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This Site:
Discovery of America
The Explorers
Post Columbian Exploration
Thirteen Original Colonies
Colonization of America
Colonial Life
Colonial Days and Ways
Independence Movement
The Patriots
Prelude to War
Revolutionary War
Revolutionary War Battles
Overview of Revolutionary War
Revolutionary War
Timeline
Civil War
American Flag
Mexican War
Republic of Texas
Indians
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The first permanent settlement of the New World was made by the
Pilgrims in the year 1620. They moved here in order to escape
tyranny, and to be able to practice their faith without persecution.
By relocating to the other side of the world, they hoped to escape
tyranny, and establish a new way of doing business.
The New World became a dream and a destination for many seeking a
better way of life. The original Pilgrims were followed by boat
after boat of people with the courage to help establish something
new and better on the opposite side of the globe.
Unfortunately, the long arm of tyranny followed them all the way to
the new world, and soon they were faced with the same oppressive
government practices that had driven them out of Europe in the
first place. As these practices grew, and became more established,
Pilgrims gave way to Patriots, and the seeds were planted for an American
Revolution.
The following sidelights on this period of World History have a
permanent interest, as showing conditions apart from those connected
with direct military operations.
In the session of the British Parliament in 1756, that body
attempted to extend its authority in a signal manner over the
colonies of the New World. They passed laws to regulate the internal
policy of the colonies, as well as their acts for the common good.
The law in Pennsylvania, under which Franklin's militia were raised,
was repealed by the King in council; the commissions of all officers
elected under it were cancelled, and the companies were dispersed.
Volunteers were forbidden to organize for their defense; and the
arrangements made by the Quakers with the Delawares, to secure peace
and friendship with the Indians, were censured by
Lord Halifax at
the head of the board of trade and plantations, as " the most daring
violation of the royal prerogative." Each Northern province was also
forbidden to negotiate with the Indians. But the spirit of the
colonists could not be brought into subjection to arbitrary royal
authority. A person who had long resided in America, and had just
returned to England, declared prophetically, " In a few years the
colonies in America will be independent of Great Britain " ; and it
was actually proposed to send over William, Duke of Cumberland, to
be their sovereign, and to emancipate, them at once.
Taxation Without Representation is Tyranny
Four great wars had burdened Great Britain with a debt of about
$700,000,000 in 1763. Her treasury was low, and she looked to the
colonies for contributions to her revenues. At the beginning of the
French and Indian War, the board of trade had contemplated a scheme
of colonial taxation, and Pitt had intimated to more than one
colonial governor that at the end of the war the government would
look to the colonies for a revenue; yet he dared not undertake a
scheme which the great Walpole had timidly evaded. Pitt's
successors, more reckless, entered upon a scheme of taxation under
the authority of Parliament, boldly asserting the absolute right and
power of that body over the colonies in "all cases whatsoever."
Then began the resistance to that claim on the part of the colonies
which aroused the government to a more vigorous and varied practical
assertion of it. For more than ten years the quarrel raged before
the contestants came to blows. The great question involved was the
extent of the authority of the British Parliament over the English
American colonies, which had no representative in that legislative
body—a question in the settlement of which the British Empire was
dismembered. The colonies took the broad ground that "taxation
without representation is tyranny."
The crown officers in America had long urged the establishment of a
parliamentary revenue for their support. Their whole political
system seemed to be but methods for the increase and security of the
emoluments of office. To meet their views, they advised a thorough
revision of the American governments—a parliamentary regulation of
colonial charters, and a certain and sufficient civil list. This
latter measure Grenville opposed (1764), refusing to become the
attorney for American office-holders, or the founder of a stupendous
system of colonial patronage and corruption. His policy in all his
financial measures was to improve the finances of his country and
replenish its exhausted treasury. When the
Earl of Halifax proposed
the payment of the salaries of colonial crown-officers directly from
England, Grenville so strenuously opposed it that the dangerous
experiment was postponed. The rapacity of crown-officers in America
for place, money, and power was a chief cause of public discontent
at all times.
 With the dawn of 1766, there were, here and there, almost whispered
expressions of a desire for political independence of Great Britain.
Samuel Adams had talked of it in private; but in
Virginia, where the
flame of resistance to the Stamp Act burned with vehemence,
Richard
Bland, in a printed Inquiry into the Rights of the British Colonies,
etc., claimed freedom from all parliamentary legislation; and he
pointed to independence as a remedy in case of a refusal of redress.
He appealed to the "law of nature and those rights of mankind which
flow from it," and pleaded that the people of the English colonies
ought to be as free in the exercise of privileges as the people of
England—freedom from taxation, customs, and impositions, excepting
with the consent of their general assemblies. He denounced the
navigation laws as unjust towards the colonies, because the latter
were not represented in Parliament. This was but an expression of
sentiments then rapidly spreading, and which soon grew into strong
desires for political independence.
When Parliament assembled on Nov. 8, 1768, the King, in his speech,
alluded with much warmth to the "spirit of faction breaking out
afresh in some of the colonies. Boston," he said, "appears to be in
a state of disobedience to all law and government, and has proceeded
to measures subversive of the constitution, and attended with
circumstances that might manifest a disposition to throw off its
dependence on Great Britain." He asked for the assistance of
Parliament to "defeat the mischievous designs of those turbulent
and seditious persons "who had deluded, by false pretences, numbers
of his subjects in America. An address was moved promising ample
support to the King, and providing for the subjection of the
rebellious spirit of the Americans. Vehement debates ensued. The
opposition were very severe. Lord North, the recognized leader of
the ministry, replied, saying: " America must fear you before she
can love you. If America is to be the judge, you may tax in no
instance; you may regulate in no instance. . . . We shall go through
with our plan, now that we have brought it so near success. I am
against repealing the last act of Parliament, securing to us a
revenue out of America; I will never think of repealing it until I
see America prostrate at my feet." This was a fair expression of the
sentiments of the ministry and of Parliament. The address was
carried by an overwhelming majority—in the House of Lords by
unanimous vote. During this year addresses and remonstrances were
sent to King George against the taxation schemes of Parliament, by
the assemblies of Massachusetts, Virginia,
Delaware, and
Georgia.
These were all couched in respectful language, but ever firm and
keenly argumentative, having for their premises the chartered rights
of the various colonies. But these voices of free-born Englishmen
were not only utterly disregarded, but treated with scorn. The pride
and the sense of justice and self-respect of the Americans were
thereby outraged. It was an offence not easily forgiven or
forgotten.
The influence of political agitation in the colonies began to be
sensibly felt in Great Britain at the beginning of 1770. The friends
of liberty in England were the friends of the colonists. The cause
was the same in all places. There was a violent struggle for relief
from thralls everywhere. America responded to calls for help from
England, as well as calls for help in America had been responded to
in England. In December, 1769, South Carolina sent £10,500 currency
to London for the society for supporting the Bill of Rights, " that
the liberties of Great Britain and America might alike be
protected," wrote members of the South Carolina Assembly. In
Ireland, the dispute with America aroused Grattan, and he began his
splendid career at about this time. The English toilers in the
manufacturing districts longed to enjoy the abundance and freedom
which they heard of in America; and 1769 is marked by the
establishment, in England, of the system of public meetings to
discuss subjects of importance to free-born Englishmen. The press,
too, spoke out boldly at that time. "Can you conceive," wrote the
yet mysterious Junius to the King, "that the people of this country
will long submit to be governed by so flexible a House of Commons?
The oppressed people of Ireland give you every day fresh marks of
their resentment. The colonists left their native land for freedom
and found it in a desert. Looking forward to independence, they
equally detest the pageantry of a king and the supercilious
hypocrisy of a bishop."
Unrest in the Colonies continued to swell, and in 1763 men dressed
as Indians boarded a British ship and dumped 340 chests of tea
overboard, in protest to British Taxes. This act of defiance is
remembered as the Boston
Tea Party. |
