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Self governing structures in the english colonies essay
Impacts of mercantilism in 18th century england
Impacts of mercantilism in 18th century england
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Economic ideas and systems come and go. Many systems have failed and many have succeeded. The British system of mercantilism was actually quite a good system for England. They raked in profits from their colonies. The only problem was that they did not give enough economic freedom to their colonies. At almost every turn, the British tried to restrict what their colonies could do and whom they could trade with. In hindsight, I believe that the British may have been a bit more lenient on their restrictions because the constant prohibitions eventually lead to revolution…
England did not directly control its colonies. Instead, they let joint-stock companies control and provide funds and foodstuffs for the colonies. Modern day corporations find their roots in these Joint-stock companies. The joint-stock companies were comprised of a group of entrepreneurs who provided the funds for all the voyages and supplies. The people funding the company usually controlled the colony as well.
The Dominion of New England was set up by English officials to unite the colonies into one defense against the Native Americans. It was run by a man named Andros, who began to levy taxes on all the colonists without first getting input from the various assemblies from the colonies. The Dominion of New England was eventually overrun. Andros was being searched for because of the failings of this Dominion, so he took cover and tried to escape the colonies by dressing like a woman. However, his boots gave him away.
The colonists were growing more and more displeased by the economic system the British were forcing on them, and then the Molasses Act came. This Act placed high tariffs on sugar, molasses and rum imported into New England in a effort to prevent colonial trade with the French West Indies sugar islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe. British sugar merchants on the islands of Barbados, Antigua and Jamaica had complained to Parliament. The law was enacted to restrict non-British trade and to further enforce the concept that trade was to be done only on British owned ships. In response to this Act, the colonists began to smuggle goods into the colonies.
Parliament also passed a series of Navigation Laws, which further restricted trade from the colonies. Cromwell passe...
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...ion and ideas and to build colonial unity, and, in 1774, these committees prepared the way for the First Continental Congress. The representatives at this First Continental Congress, except for a few radicals, had not met to consider independence, but wished only to persuade the British government to recognize their rights. A plan of reconciliation offered by Joseph Galloway was rejected. It was agreed that the colonies would refuse to import British goods until colonial grievances were righted, those grievances were listed in petitions to the king, and the congress adjourned.
The British mercantile system was doomed for disaster from the moment that the colonists set foot on the new continent. At first the British gave the colonists a certain feeling of independence, then they put the collar on and expected the colonists to do everything that they asked them to. What happened in the American colonies is a great example of the line “Give them an inch, they’ll take a mile.” The British set up the colonies in the idea of making money, which was the whole point behind mercantilism. However, you can’t expect people to kneel down and obey forever.
Starting in 1763, policies likes the Grenville program and the Sugar Act united the colonists against the British, despite their own internal conflicts. Numerous acts were placed on the colonies during 1764, such as the Sugar Act and the Currency Act. The Sugar Act lowered the duty on molasses and increased the duty on sugar, even forming new courts to try smugglers. The Currency Act enforced that none of the colonies would be
Leading up to the time of the Revolutionary War, seven policies were passed by Britain in hopes of controlling the colonies. These acts culminated in the Quebec Act which persuaded many Americans into supporting the revolutionary effort. The Proclamation of 1763 was the first policy passed by the British. This forbid any settlement west of Appalachia because the British feared conflicts over territory in this region. The proclamation, however, infuriated the colonists who planned on expanding westward. The Sugar Act was passed shortly after in 1764. This act sought harsher punishment for smugglers. The next act to be passed was possibly the most controversial act passed by Britain. The Stamp Act passed in 1765 affected every colonist because it required all printed documents to have a stamp purchased from the British authority. The colonist boycotted British goods until the Stamp Act was repealed but quickly replaced by the Declaratory Act in 1766. The British still held onto the conviction that they had the right to tax the Americans in any way they deemed necessary. The Declaratory Act was followed by the Townshend Acts of 1767. This imposed taxes on all imported goods from Britain, which caused the colonies to refuse trading with Britain. Six years passed before another upsetting act was passed. In 1773, the Tea Act placed taxes on tea, threatening the power of the colonies. The colonies, however, fought back by pouring expensive tea into the Boston harbor in an event now known as the Boston Tea Party. The enraged Parliament quickly passed the Intolerable Acts, shutting down the port of Boston and taking control over the colonies.
In 1767 many horrible things were happening to the thirteen colonies. England was punishing America for the way they were acting. They did not want the colonies to be independent; but wanted them to ask for permission to do things, and listen to what they were told. Just the year before, the Declaratory Act was passed stating that England could do what they wanted and America had to do as they said. They could pass any law onto the colonies and they would have to deal with it. Which leads to the Townshend Acts; “a series of measures introduced into the English Parliament by Chancellor of the Exchequer Charles Townshend in 1767” (Mifflin). The Townshend Acts began with the English parliament wanting to teach the colonies responsibility and ended in a massacre and boycott from all English products. Charles Townshend, being in charge of the treasury, came up with the idea to put a low tax on several small things so that the colonists would not be able to tell as much as a large tax on one thing. He proposed a tax on glass, led,
Without colonial consent, the British started their bid to raise revenue with the Sugar Act of 1764 which increased duties colonists would have to pay on imports into America. When the Sugar Act failed, the Stamp Act of 1765 which required a stamp to be purchased with colonial products was enacted. This act angered the colonists to no limit and with these acts, the British Empire poked at the up to now very civil colonists. The passing of the oppressive Intolerable Acts that took away the colonists’ right to elected officials and Townshend Acts which taxed imports and allowed British troops without warrants to search colonist ships received a more aggravated response from the colonist that would end in a Revolution.
In a similar economic revolution, the colonies outgrew their mercantile relationship with the mother country and developed an expanding capitalist system of their own. England's economic system was primarily based on mercantilism, which was directly related to the colonies. This concept of mercantilism said that wealth is power and however much power you have is how much gold and silver one country has in its treasury. For this concept to take place, England had to export more than import. Because the colonies had the raw materials needed England set up laws such as navigation laws to restrict what the colonies coul...
One way of the British controlling the colonies was to impose trade regulations on them. They forced the colonies to trade only with them, as dictated by the Navigation Acts and the mercantile system.
The colonies would grow and produce products that were needed in England, and in turn would buy manufactured goods made in England. Some producers were granted bounties, tobacco planters had a guaranteed monopoly of the British market, and the colonists enjoyed the rights of Englishmen and were protected by England, one of the strongest and most powerful countries in the world. (Merits and Menaces of Mercantilism) However, despite all these benefits, the mercantile system was an enormous burden on the colonies. Many traders and manufacturers became indebted to England, because they traded primarily on credit. Virginia tobacco planters received the worst end of it because overproduction caused prices to fall, causing many planters to plummet into debt. Trade among other countries was heavily regulated; in certain cases it was even prohibited. In 1651, Parliament passed the Navigation Acts, which required British crews to run the now British-made ships and created a long list of “enumerated goods” that had to be shipped to England before going anywhere else. (faculty.polytechnic.org) For a while these laws were laxly enforced and colonial traders continued to smuggle goods to avoid paying heavy taxes. Prime Minister George Grenville ordered strict enforcement of the Navigation Acts in 1763, and British officials began to crack down on smugglers. It then became even harder for American traders to buy, sell, and manufacture their goods without British intrusion. The colonists felt as if they were being kept in a “state of perpetual adolescence” because the trade was so heavily controlled. (Merits and Menaces of Mercantilism) These exasperating laws caused a great deal of tension between Britain and the colonies, tension that would evolve into the revolutionary war. This tension and frustration, I believe, would have prompted me to sign the Declaration of
The Navigation Acts were a series of acts made in 1651, 1660, 1663, 1673, 1696, 1773. The acts were made to encourage British shipping. The 1651 act stated that any trade between Asia, Africa or America had to be transported by a British ships. The act of 1660 made to prevent fraudulent evasions. Goods such as tobacco, sugar, rice, cotton, wool, etc. could only be shipped to Britain. The 1663 act was that Colonial exports had to be transported on English or Colonial ships, and all Colonial goods had to pass through English ports. The acts of 1673, 1696, and 1773, closed other trade loopholes, increased the list of goods and commodities, increased the taxes on goods, and appoint vice-admiralty courts in Colonial America to enforce the navigation
A new era was dawning on the American colonies and its mother country Britain, an era of revolution. The American colonists were subjected to many cruel acts of the British Parliament in order to benefit England itself. These British policies were forcing the Americans to rebellious feelings as their rights were constantly being violated by the British Crown. The colonies wanted to have an independent government and economy so they could create their own laws and stipulations. The British imperial policies affected the colonies economic, political, and geographic situation which intensified colonists’ resistance to British rule and intensified commitment to their republican values.
The British also implemented new taxes. The Sugar act of 1764 sought to reduce smuggling, which occurred partly as a result of the earlier Molasses Act. This gave British possessions in the Caribbean the upper hand in sugar trade, which in the British view helped the empire as a whole, but to Americans, and especially the merchants, this put limits on their opportunities. The Currency Act, passed about this time forbade the printing of colonial currency. British merchants benefited because they didn't have to deal with inflated American currencies. The Americans felt they were at an economic disadvantage as very little sterli...
...at the colonies bore the right to tax and legislate themselves. Additionally, an agreement was reached to once again cut off all trade until the Coercive Acts were repealed.
(Jefferson,776). This means that the colonists had no say in the laws that were being enacted and they had to get the kings approval to pass a law. The main problem with this is that when tensions grew between England and the colonies England could use this power to punish the colonies by enacting laws that would infringe on the lives of the colonists, and they could not pass any legislations to change these laws because they had no representation in parliament. On the same basis of the first grievance the next one stated, “He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.” (Jefferson,776). This means that when the colonies proposed a law the Governors could not enact them until he got the kings permission to do so. The main problem with this is most of the time the king would not acknowledge the proposal and most proposals would not be
During the early development stages of our country, there came a time when the overpowering mother country of Britain imposed a new system of taxation to control the colonies and the colonists. The Sugar Act of 1764 was the first step in bringing the new taxation system into affect. The Sugar Act, which replaced the Molasses Act of 1733, was designed to raise income without regulating the trading system that the colonies had established. Soon, Britain began to establish methods of taxes without any method of representation of the colonies and this angered the colonists. The power of Parliament to tax the colonies for the purpose of trade regulation had always been ac...
After the Seven Years Way England was broke for she had spent more money needed to win the war. Also winning the war gave the colonist a “we can do it spirit”. However because England now was facing debt she decided to tax the colonies. One the first acts passed was the sugar act passed in 1764. This Act was the raise revenue in American colonies. What it did was lowered the tax from six penses to three penses per gallon on foreign molasses. Molasses is a product made by refining sugarcane, grapes or sugar beets into sugar. This upset the colonist because before the sugar act they didn’t have to pay the tax so even if it was lowered that meant nothing for they now had to pay for it. A year later, in 1765, the Britain’s passed another act known as the Stamp Act. The Stamp Act put a tax on stamped paper, publications, playing cards, etc. Because it was on all paper products in a way it affected everyone; from the papers for the upper class such as lawyers, publications such as newspapers for the middle class, and playing cards for the lower class for entertainment. Next, the Townshend Act passed by Charles Townshend. This came in 1767, which imposed taxes on colonial tea, lead, paint, paper, and glass which just like the Stamp Act affected all of the classes in the colonist in the Americas. Though this act was removed three years later in 1770, it still left colonists with a warning that conditions may become worse. Around 1773, parliament passed the Intolerable Acts one of those acts which affected taxation was the Bost...
One facet of this unique system involved the numerous economic differences between England and the colonies. The English government subscribed to the economic theory of mercantilism, which demanded that the individual subordinate his economic activity to the interests of the state (Text, 49). In order to promote mercantilism in all her colonies, Great Britain passed the Navigation Acts in 1651, which controlled the output of British holdings by subsidizing. Under the Navigation Acts, each holding was assigned a product, and the Crown dictated the quantity to be produced. The West Indies, for example, were assigned sugar production and any other colony exporting sugar would face stiff penalties (Text, 50). This was done in order to ensure the economic prosperity of King Charles II, but it also served to restrict economic freedom. The geographical layout of the American colonies made mercantilism impractical there. The cit...