
Changes in British policies in North America caused
dissatisfaction among the colonists.

Hostilities break out between Patriot and British
forces.

The American Colonies fight the British government
for their independence.

The Declaration of Independence and Constitution are
conceived and written.

Chapter 5, Road to Independence, focuses on
events leading up to the American Revolution.

Chapter 6, The American Revolution,
describes the battles and strategies of the war.

Chapter 7, A More Perfect Union, examines the
steps Americans took after the war to build a
new nation.

Vocabulary
 Abigail Adams
 William Howe
 Stamp Act
 William Prescott
 Introduction

Who was George Grenville and what actions did he take against
the colonies?

If a British customs officer wanted to search a colonist’s house,
what did he have to do?

Who wanted the House of Burgesses to take action against the
Stamp Act?

What was the……..




Sugar Act
Stamp Act
Townshend Act
Declaratory Act

How was the Boston Massacre used by the colonies?

What was the “shot heard ‘round the world”?

Which colonist group thought the British taxes were
fair?

Which colonist group wanted to fight for
independence?

Who recommended that Washington be commander of
the Continental army?

What was the significance of the Boston
Tea Party?

How did the Second Continental Congress
govern the colonies?

Section Overview
This section describes how British
laws caused discontent among the
colonists.
Huron and Ottawa warriors silently peered from the
woods. They watched about 100 British soldiers
camped on Lake Erie’s shore. The soldiers – sent by
the British Crown – had just stopped to rest on their
way to Fort Detroit. They were worried about rumors
of Native Americans planning war.
Suddenly the warriors rushed from the forest. The
British managed to escape in two boats. War raged on
the frontier – and the British were in the thick of it!

After winning the French and Indian War, Great Britain controlled a vast
territory in North American.

To limit settlement, Britain had issued the Proclamation of 1763 which
prohibited colonists from moving west of the Appalachian Mountains.

Stopping western settlement allowed the British government to control
western expansion. They hoped to have an orderly expansion and avoid
conflicts with Native Americans. They also wanted the colonist to stay near
the coasts so that they could control the lucrative fur trade.

In order to do all these things the British planned to keep 10,000 troops in
America. This plan alarmed the colonies because they felt the large number
of troops might interfere with their liberties.

Financial problems in Great Britain were complicating matters. The French
and Indian War and left Britain with a huge debt. To increase revenue, the
king and Parliament felt it was only fair that the American Colonies help pay
part of the costs.

In 1763 George Grenville became prime minister of Britain. The Prime
Minister is the head of the civilian government in Great Britain.

Grenville was determined to reduce Britain’s debt. He led the push to
increase taxes on the colonies. When people in the colonies began to
smuggling goods to avoid paying the taxes, Grenville led the effort to punish
the smugglers.

In 1767, Parliament authorized the writs of assistance. These legal
documents allowed customs officers to enter any location to search for
smuggled goods.

With laws in place to stop smuggling, Grenville now tried to increase revenue.
In 1764 Parliament passed the Sugar Act. This act lowered the tax on
molasses imported by the colonists. He hoped people would pay the lower
tax rather than smuggle. The act also allowed officers to seize goods from
smugglers without going to court.

The Sugar Act and other new laws to control smuggled angered the colonists.
They felt that their rights as English Citizens were being violated.

In traditional English courts, the accused was “innocent until proved guilty.
The smuggling acts went against that principle.

James Otis, a young lawyer in Boston, argued that, “No parts of the colonies
can be taxed without their consent. Every part has a right to be represented.”

In 1765 Parliament passed another law in an effort to raise money. This law
placed a tax on almost all printed material in the colonies – everything from
newspapers and pamphlets to wills and playing cards. What was this Act
called?
 Stamp Act – All printed material had to have a stamp, which was applied by
British officials.

The citizens in the colonies were outraged for two main reasons.
 Parliament had interfered with colonial affairs by taxing the colonies directly
 The tax was imposed on the colonies without their consent.

In response a young member of the Virginia House of Burgesses, Patrick
Henry, was able to get the Virginia House to pass a resolution that declared
that it had “the only and sole exclusive right and power to lay taxes” on its
citizens.

In Boston, Samuel Adams helped start an organization called the Sons of
Liberty. This group took to the streets and protested the Stamp Act.

In October delegates from nine colonies went to New York to the Stamp Act
Congress. This congress petitioned the king and Parliament to repeal the
Stamp Act.

In the colonies, people refused to use the British stamps. They also urged all
citizens to boycott (refuse to buy) British and European goods.

These boycotts caused many merchants in Britain to lose money because the
Colonies would not buy goods from them. Soon even British merchants were
begging Parliament to repeal, or cancel, the Stamp Act.

In March 1766, Parliament gave in to the demands of the Colonies and
repealed the Stamp Act.

The colonies celebrated the end of the Stamp Act, but, on the same day
Parliament passes the Declaratory Act.

The Declaratory Act of 1766 stated that Parliament had the right to tax and
make decisions for the British colonies, “in all cases.” The colonies had won
the battle over the Stamp Act but the war over who could make decisions for
the colonies had just begun.

Soon after the Stamp Act was repealed, Parliament passed a set of laws that
became known as the Townshend Acts.

The new taxes applied only to imported goods. However, the taxes applied
to many basic items – such as glass, tea, paper, and lead. These were things
that the colonies had to import because they did not produce them
themselves.

By this time the colonies were outraged by any taxes.
They felt that they were the only ones that had the
right to levy taxes through their own representatives.

The colonies responded to the new taxes by once again
boycotting the imported goods. Many people began to
make their own goods. The Daughters of Liberty
were a group of women who urged Americans to only
wear homemade fabrics and clothes.

The people believed that they would help the American
colonies become economically independent.

Section Overview
This section describes what
happened at the Boston Massacre
and the Boston Tea Party.
In the spring of 1768, British customs officials in Boston
seized the Liberty, a ship belonging to John Hancock, a
merchant and protest leader. The ship had docked in
Boston Harbor to unload a shipment of wine and take
on new supplies. The customs officials, however,
charged that Hancock was using the ship for
smuggling. As news of the ship’s seizure spread
through Boston, angry townspeople filled the streets.
They shouted against Parliament and the taxes it had
imposed on them. The Liberty affair became one of the
events that united the colonists against British policies.

Incidents like the Liberty affair made customs officials in the
colonies worried. They sent word back to England that the
colonies were on the brink of rebellion.

Parliament responded by sending two regiments of troops to
Boston. The “Redcoats” set up camp in the middle of town.
Many of the Redcoats were soldiers from poor families and they
earned little in pay. They were taunted by boys in the streets.
Tensions grew between the soldiers and the townspeople.

On March 5, 1770, the tension reached a peak. A fight broke out
between some of the soldiers and townspeople. Angry
townspeople picked up any weapon they could find – sticks,
stones, shovels, and clubs.

As the mob approached the soldiers began throwing stones and
shouting, “Fire, you bloodybacks, you lobsters.” “You dare not
Fire!”

When one of the soldiers was knocked down by a throne brick,
the soldiers did open fire on the mob. Several shots were fired
and five colonists were killed. This encounter became know as
what?
 The Boston Massacre

Colonial leaders used news of the killings as propaganda. What
is propaganda?
 Information designed to influence opinion.

In response to the Boston Massacre and aware of the growing opposition to
its policies, Parliament repealed all of the Townshend Acts taxes except the
one on tea.

The colonists ended boycotts, except on taxed tea, and started to trade again
with British merchants.

Some colonial leaders continued to call for resistance to British rule. In 1772
Samuel Adams used the committee of correspondence, and organization
used in earlier protests, to circulate writings about colonists’ grievances
against Britain.

In 1773, the British East India Company faced ruin over the boycotts. To save
the company, Parliament passed the Tea Act of 1773. The Tea Act gave the
company the right to bypass colonial merchants and sell their tea directly to
shopkeepers at a cheaper price. This gave the company an advantage over
colonial companies.

Colonial merchants called for a new boycott of English goods.
They argued that the Tea Act was just another attempt to crush
liberty in the colonies.

Parliament ignored the warnings that another crisis was
brewing. They shipped tea to Philadelphia, New York, Boston,
and Charles Town.

The colonists forced the ships sent to New York and
Philadelphia to turn back. The tea sent to Charles Town was
seized and stored in a warehouse.

In Boston a showdown began. Three teas ships arrived in
Boston Harbor in late 1773. When royal governor ordered that
the tea be unloaded, Samuel Adams and the Boston Sons of
Liberty acted.

On December 16, a group of men disguised as Mohawks and armed with
hatchets, forced their way onto the ships and dumped the tea into the harbor.
This became known as what?
 The Boston Tea Party

While people in the Colonies celebrated when they heard what had been
done, the reaction in London was quite different. King George III realized
that Britain was losing control of the colonies. He declared, “We must master
them or totally leave them alone.”

Parliament decided to punish Boston. In the spring of 1774 they passed the
Coercive Acts. These acts closed Boston Harbor until the Massachusetts
colonists paid for the ruined tea. This prevented the arrival of food and other
supplies that came by ship. They also banned all town meetings.

One of the acts most hated by the people of Boston was their
being forced to shelter British soldiers in their homes. The part
of the Coercive Acts violated the colonists basic rights as
English citizens. No quartering of troops in private homes and
no standing army in peacetime without their consent.

Shortly after, Parliament passed the Quebec Act which set up
a government in Quebec and gave land west of the
Appalachians and north of the Ohio River to Quebec.

The American Colonies called these new laws by another
name. They were called the…..
 Intolerable Acts

Section Overview
This section examines what
happened at the Continental
Congress and how the colonies
prepared for war.
At first few colonists wanted a complete break with Britain. One of the most
popular songs of the time, “The Bold Americans,” called for both liberty and
continued loyalty to the British king:
We’ll honor George, our sovereign, while he sits on the throne.
If he grants us liberty, no other king we’ll own.
If he will grant us liberty, so plainly shall you see,
We are the boys that fear no noise! Success to liberty.
As tensions mounted, however, a peaceful compromise was no longer possible.

The colonial leaders realized that it would take more than
boycotts to gain liberty. They would need all of the colonies to
work together.

In September 1775, delegates from all the colonies, except
Georgia, met in Philadelphia to discuss American interests and
challenge British control. The called their new organization the
Continental Congress.

Among the participants were Bostonian Samuel Adams and his
younger cousin John Adams. John Jay from New York. From
Virginia came Richard Henry Lee, Patrick Henry, and George
Washington.

The delegates were not united in their views, but realized they
needed to work together. They first drafted a statement of
grievances that called for the British government to repeal the
13 acts that had been passed since 1763.

They felt that these acts violated their rights as British citizens.

They also backed the formation of militias so that the people in
the colonies could protect themselves.

Militias in Massachusetts held frequent training sessions, made
bullets, and stockpiled rifles and muskets. These militias were
commonly called minutemen.

The British responded by declaring that the colonies were “in a
state of rebellion”. By April 1775, British general Sir Thomas
Gage had several thousand soldiers under his command in and
around Boston.

Gage’s orders were to take away the weapons of the
Massachusetts militia and arrest the leaders. He learned that
there was a large number of rifles and ammunition stored at
Concord. He ordered 700 troops to march to Concord.

On the night of April 18, 1775, someone noticed the British
troops were marching toward Concord. Paul Revere and
William Dawes were sent to ride to Lexington to warn Samuel
Adams and John Hancock that the British were coming to arrest
them.

At dawn the redcoats approached Lexington, where they were
met by 70 minutemen near the middle of the town. Shots were
exchanged and 8 minutemen were killed.

The British continued their march to Concord. Once they
arrived there they discovered that most of the gunpowder had
been moved. They destroyed the remaining supplies.

On Concord’s North Bridge, the minutemen were waiting for
them. Many men had positioned themselves along the road
behind rocks and trees. As the British marched by on the road
to Boston, the minutemen opened fire. By the time the British
reached Boston, at least 174 were wounded and 73 dead.

Afterward, the poet Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote in “The
Concord Hymn”, that the Americans at Lexington and Concord
had fired the “shot heard ‘round the world.”

Shortly after the battle, Benedict Arnold was authorized to
raise a force of 400 men to seize the Fort Ticonderoga. Arnold
learned that Ethan Allen, was also leading a force from
Vermont called the Green Mountain Boys.

They joined forces and together captured Fort Ticonderoga.

After these battles, the call went out around the colonies for
volunteers to join the militias. Soon the militia around Boston
numbered more that 20,000.

On June 16, 1775, about 1,200 militiamen under the command
of Colonel William Prescott set up fortifications at Bunker Hill
and Breed’s Hill across the harbor from Boston.

The British decided to drive the Americans from these
locations. The British charged up the hills and eventually
captured them but suffered heavy losses. More than 1,000
dead and wounded.

As American colonists learned about these battles, they faced
a major decision. Should they join the rebels or remain loyal to
Britain? Those who chose to stay with Britain were called
Loyalists. The Patriots, were determined to fight the British
until American Independence had been won.

Section Overview
This section examines why the
Declaration of Independence was
written.

On May 10, 1775, the Second Continental Congress assembled
for the first time. The delegates included some of the greatest
political leaders in America. Several were individuals that had
been at the First Continental Congress. Among new attendees
were Benjamin Franklin, John Hancock, and Thomas Jefferson.

The Second Continental Congress began to govern the
colonies. It authorized the printing of money and set up a post
office with Franklin in charge.

Most importantly, the Congress created the Continental Army
to fight against Britain. On John Adam’s recommendation, the
Congress chose George Washington to be the army’s
commander.

After Washington left to take charge of the colonial forces in
Boston, the delegates offered Britain one last chance to avoid
all-out war. In July the Congress sent the Olive Branch
Petition to King George III. In it they asked the King to protect
the rights of the colonists.

King George III refused to receive the petition and instead he
prepared for war by hiring 30,000 German troops to send to
America to fight beside British troops.

Meanwhile the Congress learned that the British troops
planned to attack from what is now Canada. The Americans
decided to strike first and marched north from Fort
Ticonderoga and captured Montreal.

Washington reached Boston in July 1775. He found that the
militia was growing in numbers but was very disorganized. Be
began the job of shaping them into an army.

By March 1776, Washington felt his army was ready to fight.
He ordered is army to form a semicircle around Boston and
take over the hills surrounding the city. With the use of
cannon, taken form the capture of Fort Ticonderoga, he was
able to drive the British from the city.

Throughout the colonies in late 1775 and early 1776, some
Americans still hoped to avoid a complete break from England.
Support for independence was growing, however. In January
1776, Thomas Pain published his pamphlet called Common
Sense. In it he called for complete independence.

At the Second Continental Congress the meeting hall was filled
with spirited debate over the issue of whether the colonies
should declare themselves and independent nation.

On June 7 Virginia’s Richard Henry Lee proposed a bold
resolution: “That these United Colonies are, and of right
ought to be, free and independent States…. and that all
political connection between them and the State of Great
Britain is , and ought to be, totally dissolved.”

While the delegates debated the resolution, the Congress
chose a committee to draft a Declaration of Independence.
Thomas Jefferson was chosen to write the document.

Jefferson drew on the ideas of thinkers such as English
philosopher John Locke to set out the colonies’ reasons for
proclaiming their freedom.

Locke had written…
 that people were born with certain natural rights to life,
liberty, and property;
 that people formed governments to protect these rights;
 and that a government interfering with these rights might
rightfully be overthrown.

On July 2, 1776, the Congress finally voted on Lee’s resolution
for independence. Twelve colonies voted for it. New York did
not vote but later announced its support.

The Congress next took up Jefferson’s draft of the Declaration
of Independence. After some changes, they approved the
document on July 4, 1776.

John Hancock, the president of the Congress, was the first to
sign. He did so in a bold signature so that King George III would
be able to read it without glasses. 56 delegates signed the
original document. Copies were sent out to the newly declared
states.

Section Overview
At the signing of the Declaration of
Independence, Benjamin Franklin remarked
to John Hancock,
“We must indeed all hang together, or,
most assuredly, we shall all hang
separately.”

The Declaration has four major sections. The
preamble, or introduction, states that people who
wish to form a new country should explain their
reasons for doing so.

The next two sections list the rights the colonists
believed they should have and their complaints
against Britain.

The final section proclaims the existence of the new
nation.

The Declaration of Independence states what Jefferson and
many Americans thought were universal principles.
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men
are created equal, that they are endowed by their
Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among
these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”

The Declaration states that government exists to protect these
rights. If it does not, I goes on to state that….
“it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it and
to institute new Government.”

The Declaration goes on to list the many grievances
Americans held against the king and Parliament. The
crimes of King George III included….
 “cutting off our trade with all parts of the world”
 “imposing taxes on us without our consent.”

The Declaration says that Americans had “Petitioned
for Redress” of these grievances. These petitions,
however, were ignored or rejected by Britain.

The Declaration ends by announcing America’s new status.
Now pledging…
“to each other our Lives, our Fortunes,
and our sacred Honor”
French and Indian War
leaves Great Britain in
debt
Britain taxes the
colonies; Parliament
passes Sugar Act and
Stamp Act
Colonists boycott British
goods
British send troops to
Boston, resulting in the
Boston Massacre
First Continental
Congress drafts a
statement of grievances
Parliament passes the
Coercive Acts
Colonists respond with
Boston Tea Party
British repeal import
taxes
British troops fight
colonists at battles of
Lexington and Concord;
British defeat colonial
forces at Bunker Hill
Congress signs
Declaration of
Independence
Revolution begins
Test Review
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