For over a century Great Britain had ruled the colonies in America. Since the founding of the Chesapeake Bay colony in the south in 1607, and the Massachusetts Bay colony in the north in 1630, the colonies had relied on the crown for many of their needs. Over time the colonists established a social and economical system that was almost independent of the British Empire. In April of 1775, after many transgressions on both sides, the colonists decided that they no longer needed, or wanted the support, protection, and leadership of the country that founded them. There were many factors, both immediate, and longstanding that lead to the decision to fight for freedom from British rule. The American Revolution had some of its beginnings in the French and Indian war. For seven years, Britain battled the French and Indian nations in the colonies. Where the colonies militia fought beside the troops of the British army and learned war first hand. After winning the war, Britain had a large debt 140 million pounds. To pay these expenses, it was reasoned that taxing the colonies should pay the debt. The war had been fought to protect the land of the Ohio River Valley, land that was part of the colonies. Even before the French and Indian War, political harmony between the colonies and the British was already being breaking down, due to all of the new acts that were passed in accordance with the mercantile theory of economics. This theory of economics believed that the goal of the individual should be to increase the total wealth of the country, and that the world wealth was finite. The British believed that the colonies only existed to increase the wealth of Britain. The belief in mercantilism and a large war debt lead to Britain's... ... middle of paper ... ...elped to bring on the Revolutionary War like the Stamp and Sugar Act, and the Boston massacre, the roots of the war may lie in the first colonists to settle in the new world. Colonists were forced to rely on themselves for much of their existence while support from their home country was across this ocean. This forced independence in the early days of the colonies helped to inspire a strength that ultimately lead to belief that the colonists were best ruling themselves, something they felt that they'd been doing all along. Bibliography Brinkley, Alan American History A Survey, Volume I: To 1877, New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 2003. pg. 101-122, 209-213. Taylor, Alan American Colonies: The Settling of North America, New York, NY: Penguin Group, 2001. pg. 1685-1730 "American Revolution"(ONLINE) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Revolution, October 23, 2003
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Show MoreThere were many factors that led up to the American Revolutionary War, one of these factors were the laws and acts being passed at the time. The British Parliament attempted to limit the power the American Colonist had at the time by taking away from their income. How they did this one may ask? The simple answer is taxes. One of the many taxes imposed was the stamp act. During this time the American colonies were being oppressed by the British one of the first signs of this was the Stamp Act. The act stated that almost anything written had to be stamped and tax...
When the colonies were being formed, many colonists came from England to escape the restrictions placed upon them by the crown. Britain had laws for regulating trade and collecting taxes, but they were generally not enforced. The colonists had gotten used to being able to govern themselves. However, Britain sooned changed it’s colonial policy because of the piling debt due to four wars the British got into with the French and the Spanish. The most notable of these, the French and Indian War (or the Seven Years’ War), had immediate effects on the relationship between the colonies and Great Britain, leading to the concept of no taxation without representation becoming the motivating force for the American revolutionary movement and a great symbol for democracy amongst the colonies, as Britain tried to tighten their hold on the colonies through various acts and measures.
American revolution, a war of independence, started on April 14, 1775 between the American colonies and the Britain. However, the series of events happened before 1775 already marked the beginning of the revolution war. During 1754 and 1763, there was a war between Britain and France which ended up with the victories British deeply in debt. Britain was weakened by the war and their economy was suffering, thus they started to impose tax from the American colonists. And that leaded to the the Stamp Act and the Sugar Act. The American colonists were not happy about the taxes not only because they were paying more money, but also because they were outraged and have no say in the taxes since they do not have a
Edward, Rebecca and Henretta, James and Self, Robert. America A Concise History. 5th ed. Boston: Bedford/ St. Martin’s, 2012.
Henretta, James A. and David Brody. America: A Concise History, Volume I: To 1877. 4th ed. Boston:
Henretta, James A., Robert O. Self, and Rebecca Edwards. America a Concise History. Vol. 1: To 1877. Boston: Bedford / St. Martin's, 2013. N. pag. Print. Pages 195, 196, 198-199
The American Revolution was a war filled with many battles for a result of independence for Americans. The war lasted from April 1775- September 1783. However, it wasn't the longest war in history, if the Loyalist were going to lose they weren't giving it up too easy. The Loyalist were willing to do anything to keep the power of Britain over America. Some of the Brits moved away to America for more independence. The war was fought between the British Kingdom and the American colonists (colonial rebels). Many things lead up to this terrific war. Reasons why is because the Americans wanted their own independence from Great Britain. The king of Great Brit spent lots of money on the French-Indian War. In result, the king was in debt, so he taxed the Americans on just about everything they used in their everyday lives, such as: tea, sugar, and printed items. He did this so he could get all of his money back. The Americans were tired of this treatment so they decided to act and war had began.
The interests of England within the colonies were self-centered. The English were exploiting were trying to govern the colonies by using the mercantilist system. Mercantilism is when the state directs all the economic activities within it's borders(Blum 31). England was not attempting to make any changes that would help the colonists. They limited the colonies commerce to internal trade only(Miller 9). The English were exploiting the colonies by demanding that the colonies import more from England then they exported to the colonies. They were importing raw materials from the colonies and making them into exportable goods in England. They would then ship these goods to foreign markets all around the world including the colonies(America Online ). Throughout the seventeenth century the English saw America as a place to get materials they didn't have at home and a market to sell finished products at after the goods had been manufactured. This was detrimental to the colonies because it prevented them from manufacturing any of the raw materials they produced and made them more dependent upon England.
Henretta, Brody, James David. America. Fourth ed. A Concise History. 1, to 1877. William J. Lombardo. Boston, Ma: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2010. (accessed 20 May 2014)
...y choice, as it was at this time that the colonies were becoming more independent. Overtime, however, Britain and the colonies came to resent each other which resulted in the colonies becoming increasingly independent by distancing themselves from the British. This was due to the fact that British had incurred substantial debt during the French and Indian War which they ultimately tried to finance by taxing the colonists. The colonists, however, were unwilling to be taxed by the British. They did not believe that Britain, after a period of salutary neglect, should be permitted to return to direct rule, in this case through the imposition of taxes. Instead the colonists believed that there should be “no taxation without representation”. This caused the colonies to join together and rebel against the British and their policies in the form of the American Revolution.
The Revolutionary War was a war between the Thirteen Colonies and Great Britain from 1775-1783 during the American Revolution. The American colonists fought the British in hope of freedom and separation from Great Britain. “This was the completion stage of the political American Revolution whereas the colonists had denied the rights of the Parliament of Great Britain in governing them without any representation,” ("American Revolutionary War."). The Revolutionary War consisted of many different bloody battles on American soil. The war resulted in an American victory because of many historical reasons. The factors that contributed to an American victory of the Revolutionary War are British debt, distance between America and Great Britain, war tactics, French involvement, and important battles.
In 1776, the American colonists declared their independence from Great Britain. The colonists once had a great respect for their mother country until they found themselves treated unfairly and unreasonably. The American colonists were justified in declaring independence from Great Britain because of Britain’s restrictive trade policies, taxation without consent, and prohibition of westward settlement.
The relationship between Britain and her Americans colonies slowly deteriorated between the 1750s and the beginning of the American Revolution. When the first British immigrants settled in America, the relationship of the colonies and their mother country was somewhat peaceful. In the following generations, however, their relationship became tenser as Britain imposed policies and taxes on unrepresented American colonists. The British believed they were right in doing so because they had large debts to pay from ongoing wars with France. These taxes caused uprisings among colonists which contributed to British occupation in America, leading to more rebellions. Eventually, the rift in the relationship between the colonists and the British led to the Revolutionary War and the formation of a new country.
There are four major reasons that the rebellion of the colonists accumulated into a full scale revolution. The most indistinct of these four reasons is the old societal legacies of the colonies, namely: social, political, religious, and economic values. These deeply rooted values were ingrained and inherited from the generations of colonists, and once the British began upsetting those values, resentment set in and began to undermine the British authority. For example, many of those who came to America were of British decent; they loved being English and fancied that, as colonists, they were taking part in the building of a bigger and stronger British Empire. But to those in England, the Americans were no better than barbarians. The English did not view A...
In 1776 Thomas Paine wrote ‘there is something very absurd, in supposing a continent to be perpetually governed by an island’. This Enlightenment thinking is what made the Revolution revolutionary. Colonists rejected the ideas of imperial monarchy and made a bold statement in deciding to have a non-monarchical government. In the 1680s John Locke’s writings of a social contract, showed the colonists that the British lacked the legitimacy to impose taxes on them, in his writings Locke wrote that if the people are dissatisfied with the government then they have a right to rebel – this is what the Americans did in 1775. By the time the fighting had started most of the colonists were already self-governing and saw themselves as a different entity to Britain. This can be seen in the term ‘Patriots’, which was used for the colonists who rejected the Acts passed by Britain.