Causes and events leading to the American Revolution

1
Causes and events leading to the American
Revolution

• 1763-1775

2

• What is perspective?
• If two people look at the same thing but see it
  two different ways, how do we know which person
  is right and which one is wrong?

3

• When you first look at this, do you see an old
  man with ivy leaves around him, or do you see a
  couple kissing?

4

• A rabbit, looking right?
• Or a duck, looking left?
• Who is right and who is wrong?

5

• "The Colonies were acquired with no other view
  than to be a convenience to us, and therefore it
  can never be imagined that we are to consult
  their interest."
• Editorial
• The London Chronicle, 1764

6

• If our trade be taxed, why not our lands, or
  produce... in short, everything we possess? They
  tax us without having legal representation."
• Samuel Adams, 1765
• Founder of the Sons of Liberty

7

• There wasnt just one single event that caused
  the American Revolution. And there wasnt just
  one opinion on what the colonists should do. If
  there had been, then all colonists would have
  joined in the fight against the British. They
  didnt. Many remained loyal to the king
  (loyalists) and opposed a revolution.

8

• The following events are just some of the things
  that led many to believe that theirs was a cause
  worthy of risking their lives.

9

• After viewing, you decide. Would you have
  remained loyal to the King or would you have
  chosen to break away?
• Would you have risked your life for something you
  believed in?
• Many people died during the revolution. Was it a
  worthy cause?

10

• Make a timeline that looks like this.

11
When you see a slide with the British Flag,
record the date and event above the line.
1763 Treaty of Paris
12

• When you see a slide with a minute man, record
  the date and event below the timeline.
• 1763
• Treaty of Paris
• 1764
• Beginning of
• Colonial Opposition

13

• Try to look at each event from the perspective of
  both the British and the Colonists.

14

• By the way, you wont need to record something
  from every slide. Just the slides with either a
  British flag or a Minute man.

15
The Events
16
February 10,1763

• British and French sign the Treaty of Paris,
  ending The French and Indian War. The cost of the
  war left a huge national debt hanging over the
  government of Britain. 

17
Perspective

• The King felt that the colonists should bear the
  burden of the expense of maintaining the
  colonies.

18

• The Colonists felt they did enough already
  without adding additional taxes
• Colonies provided raw materials to England.
• They provided markets for goods produced in
  Britain (in other words, it gave England
  customers to sell to).
• All of this they did with little or no say
  in a government that passed laws without
  consulting them first.

19
1764

• Sugar Act. Parliament, desiring revenue from its
  North American colonies, passed the first law
  specifically aimed at raising colonial money for
  the Crown. The act increased duties (tax) on
  non-British goods shipped to the colonies. In
  other words, anything that was sold by the
  British, cost the colonists more money.

20

• Why would the cost of sugar affect the
  colonists? What did they need sugar for?
• Hint Middle Passage
• Answer To make and sell rum.
• If sugar (a necessary ingredient in making rum),
  cost them more it would cut into their profits.
  They would make less money on the rum.

21
1764

• Currency Act. This act prohibited American
  colonies from issuing their own currency,
  angering many American colonists.

22

• This meant that colonies must pay all taxes with
  gold or silver coins.
• The more taxes that were required, the more gold
  and silver went to England, making it more and
  more scarce in the colonies.
• Without currency of their own, forced to pay for
  everything with gold, silver, or bartering
  (trading one thing for another), it became
  increasingly difficult for colonists to buy the
  things they needed.

23
1764

• Beginnings of Colonial Opposition. American
  colonists responded to the Sugar Act and the
  Currency Act with protest. By the end of the
  year, many colonies were refusing to use imported
  English goods.

24
March 22,1765

• The Stamp Act was passed by Parliament

25

• The act levied a tax on all newspapers, legal
  documents, pamphlets, almanacs, playing cards and
  dice by requiring that they bear a stamp.  The
  money from the tax was to be used to pay for the
  defense of the colonies.

26

• This ignited a major cause of the American
  Revolution . With no representatives in
  parliament to plead their cause, the colonists
  grew increasingly angry at having no say in laws
  being passed that affected their lives. They
  protested against taxation without
  representation.

27
1765 The Stamp Act Congress

• Meeting in New York City, this group of
  colonists sent petitions to King George III and
  to Parliament, saying Parliament had no right to
  tax the colonies. Parliament and the king
  ignored the petitions.

28

• Becoming increasingly frustrated at not being
  heard, American opposition was intense. Merchants
  refused to buy British goods, stamp agents were
  threatened and official stamps were destroyed. 

29
Tarring and feathering

• After the enactment of the Stamp Act, it was
  common to threaten or attack British government
  employees in the colonies. One way was by tar and
  feathering.

30

• Applying the burning hot tar to bare skin usually
  caused painful blistering and efforts to remove
  it often made the condition worse. The adding of
  feathers which stuck to the tar added to the
  humiliation and made the victim a comical figure.
  

31

• Tar could easily be found in the shipyards and
  everyone had feathers in their pillows. With the
  materials at hand, tarring and feathering was a
  common threat and punishment. Though the tarring
  was not usually fatal, it was extremely
  unpleasant.

32

• By November 1, 1765, the day the Stamp Act tax
  went into effect, there were no stamp
  commissioners left in the colonies to collect it.

33
1765

• Quartering Act. The British further angered
  American colonists with the Quartering Act, which
  required the colonies to provide barracks and
  supplies to British troops.

34
1767

• Townshend Acts. To help pay the expenses involved
  in governing the American colonies, Parliament
  passed the Townshend Acts, which initiated taxes
  on glass, lead, paint, paper, and tea.

35
October 1, 1768

• British troops arrived in Boston to quell the
  growing unrest in the American colonies

36
March 5 1770

• Boston Massacre. The arrival of troops in Boston
  provoked conflict between citizens and soldiers.
  A group of soldiers surrounded by an unfriendly
  crowd opened fire, killing five Americans.

37
(No Transcript)
38
May 10 1773

• The Tea Act. Passed in Parliament to save the
  East Indian Company - a British company- from
  bankruptcy. No new tax was imposed but what this
  act did was take the tea from the East Indian
  Company and ship it directly to the colonies to
  be sold at a bargain price. Because the act did
  away with the tax on British tea but kept the tax
  on the colonists tea, the company was able to
  undersell the colonial merchants tea. The
  British company's unfair advantage led to the
  near destruction of the American tea merchants
  trade.

39
December 16 1773
Boston Tea party

• In protest over the Tea Act, members of the Sons
  of Liberty dressed as Indians boarded three
  British ships in Boston harbor and threw the
  valuable tea overboard.

40
May 13, 1774

• Thomas Gage
• (a British General) replaced the colonial
  Governor of Boston.

41
September 5 - October 25 1774

• Twelve colonies, all but Georgia, sent 56
  delegates to Philadelphia to participate in the
  First Continental Congress.  The purpose of the
  First Continental Congress was to debate and plan
  a unified response to British policy and
  actions.  It was the first time many of these
  influential men had met face to face. 

42
September 1774

• General Gage, the Governor of Boston, responded
  to increased threats of violence from the
  American colonists by fortifying Boston Neck, the
  thin spit of land connecting Boston to the
  mainland.  This move effectively cut the city of
  Boston off from the rest of Massachusetts,
  placing the city under siege.

43
October 1774

• General Gage dissolved the Massachusetts General
  Court in an attempt to lessen the power of the
  colonists and increase the power of the king in
  Massachusetts. 

44

• Members of the court reconvened as the
  Massachusetts Provincial Congress and voted to
  recruit 12,000 men for a militia (composed of
  American minutemen -- colonists prepared to fight
  the British on a minute's notice) and purchase
  5,000 muskets and bayonets.

45
March 25 1775

• Patrick Henry delivered his "give me liberty or
  give me death" speech to the Virginia Assembly in
  Richmond. 

46
March 30 - April 5 1770

• General Gage ordered his troops on a practice
  march around Boston.  The Massachusetts
  Provincial Congress at Concord viewed the British
  march as an act of open hostility. They issued
  formal grievances against the British government
  and adopted fifty-three articles of war against
  the British army. 

47
April 18 1775

• General Gage planned a secret night march on
  Concord to seize the colonists' store of weapons.

48

• Paul Revere immediately rode out over Boston Neck
  towards Lexington to warn John Hancock and Samuel
  Adams, fellow members of the Sons of Liberty. 
  After Revere reached Lexington, he went to
  Concord where he was caught and questioned by six
  British officers.  The officers left Revere
  horseless and stranded near Lexington. 

49
April 19 1775

• In Lexington, 130 minuteman met the British
  troops in attempt to stop the army from reaching
  Concord.  The American patriots were outnumbered
  and began to disperse.  However, a shot was fired
  and the British troops killed eight colonists and
  wounded ten. 

50

• And so began the American Revolution.

51

• After looking at some of the causes and
  events that led to the American Revolution, you
  must now decide if you would have joined the
  struggle for independence or if you would have
  remained loyal to the king.

52

• List reasons
• for independence against independence

53

• Your decision?
• Are you a patriot? Or a loyalist?

54
Your Task

• You are to convince fellow colonials to either
  remain loyal to the king or to fight for
  independence. Here are the different methods you
  may consider using

55

• A letter to the editor of your local colonial
  paper.
• Political cartoon
• Speech
• Commercial
• Broadside
• Song