Issues Of Taxation: Townshend Duties And Others

Question 1

Townsend duties.
When ?
Who and why ?
Duties on what ?
What is created ?

Answer 1

When- May 1766 and repealed in 1770
- William Pitt as PM needed a solution to the £400k cost of stationing an army in America and with the help of his COE Charles Townshend they introduced a series of duties on:
- glass, wine, China, lead, paint, paper and tea
- these were external taxes on imports of these goods
- created new admiralty courts to try Americans who ignored the duties

Question 2

Was resistance to the acts fast and why was this ?

Answer 2

No it was developed much slower than in 1765 as not all Americans were sure wether they violated colonial rights
Merchants enjoys a period of economic boom and did not want a trade war
However resentment was soon widespread

Question 3

How did colonists respond to the townshend duties intellectually and politically ?
- Slogan and key figure
- gatherings

Answer 3

Intellectually
- ‘no taxation without representation’ slogan continued (originally spoken by James Otis)
- John Dickinson’s influential letters of a Pennsylvanian farmer printed in newspapers: argued parliament could regulate colonial trade it couldn’t internally or externally tax without consent
- many feared patronage power would corrupt the majority in assemblies

Political
- 1768 Massachusetts assembly circular letter denouncing the Townsend duties- work of Samuel Adam’s and James Otis
- Virginia house of Burgesses issued a circular latter suggesting taking action against the attempted inslavement
- sons of liberty movement was revived

Question 4

Whag was the economic response to the Townsend duties?

Answer 4

• 1768 Boston organised a new economic boycott against Britain but many merchants didn’t support it
• by 1769 all colonies bar New Hampshire organised a boycott of British goods and in some places committees were established to enforce it with those who broke it being tarred an feathered

Question 5

What was the violent resistance to the Townsend duties?

Answer 5

• outrage helped to spark the livery seizure and riots in 1767
• June 1768 the liberty merchant ship belonging to John Hancock was arrested on suspicion of smuggling which led to protest causing customs of officials to report Boston as being in a state of inessurectikn
• lead to the Boston Massacre March 5 1770 with 5 killed which was used by Samuel Adam’s to site up popular resistance

Question 6

When were the Townsend duties repealed ?

Answer 6

1770
- third wave of protest came because government left one tax in place as a symbolic gesture of their right to tax tea
- protests up and down the colonies
-June 1772 Briths warship burned by American Partiors
- Late 1772 committees of Correspondence linking up patriots in all 13 colonies

Question 7

When and what were the Qautering Act and the New York Restraint Act ?

Answer 7

1765 and 1767
- forced colonial legislatures to raise revenue to pay for quartering and supply for British soldiers stationed in America
- it was considered an indirect tax and aroused deep hostility no more so than New York where there were huge numbers of soldiers

Question 8

How did the colonists ready to the Quartering Act and New York restraining act ?

Answer 8

• when NY refused to supply Brit army parliament acted with the NY suspending act which threatened to repeal all laws passed by the colony after October 1767- it was felt government overstepped the mark
• served to raise tensions as it questions the constitutional standing of the colonial assemblies