ch7

Molasses Act

(1733) A British law that imposed a tax on sugar, molasses, and rum imported from non-British colonies into North American colonies. It was intended to maintain the monopoly of the American sugar market by the West Indies sugarcane growers. It was the least successful of the Navigation Acts, since it was avoided by smuggling.

Sugar Act

(1764) British deeply in debt partly to French & Indian War. English Parliament placed a tariff on sugar, coffee, wines, and molasses. colonists avoided the tax by smuggling and by bribing tax collectors.

Townshend Revenue Act

-tax to be placed on tea, glass, and paper. revenues raised be used to pay crown officials in the colonies. The writ of assistance was a general license to search anywhere, rather than a judge's warrant permitting a search only of a specifically named property.

Navigation Acts

1650 laws that required among other things that all goods to and from the colonies be transported on British ships

Thomas Gage

1721-1787 Governor of Massachusetts and a leader in the British army during the Revolutionary War

Currency Act

1764 Stopped colonial printing of paper money & forced colonists to pay in gold and silver

Tea Act

1773; placed a tax on an item to help save the British East India Company; colonists boycotted

Charles Townshend

A man who could deliver brilliant speeches in Parliament even while drunk. He rashly promised to pluck feathers from the colonial goose with a minimum of squawking. He persuaded Parliament in 1767 to pass the Townshend Acts. He seized a dubious distinction between internal and external taxes and made this tax an indirect customs duty payable at American ports. But colonials didn't want taxes.

Sons of Liberty

A radical political organization formed after the passage of the Stamp Act to protest various British acts; organization used poth peaceful and violent means of protest

Samuel Adams

A second cousin of John Adams, he contributed a potent pen and tongue to the American Revolution as a political agitator and organizer of rebellion. He was the leading spirit in hosting the Boston Tea Party. A failure in the brewing business, he was sent by Massachusetts to the First Continental Congress of 1774. He signed the Declaration of Independence and served in Congress until 1781.

Boston Massacre

Acting apparently without orders, but nervous and provoked by the jeering crowd, the troops opened fire and killed or wounded eleven citizens, an event that became known as the Boston Massacre.

Writs of Assistance

Allowed England to search colonists' ships and other private property without an individual warrant

Paul Revere

American silversmith who became a hero after his famous ride to warn of the British advance on Lexington and Concord.

East India Company

An English company formed in 1600 to develop trade with the new British colonies in India and southeastern Asia.

Suffolk Resolves

Declared that the colonies need not obey the 1773 Coercive Acts, since they infringed upon basic liberties

Battle of Lexington/Battle of Concord

First battles of the Revolutionary War, fought outside of Boston. The colonial militia successfully defended their stores of munitions, forcing the British to retreat to Boston.

Patrick Henry

He voiced out that the Stamp Act is illegal. "Give me liberty or give me death"

First Continental Congress

It was to meet in Philadelphia to consider ways of redressing colonial grievances. Twelve of the thirteen colonics, with Georgia alone missing, sent fifty-five well-respected men, among them Samuel Adams, John Adams, George Washington, and Patrick Henry. Intercolonial frictions were partially melted away by social activity after working hours; in fifty-four days George Washington dined at his own lodgings only nine times.

Committees of Correspondence

Local committees established across Massachusetts, and later in each of the thirteen colonies, to maintain colonial opposition to British policies through the exchange of letters and pamphlets.

Minutemen

Member of a militia during the American Revolution who could be ready to fight in sixty seconds.

The Association

Non-importation agreement crafted during the First Continental Congress calling for the complete boycott of British goods.

Declaratory Act

Passed alongside the repeal of the Stamp Act, it reaffirmed Parliament's unqualified sov- ereignty over the North American colonies.

George Grenville

Prime Minister George Grenville first aroused the resentment of the colonists in 1763 by ordering the British navy to begin strictly enforcing the Navigation Laws. He also secured from Parliament the so-called Sugar Act of 1764, the first law ever passed by that body for raising tax revenue in the colonies for the crown.

Circular Letter

Responding to the Townshend Acts, the Massachusetts Assembly circulated a letter to the other colonies, asking that they work together and jointly issue a petition of protest

Coercive Acts/Intolerable Acts

Restrictions were likewise placed on the precious town meetings. Contrary to previous practice, enforcing officials who killed colonists in the line of duty could now be sent to Britain for trial.

Boston Tea Party

Rowdy protest against the British East India Company's newly acquired monopoly on the tea trade. Colonists, disguised as Indians, dumped 342 chests of tea into Boston harbor, prompting harsh sanctions from the British Parliament.

Quartering Act

This measure required certain colonies to pro- vide food and quarters for British troops.

Boston Port Act

This was one of the Coercive Acts, which shut down Boston Harbor until Boston repaid the East India Company for the lost tea.

Non-importation Agreements

an agreement that pledged not to import or use goods imported from great britain

Andrew Oliver

commissioned to administer the unpopular Stamp Act in Massachusetts. On August 14, he was hanged in effigy from Boston's Liberty Tree in a protest organized by the Loyal Nine, a precursor to the Sons of Liberty. That night his house in Boston was ransacked by an angry crowd. On August 17, he was compelled to publicly resign his commission. On December 17, the Sons of Liberty again forced him to publicly swear that he would never act as stamp distributor

Massachusetts Government Act

many of the chartered rights of colonial Massachusetts were swept away. Restrictions were likewise placed on the precious town meetings. Contrary to previous practice, enforcing officials who killed colonists in the line of duty could now be sent to Britain for trial. ppl are no longer in charge, the king appointed officers and judges.

Salutary Neglect

the new monarchs relaxed the royal grip on colonial trade, inaugurating a period of "salutary neglect" when the much-resented Navigation Laws were only weakly enforced.

Stamp Act

to raise revenues to support the new military force. The Stamp Act mandated the use of stamped paper or the affixing of stamps, certifying payment of tax. Stamps were required on bills of sale for about fifty trade items as well as on certain types of commercial and legal documents, including playing cards, pamphlets, newspapers, diplomas, bills of lading, and marriage licenses.

Stamp Act Congress

which brought together in New York City twenty-seven distinguished delegates from nine colonics. After dignified debate the members drew up a statement of their rights and grievandes and beseech the king and Parliament to repeal the repugnant legislation. Against Stamp Act.