Chapters 6-7: The Revolution

Question 1

Who was Lord Grenville?

Answer 1

The British Prime Minister from 1763-1765

Question 2

Why did Lord Grenville seek to tax the colonies to provide revenue?

Answer 2

To compensate Britain for the debt incurred defending North America during the French and Indian War and to pay part of the cost of maintaining forces in the colonies

Question 3

What did Lord Grenville do?

Answer 3

In 1763 he ordered the Navy to enforce the unpopular Navigation Laws and was responsible for the Sugar Act, Quartering Act, and Stamp Act.

Question 4

What and when was the Sugar Act?

Answer 4

1764
This law was intended to raise revenue and reduce smuggling. It raised duties on refined sugar, textiles, and other goods imported from places other than Britain or British colonies. But it reduced the duties on molasses imported from the French West Indies in an effort to reduce smuggling.

Question 5

How did the Sugar Act affect the colonies’ court system?

Answer 5

The law also discarded many traditional English protections for fair trials, giving judges a financial incentive to find violators guilty and presuming guilt, not innocence, on the part of the accused.

Question 6

What were the Writs of Assistance?

Answer 6

The writs of assistance were general search warrants, court orders authorizing British officials to search colonial homes, ships, and buildings for smuggled goods. Writs of assistance permitted a colonial official to search any place and seize any smuggled goods.

Question 7

What were Admiralty Courts?

What was the colonists’ response to them?

Answer 7

In an admiralty court, no jury (often sympathetic to the accused colonist) was allowed. Instead a judge (appointed by Britain) decided the case. The burden of proof was on the defendant, who was assumed guilty until proven innocent.
Colonists felt their rights as Englishmen were being violated by trial in admiralty courts.

Question 8

What were the traditional rights of englishmen in the 17th century?

Answer 8

A combination of English common law and statute law helped protect an individual against governmental tyranny and give that individual certain basic rights:

• life, liberty, or property could not be taken away arbitrarily,
• if he was arrested he was entitled to a statement of charges and a speedy trial by jury,
• government officials couldn’t search his home without a warrant.

Question 9

What and when was the Quartering Act?

Answer 9

1765
This act required colonists to provide food and shelter to British soldiers, who many colonists believed were only present to keep the colonists in line.

Question 10

What and when was the Stamp Act?

It was the first ____ ____.

Answer 10

1765
This required that revenue stamps be affixed to legal papers, licenses, newspapers, pamphlets, playing cards, and many other items.
Stamp taxes were common in Britain. Grenville thought it reasonable to ask colonists to pay for part of their own defense.
First internal tax

Question 11

What was the colonists’ response to the Stamp Act of 1765?

Answer 11

Colonists protested strongly. This was the first internal tax levied by Parliament. It hit all segments of society, but it particularly affected lawyers and newspaper publishers—two of the most articulate and influential groups in the colonies.

Question 12

What and when was the Stamp Act Congress?

Answer 12

1765–1766

This group met in New York City with twenty-seven delegates from nine colonies.

Question 13

What happened in the Stamp Act Congress?

Answer 13

The delegates affirmed that Parliament had no authority to levy taxes outside Britain and urged colonists to adopt non-importation agreements.
This was a step toward colonial unity.

Question 14

What were the non-importation agreements?

Answer 14

The non-importation agreements were promises to boycott British goods. Domestic products, such as homespun fabric replaced British imports.

Question 15

Which organizations supported the non-importation agreements by tarring and feathering and hanging stamp agents in effigy?

Answer 15

Sons of Liberty

Daughters of Liberty

Question 16

What were the results of the non-importation agreements?

Answer 16

The tax collecting operation broke down, and stamp taxes were never collected. The British economy was hurt by the boycott and thousands of Englishmen were thrown out of work, leading to British demands for the repeal of the Stamp Act.

Question 17

What and when was the Declaratory Act?

Answer 17

1766
This act was passed after the repeal of the Stamp Act. This measure proclaimed that Parliament had the right to bind the colonies in all cases whatsoever.
This was a feeble victory for Britain, however, since the colonists had already proven that the Parliament could be forced to yield to boycotts and mob action.

Question 18

What and when were the Townshend Acts?

Answer 18

1767
Charles Townshend, Chancellor of the Exchequer, proposed that Britain accept the colonial distinction between internal and external taxes. He convinced Parliament to levy taxes on imports of lead, paper, paint, and tea and to send special revenue officers to collect the duties. The revenues raised by this act would be used to pay the salaries of royal governors and judges in America.

Question 19

How did the colonists react to the Townshend Acts?

Answer 19

Colonists regarded the acts as another attempt to control them. Nonimportation agreements were implemented again. Sam Adams persuaded Massachusetts to send a Circular Letter to other colonies urging united opposition to British policies.

Question 20

Who wrote “Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania” and when was it popular?

Answer 20

1767-1768

John Dickinson

Question 21

What was the “Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania”?

Answer 21

John Dickinson responded to the Townshend Acts with a series of letters, widely read, that equated taxation without representation with slavery. Dickinson acknowledged that Parliament could regulate trade, but he argued that only the colonists could tax themselves for the purpose of raising revenue.
Dickinson was also persuasive in calling for united resistance by the colonies.

Question 22

What and when was the Boston Massacre?

Answer 22

The Boston Massacre—1770
British officials placed two regiments of troops in Boston in 1768 to combat the violence stirred up by customs officers. The colonials resented the presence of the troops and taunted them unmercifully.
On the evening of March 5, 1770, a crowd of 60 townspeople set upon a squad of ten soldiers, hit one with a club, and knocked down another. Acting without orders but under extreme provocation, the troops opened fire and killed or wounded eleven citizens. Only two of the soldiers were convicted. This further inflamed the colonials against the British.

Question 23

What and when was the “Gaspee” Incident?

What did it lead to?

Answer 23

1772
Merchants and ship owners continued to smuggle goods into the colonies to avoid import duties. When the Gaspee, an English customs ship, ran aground off Rhode Island, colonists boarded the ship and set it afire to show their displeasure.
The accused were sent to Britain for trial. Colonial outrage stimulated the development of the Committees of Correspondence.

Question 24

What were the Committees of Correspondence, and why were they significant?

Answer 24

In response to the Gaspee Incident, Sam Adams organized a committee in Boston to communicate with patriots in other towns and colonies. The concept spread rapidly; by the following year, there were eighty committees in Massachusetts alone.
The committees printed political pamphlets, organized resistance to the Crown, supported non-importation agreements, and, in Boston, helped organize the Boston Tea Party. The committees were important in helping to unify the colonies.

Question 25

Who was Samuel Adams?

Answer 25

Samuel Adams organized the local committees of correspondence in Massachusetts. A master propagandist and engineer of rebellion, he became known as the “penman of the Revolution.”

Question 26

What was the East India Tea Co.?

Answer 26

The East India Tea Company was about to go bankrupt and had 17 million pounds of unsold tea. The London government would lose a great deal in tax revenue if the company went bankrupt, so they granted the company a monopoly on the American market.

Question 27

What and when was the Tea Act?

How did the colonists react to it?

Answer 27

1773
The Tea Act reduced the tax on tea to aid the East India Tea Company. But this meant that colonial smugglers could no longer undercut the legal price, hurting their business. Also colonial merchants were upset by the precedent of granting British companies monopolies in colonial markets.

Question 28

When was the Boston Tea Party?
What happened?
What did it lead to?

Answer 28

Boston Tea Party—Dec. 1773
In protest against the Tea Act, a group of Bostonians boarded ships in Boston Harbor and dumped 342 crates of tea overboard.
This led to Britain’s response—the Intolerable or Coercive Acts.

Question 29

What and when were the Intolerable/Coercive Acts?

Answer 29

1774
These acts included the Boston Port Act, which shut down Boston Harbor until the tea was paid for; the Massachusetts Government Act, which revoked the Massachusetts charter and made the government less democratic; an expanded Quartering Act; and the Administration of Justice Act, which removed the power of colonial courts to try royal officers.

Question 30

When and when was the Quebec Act?

Answer 30

Quebec Act—1774
Though a separate act, this was generally grouped by colonists with the Intolerable Acts.
The Quebec Act alarmed the colonies because it recognized the Catholic Church in Quebec. Some colonials took it as a sign that Britain was planning to impose Catholicism upon the colonies.

Question 31

What and when was the The First Continental Congress?

Answer 31

September 1774
In response to the Intolerable Acts, delegates from twelve of the thirteen colonies met to consider ways of redressing colonial grievances. John Adams swayed his colleagues toward a revolutionary course, defeating the proposal for American home rule under British direction.
They drew up the Declaration of Rights and Grievances (argued against taxation without representation and against virtual representation) and appeals to British people (asking not for independence but for a change in British policy). They also created the Association.

Question 32

What was the Association?

How successful was it?

Answer 32

Created by the First Continental Congress, it enforced the non-importation and non-consumption of British goods and non-exportation of American goods to Britain by empowering local Committees of Vigilance in each colony. Violators were to be punished by publicity or boycott. This was meant to pressure Britain to repeal the Coercive Acts.
Though the Association managed to cut British imports by 97% in 1775, the British, determined not to repeal the Coercive Acts, did not give in.

Question 33

What and when were Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts?

Answer 33

April 1775
General Gage, stationed in Boston, was ordered to arrest Samuel Adams and John Hancock. The British marched on Lexington, where they believed Adams and Hancock were hiding. The colonial militias attempted to block the progress of the troops and were fired on by the British at Lexington. The British continued to Concord, where they believed the colonials had a cache of weapon; they were attacked by the colonial militia. As the British retreated to Boston, the colonials continued to shoot at them from behind cover on the sides of the road. This was the first battle of the Revolutionary War.

Question 34

What was the significance of Fort Ticonderoga?

Answer 34

May 1775
A small force of American soldiers under the leadership of Ethan Allen and Benedict Arnold surprised and captured the British garrisons at Ticonderoga and Crown Point. A valuable supply of powder and artillery was secured for the siege of Boston.

Question 35

What and when was the Battle of Breed’s Hill?

What was the British result?

Answer 35

June 1775
British forces launched a frontal attack against American forces on Breed’s (not Bunker) Hill and suffered over 1100 casualties to 300 for the colonials. The British won when a lack of gunpowder forced colonists to retreat.
In response, many Britons demanded retaliation. The King declared New England in a state of rebellion. In December Parliament extended this to all colonies.

Question 36

What and when was the Second Continental Congress?

Answer 36

The First Continental Congress had called for a second congress to meet if King George did not agree to their demands. So in 1775, the Second Continental Congress convened.
Initially many delegates opposed independence and supported John Dickinson’s Olive Branch Petition.
Prodded in part by Paine’s Common Sense, the Congress drafted and signed the Declaration of Independence, which justified the Revolutionary War and declared that the colonies should be independent of Britain.
The other accomplishments of this Second Continental Congress were the appointment of George Washington as commander of the Continental Army, the writing of the Articles of Confederation, and the direction of the war against Britain.

Question 37

What and when was the Olive Branch Petition?

Answer 37

July 1775
On July 8, 1775, the colonies made a final offer of peace to King George, agreeing to be loyal to him if the British government addressed their grievances (repeal the Coercive Acts, end taxation without representation). This appeal, arriving in London at the same time as news of Breed’s Hill, was rejected.

Question 38

What was the significance of the appointment of Washington?

Answer 38

There were some misgivings regarding this appointment; Washington had never risen above the rank of colonel in the army and had never commanded more than twelve hundred men. However, he was gifted with outstanding powers of leadership and possessed an immense strength of character. He acted as a symbol and a rallying point for the colonists.

Question 39

Explain the significance of Thomas Paine’s “Common Sense.”

Answer 39

Published in 1776, Common Sense was one of the most influential pamphlets ever written. It stated that America should set herself up as an independent, democratic republic. Paine helped to convince thousands of Americans that independence was necessary. Also Paine reminded the Americans that the French would never help them if they still swore allegiance to the British Crown.

Question 40

When was the Declaration of Independence signed?

Who drafted it?

Answer 40

July 1776
It was drafted by Thomas Jefferson. The Continental Congress accepted most of Jefferson’s draft but cut several sections including one in which Jefferson denounced the slave trade.

Question 41

What did the Declaration of Independence argue and declare?

Answer 41

It argued that all people have natural rights, a doctrine expounded earlier by the British philosopher John Locke. By this, Jefferson meant that people, by their mere existence, have rights that no government can justly take from them. People have the right to rebel against any government that tries to do so.
It blamed King George for the problems leading to the Revolution.
It declared, finally, the independence of the United States.

Question 42

Who were the Hessians, and what was their significance?

Answer 42

King George hired 30,000 German mercenaries, known as Hessians. The British army doubled in size during the Revolutionary War.
The British decision to hire foreign mercenaries was an emotional shock to the colonists, further widening the gap between the US and Britain.

Question 43

Who was George Rogers Clark and what did he do?

Answer 43

Clark conceived the idea of seizing by surprise the scattered forts the British captured from the French in the wild Illinois country. He floated down the Ohio River with 175 men and successfully captured in quick succession three forts.
This helped to persuade the British eventually to give the region north of the Ohio River to the United States.

Question 44

Who was Lafayette and what did he do?

Answer 44

The young (nineteen) French general donated $200,000 and his efforts, and helped the US secure further aid from France.

Question 45

What and when was the Battle of Saratoga?
Explain the military and diplomatic significance.
What did the British offer the colonies after the battle?

Answer 45

Oct. 1777
Militarily, this battle was significant in that it halted a British attempt to split New England from the rest of the colonies, and it resulted in the surrender of Gen. Burgoyne’s army to the Americans.
Diplomatically, Saratoga was even more important since it convinced the French that the US could win the war and deserved diplomatic recognition. The next year the French declared war on England, as did Spain and Holland in 1779.
The British responded to Saratoga by offering the colonies home rule within the British Empire—essentially what most colonists had wanted all along.

Question 46

Name two leading patriot women and explain their significance.

Answer 46

Mercy Otis Warren—Warren was college educated, very unusual for women at the time. After her brother James Otis was beaten for his Patriot activities, Warren began writing and publishing Patriot propaganda in letters to newspapers, political pamphlets, and satirical plays (the first plays written by an American woman). After the Revolution Warren took an Anti-Federalist stance and opposed ratification of the Constitution since it lacked a bill of rights.

Abigail Adams—Adams was the wife and confidant of John Adams. When John was a delegate to the Second Continental Congress that was debating the Declaration of Independence, Abigail urged him to include the principle of legal equality for women, writing, “I desire you would Remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favourable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the Husbands. Remember all Men would be tyrants if they could.”

Question 47

Who were Loyalists (Tories)?

Answer 47

These were Americans who remained loyal to the King.
They comprised a quarter to a third of the population.
They were generally people of education and wealth who were satisfied with their lot and who believed violent change would be only for the worse. Loyalists were often older people, royal officers, Anglican clergymen and Anglican church members.

Question 48

What and when was the Pennsylvania Gradual Emancipation Law?

Answer 48

1780
As Americans fought for independence, some began to take seriously the claim of liberty for all, including slaves. Pennsylvania was the first state to take action. No new slaves could be brought into the state, and children born to slaves were freed when they turned 28. But slavery was ended only gradually. Anyone a slave when the law passed was a slave for life, and Pennsylvania still had 400 slaves in 1830.
Free blacks were aided immediately by the law which ended the ban on interracial marriage and allowed them to testify in court. Free blacks were, however, barred from voting and serving in the militia.

Question 49

Who was Benedict Arnold?

Answer 49

An American general who fought well for the US early in the war, he tried to help the British take West Point, a key to the Hudson River, but he was found out and declared a traitor.

Question 50

What and when was the Battle of Yorktown?

Answer 50

Oct. 1781
British General Cornwallis had fallen back to Yorktown to await sea-borne supplies and replacements. However, American General Washington attacked by land while French Admiral De Grasse blocked the British escape by sea. Together they forced General Cornwallis to surrender his entire force of 7000 men.
This did not end the war, but it did force the British to begin serious peace negotiations with the Americans.

Question 51

When was the Treaty of Paris?

Answer 51

1783

Question 52

What did the Treaty of Paris do?

Answer 52

This treaty ended the Revolutionary War, recognized the independence of the American colonies, and granted the colonies the territory from the southern border of Canada to the northern border of Florida, and from the Atlantic coast to the Mississippi River. It also allowed Americans to retain fishing rights on the Grand Banks off Newfoundland, at that time one of the world’s richest fisheries.
American negotiators Ben Franklin, John Adams, and John Jay ignored their instructions to negotiate alongside their French allies. Instead, they struck a separate deal with the British, one that was probably more favorable to the US than a French-controlled treaty would have been. Britain was happy to give the US liberal terms, hoping to split the new nation from its French ally.

Question 53

Explain the impact of the Revolution on American society, economics, and politics.

Answer 53

Social: Increased social equality, increased separation of church and state, encouraged gradual elimination of slavery in Northern states, elevated the status of women through the ideal of republican motherhood.
Economic: An end to primogeniture (limited land inheritance to the first-born son) and entail (prohibited division of an estate upon inheritance), abolition of imprisonment for debt
Political: New constitutions for the states, most containing a bill of rights, along with reductions of property qualifications for voting and holding office

Question 54

What were the Articles of Confederation and when were they adopted?

Answer 54

The Articles of Confederation were the framework of the new government adopted in 1781; it created a loose league of thirteen sovereign states. This new government was extremely weak and had difficulty maintaining order, commanding respect from foreign governments, or improving economic conditions.
However, the US government under the Articles did manage to successfully prosecute the war and conclude a favorable peace.