to govern as we saw fit. The series of oppressive acts of Parliament and the refusal of King George to stick up for the rights of the colonists had taken their toll. The once proud British subjects now saw themselves as proud Americans. In order to encourage the fight for separation from Britain, the authors of our founding documents began making the case for independence. On January 9, 1776, Thomas Paine's "Common Sense" was published in Philadelphia. The 50 page pamphlet was highly critical of King George III and attacked the concept of allegiance to a Monarchy. Common Sense became an instant best-seller in America. Paine wrote:
SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness positively by uniting our affections, the latter negatively by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher. Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil in its worst state an intolerable one...
In order to gain a clear and just idea of the design and end of government, let us suppose a small number of persons settled in some sequestered part of the earth, unconnected with the rest, they will then represent the first peopling of any country, or of the world. In this state of natural liberty, society will be their first thought. A thousand motives will excite them thereto, the strength of one man is so unequal to his wants, and his mind so unfitted for perpetual solitude, that he is soon obliged to seek assistance and relief of another, who in his turn requires the same. Four or five united would be able to raise a tolerable dwelling in the midst of a wilderness, but one man might labor out the common period of life without accomplishing any thing; when he had felled his timber he could not remove it, nor erect it after it was removed; hunger in the mean time would urge him from his work, and every different want call him a different way. Disease, nay even misfortune would be death, for though neither might be mortal, yet either would disable him from living, and reduce him to a state in which he might rather be said to perish than to die.
Thomas Payne
Thus necessity, like a gravitating power, would soon form our newly arrived emigrants into society, the reciprocal blessings of which, would supersede, and render the obligations of law and government unnecessary while they remained perfectly just to each other; but as nothing but heaven is impregnable to vice, it will unavoidably happen, that in proportion as they surmount the first difficulties of emigration, which bound them together in a common cause, they will begin to relax in their duty and attachment to each other; and this remissness, will point out the necessity, of establishing some form of government to supply the defect of moral virtue....
Go Back
In October 1765, the Stamp Act Congress convened in New York City, with representatives from nine of the colonies - NY, NJ, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Delaware, Maryland,
and South Carolina. The Congress prepared a resolution to be sent to King George III and the English Parliament. Specifically, the conclusions of this Congress were embodied in four separate papers (or letters) which were sent out accordingly: (1) A Declaration of Rights and Grievances; (2) a Petition to King George; (3) a Memorial and Petition to the House of Lords; and (4) a Petition to the House of Commons. The first document was the most important. It proclaimed that in return for their allegiance to the Crown, the colonists were granted "the undoubted rights of Englishmen, that no taxes be imposed on them but with their own consent" and asked for the repeal of the Stamp Act and the Acts of 1764. The Declaration emphasized that this right of representation is affirmed as "an ancient and inalienable right that cannot be infringed." Only colonial legislatures can tax colonial residents. [Avery and Abbatt, A History of the United States and its People: From Their Earliest Records to the Present Time (Vol. 5), pp. 63-64]. To defend their objections, they turned to a defense argument that Lord Coke used in 1609-1610 - 'Superiority of the common law over acts of Parliament.' In this argument, Coke claimed that "when an act of parliament is against common right or reason, or repugnant, or impossible to be performed, the common law will control it and adjudge such an act void." Because the Stamp Act offended the concept of consensual taxation, the colonists believed it to be invalid.
In March 1766, Ben Franklin and others appeared before Parliament to argue the American case. There was much debate and Franklin warned of a likely revolution in the colonies if the Stamp Act was enforced by the British military, which had already sought authorization to begin quartering and enforcing the Act. (The colonies refused to give the authorization). Parliament then rescinded the bill.
But while the colonists enjoyed a temporary victory, the damage was done. The political climate was changing. The relationship with Britain had become too strained. As John Adams would later write to Thomas Jefferson, "The Revolution was in the minds of the people, and this was effected, from 1760 to 1775, in the course of 15 years before a drop of blood was shed at Lexington." [National Archives]
On the same day that the Stamp Act was repealed, Parliament passed the Declaratory Act stating that it had total power to legislate any laws governing the colonies in all cases whatsoever. In August, violence broke out in NY between British soldiers and armed colonists as a result of the refusal of New York colonists to comply with the Quartering Act. In retaliation, King George suspended the NY legislature.
In 1767, Parliament passed the Townshend Revenue Acts, which imposed a new series of taxes on the colonists - on imports of such products as paper, tea, glass, lead and paints. Several months later, Samuel Adams began to circulate a letter calling for colonists to oppose taxation without representation and to begin to unite. One by one, the states began to endorse this letter. They began to urge their citizens to arm themselves. The more Parliament tried to raise revenue and suppress the growing unrest, the more the colonists demanded the charter rights they had brought with them a century and a half earlier.
On March 5, 1770, after a mob harassed British soldiers in Boston, the soldiers opened fire on them. This was known as the Boston Massacre and caused strong tensions with Britain. Later that year, King George agreed to repeal the Townshend Acts on all items except for tea and he would not renew the Quartering Act.
In May 10, 1773, Parliament passed the Tea Act, which placed a heavy import tax on tea and allowed the India Tea Company to have a monopoly to supply the colonies. Several months later, three ships loaded with tea arrived in Boston Harbor. A large group of colonists in Boston got together and decided they would demand that the Royal Governor of Massachusetts send the ship back to England but when he got wind of this, he ordered the ships to stay tight and not to leave until the tea taxes were paid. On December 16, colonists disguised themselves as Mohawk Indians, boarded the ships, and dumped all 342 containers of tea into the harbor. That was the infamous Boston Tea Party.
In retaliation for the destruction of the tea, an irate Parliament passed the first of a series of Coercive Acts (called "Intolerable Acts" by the colonists). The Boston Port Bill shut down all commercial shipping in Boston Harbor until Massachusetts paid the taxes owed on the tea dumped in the harbor and also reimbursed the East India Company for the loss of the tea. In May 1774, General Thomas Gage, commander of all British military forces in the colonies, arrived in Boston, became the new Royal Governor, ended colonial self-rule, and put Massachusetts under military rule. Britain sent more and more troops to subjugate the colonies and a new Quartering Act was enacted by Parliament. At this same time, colonists began to demand an inter-colonial Congress to unite the colonies so they could effectively put pressure on Britain to repeal the Coercive Acts.
From September 5 -24, 1774, the First Continental Congress met in Philadelphia. There were 56 delegates, representing every colony except Georgia. Attendants included Patrick Henry, George Washington, Samuel Adams, and John Hancock. The Continental Congress immediately declared its opposition to the Coercive Acts, declaring that they would NOT be obeyed. Furthermore, it asserted the rights of all colonists to "Life, Liberty, and Property." It authorized the formation of local militia, announced a boycott of English imports, placed an embargo on exports to Britain, and discontinued the slave trade.
On March 23, 1775, Patrick Henry delivered a speech at the Virginia Convention against British rule, stating:
"I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past.... Let us not deceive ourselves, sir. These (the acts imposed by King George and the British Parliament) are the implements of war and subjugation; the last arguments to which kings resort.... we have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne! In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free-- if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending--if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained--we must fight! When shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"
The following month, General Gage (aka, Governor of Massachusetts) was ordered by Britain to enforce the Coercive Acts and to suppress all "open rebellion" among the colonists using any force necessary. On April 18, General Gage ordered 700 British soldiers to Concord to destroy the colonists' weapons depot. That night, Paul Revere and William Dawes rode from Boston to warn colonists. Revere reached Lexington about midnight and warned Sam Adams and John Hancock who were hiding out there. "One if by land and two if by sea."
By dawn the following day, about 70 armed Massachusetts militiamen stood face-to-face to the advancing British guard on Lexington Green. An unauthorized shot was fired - "the shot heard around the world" - and thus began the American Revolution.
"The Revolution was effected before the War commenced", said John Adams. "The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people..... This radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people, was the real American Revolution."
On May 10, 1775, the Second Continental Congress convened in Philadelphia, and John Hancock was elected as its president. On June 15, the Congress unanimously voted to appoint George Washington as General and Commander-in-Chief of the new Continental Army.
We were now in a war for our independence, for the rights of man and the right to govern as we saw fit. The series of oppressive acts of Parliament and the refusal of King George to stick up for the rights of the colonists had taken their toll. The once proud British subjects now saw themselves as proud Americans. In order to encourage the fight for separation from Britain, the authors of our founding documents began making the case for independence. On January 9, 1776, Thomas Paine's "Common Sense" was published in Philadelphia. The 50 page pamphlet was highly critical of King George III and attacked the concept of allegiance to a Monarchy. Common Sense became an instant best-seller in America. Paine wrote:
SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness positively by uniting our affections, the latter negatively by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher. Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil in its worst state an intolerable one...
In order to gain a clear and just idea of the design and end of government, let us suppose a small number of persons settled in some sequestered part of the earth, unconnected with the rest, they will then represent the first peopling of any country, or of the world. In this state of natural liberty, society will be their first thought. A thousand motives will excite them thereto, the strength of one man is so unequal to his wants, and his mind so unfitted for perpetual solitude, that he is soon obliged to seek assistance and relief of another, who in his turn requires the same. Four or five united would be able to raise a tolerable dwelling in the midst of a wilderness, but one man might labor out the common period of life without accomplishing any thing; when he had felled his timber he could not remove it, nor erect it after it was removed; hunger in the mean time would urge him from his work, and every different want call him a different way. Disease, nay even misfortune would be death, for though neither might be mortal, yet either would disable him from living, and reduce him to a state in which he might rather be said to perish than to die.
Thus necessity, like a gravitating power, would soon form our newly arrived emigrants into society, the reciprocal blessings of which, would supersede, and render the obligations of law and government unnecessary while they remained perfectly just to each other; but as nothing but heaven is impregnable to vice, it will unavoidably happen, that in proportion as they surmount the first difficulties of emigration, which bound them together in a common cause, they will begin to relax in their duty and attachment to each other; and this remissness, will point out the necessity, of establishing some form of government to supply the defect of moral virtue....
| "Every Picture Tells a Story ... Don't It:" An August Afternoon in Charleston, Part II | In the Past, Body & Soul | The Constitutional Convention of 1787: A Miracle in Philadelphia |
Home
Contact
About
Service Rates
Privacy Policy
Follow on Facebook
Subscribe to Newsletters
Rss Feed
Keywords
Eastern NC Now & ENC NOW © Copyright 1998-2024 All Rights Reserved.
