The Road To Revolution

1
The Road To Revolution

• Part One America in the Mid-1700s

2
Social Ranks

• Land ownership determines wealth social
  position.
• Most colonists are middle-class, meaning that
  they own some land.
• Servants and non-landowners are the lowest class.
• Women take care of their homes. Some run inns and
  shops.

3
Literacy

• In New England, 85 percent of white men could
  read.
• In the Middle Colonies, 65 percent of white men
  could read.
• In the Southern Colonies, 50 percent of white men
  could read.
• In all regions, about half as many white women as
  men were literate.
• It was illegal to teach slaves to read.
• Free African Americans were rarely taught to
  read.

4
The Great Awakening

• By the 1700s, many colonists had lost the
  religions passion that brought their ancestors to
  the New World.
• In the 1730s and 1740s, a movement called The
  Great Awakening swept through the colonies.
• It preached that emotion about religion was more
  important than acting on faith.
• It encouraged ideas of equality and the right to
  challenge authority.
• This inspired the colonists to fight so hard for
  independence.

5
The Enlightenment

• In Europe, scientists discovered natural laws,
  like gravity, that govern the universe.
• Writers applied the idea of natural law to human
  nature and government.
• John Locke argued that people have natural rights.

6
Enlightenment Ideas

• Rights include life, liberty and property.
• Governments are created to protect those rights.
• If government fails in this, the people have the
  right to change it.
• People all over Europe began to wonder if their
  governments protected their rights and freedoms.

7

• The History of British Government

8
The Magna Carta

• The Magna Carta, signed in 1215, was a written
  document that limited the rights of the king.
• People could not have their property seized by
  the king,
• People could not be taxed unless a council of
  important men agreed.
• People could not be put on trial without
  witnesses.
• People could only be sentenced by a jury of their
  peers, of their own social rank.

9
Parliament

• A two-part group that is Englands law-making
  body.
• Members of the House of Commons are elected by
  the people.
• Members of the House of Lords are unelected
  nobles, judges and church officials.

10
Colonial Assemblies

• Parliament was too far from the colonies to make
  all the necessary decisions.
• People in the colonies elected people to their
  own legislative, or law-making bodies, called
  colonial assemblies.
• The King appointed Royal Governors to rule each
  colony for him.
• The colonies had no representatives in
  Parliament.

11
The Glorious Revolution

• King James II did not respect the powers of
  Parliament.
• He was kicked off the throne, and King William
  III and Mary II succeeded him. This was known as
  The Glorious Revolution.
• William and Mary signed the English Bill of
  Rights

12
English Bill of Rights

• An agreement to respect the rights of English
  citizens and Parliament.
• Could not cancel laws or impose taxes without
  Parliaments approval.
• Parliament must have frequent meetings and
  elections.
• Excessive fines and cruel punishments were
  forbidden.
• People could complain about the King and Queen
  without being arrested.

13
How did the colonists feel?

• American colonists thought of themselves as
  British citizens.
• They felt they had the same rights as all
  Englishmen under the Bill of Rights.
• England did not control the colonies very
  strictly for most of the 1700s.
• This hands-off policy of not enforcing laws is
  called salutary neglect.

14
French and Indian War

• From 1754 to 1763, France and England fought for
  control of the land west of the colonies.
• General George Washington helped the British win.
• To avoid angering the Native Americans more,
  England passed the Proclamation of 1763, which
  closed the land west of the Appalachian Mountains
  to settlers.
• Colonists who helped fight the war and those who
  lived on the land felt they had been cheated.