1. The American Revolution
Unit 3: The American Revolution

2. The Crisis begins

3. Consolidating the Empire
During the Seven Years’ War, Britain treated the colonies as their ally.
After the Seven Years’ War, London insisted that the colonists play a subordinate role to the mother country and help pay for the protection the British provided.
In Britain, the theory of “virtual representation” held that each member of the British Parliament represented the entire empire.
The colonists argued London could not tax them because they were underrepresented in Parliament.

4. Taxing the colonies
The Sugar Act of 1764 reduced the existing tax on molasses, but also established machinery to end widespread smuggling by colonial merchants.
The Stamp Act of 1765 was a direct tax on all sorts of printed materials.
The act was wide-reaching and offended virtually every free colonist.
Opposition to the Stamp Act was the first great drama of the Revolutionary era and the first major split between the colonists and Great Britain over the meaning of freedom.

5. Taxation and Representations
American leaders viewed the British empire as an association of equals in which free settlers overseas enjoyed the same rights as Britons at home.
The Stamp Act Congress met in 1765 to endorse the resolutions of Virginia’s House of Burgesses.
Patrick Henry

6. Liberty and Resistance
No word was more frequently invoked by critics of the Stamp Act than “liberty.”
Liberty Tree
A Committee of Correspondence was created in Boston and other colonies to exchange ideas about resistance.
The Sons of Liberty were organized to resist the Stamp Act and to enforce a boycott of British goods.
London repealed the Stamp Act, but issued the Declaratory Act.

7. The Road to Revolution

8. The Townshend Crisis
The 1767 Townshend Act imposed taxes on imported goods.
By 1768, colonies were again boycotting British goods.
Rather than rely on British goods, colonists relied on homespun clothing; use of American goods came to be seen as a symbol of American resistance.
Urban artisans strongly supported the boycott.

9. The Boston Massacre
The March 1770 conflict between Bostonians and British troops left five Bostonians dead, including a mixed-race sailor named Crispus Attucks.
The boycott ended after the Townshend duties were repealed, leaving only a tax on tea.

10. Wilkes and Liberty
The treatment of John Wilkes and the rumors of Anglican bishops being sent to America convinced many settlers that England was succumbing to the same pattern of political corruption and decline of liberty that afflicted other countries.

11. The Tea Act
The East India Company was in financial crisis, and the British government decided to market the company’s Chinese tea in North America.
The Tea Act was intended to aid the East India Company and to defray the costs of colonial government.
December 16, 1773: colonists threw more than 300 chests of tea into the Boston Harbor.

12. The Intolerable Acts
London’s response to the Bostonians’ action was swift and harsh, with the so-called Intolerable Acts.
The Quebec Act granted religious toleration for Catholics in Canada.

13. The Coming of Independence

14. The Continental Congress
To resist the Intolerable Acts, a Continental Congress convened in Philadelphia in 1774.

15. The Continental Association
The Congress adopted the Continental Association, which called for an almost complete halt to trade with Great Britain and the West Indies.
Committees of Safety were established to enforce the boycotts.
The Committees of Safety enlarged the political nation.

16. The “Sweets of Liberty”
By 1775, talk of liberty pervaded the colonies.
As the crisis deepened, Americans increasingly based their claims not simply on the historical rights of Englishmen but on the more abstract language of natural rights and universal freedom.
John Locke
Thomas Jefferson

17. The Outbreak of War
In April 1775, war broke out at Lexington and Concord.
The Battle of Bunker Hill was a British victory, but the colonists forced General Howe from Boston by March 1776.
The Second Continental Congress raised an army and appointed George Washington its commander.

18. Independence?
That the goal of this war was independence was not clear by the end of 1775.
Opinions varied in the colonies as to the question of independence.

19. Paine’s Common Sense
In January 1776, Thomas Paine published Common Sense which criticized monarchy and aristocracy.
Paine deemed absurd a small island ruling a continent.
Paine tied the economic hopes of the new nation to the idea of commercial freedom.
Paine argued that America would become a haven for liberty, “an asylum for mankind.”
Paine dramatically expanded the public sphere where political discussion took place.
He pioneered a new style of political writing, engaging a far greater audience than anyone before him.
His persuasions led the Second Continental Congress to sever the colonies’ ties with Great Britain.

20. The Declaration of Independence
The Declaration of Independence declared the United States an independent nation.
Jefferson’s preamble gave the Declaration its enduring impact.
The Declaration of Independence completed the shift from the rights of Englishmen to the rights of mankind as the object of American independence.
The "pursuit of happiness" was unique.

21. An Asylum for mankind
The idea of “American exceptionalism” was prevalent in the Revolution.

22. The global Declaration of Independence
Although for most Americans winning international recognition for their independence trumped concern for global human rights, Thomas Jefferson hoped the Declaration would inspire others to claim liberty and self- government.
Numerous anticolonial movements, such as Vietnam in 1945, have modeled their own declarations of independence on America’s.
The Declaration’s principle that political authority rests on the will of “the people” has been influential around the world.

23. Securing Independence

24. The Balance of Power
Britain had the advantage of a large, professional army and navy.
Patriots had the advantages of fighting on their own soil and a passionate desire for freedom.

25. African Americna in Revolutionary America
George Washington accepted black recruits after Lord Dunmore’s proclamation offered freedom to slaves who fought for the British.
Five thousand African-Americans enlisted in state militias and the Continental army and navy.
Some slaves gained freedom by serving in place of an owner.
Siding with the British also offered opportunities for liberty.

26. The First Years of the War
The war initially went badly for Washington; many of his troops went home.
Washington managed a successful surprise attack on Trenton and Princeton.

27. The Battle of Saratoga
The Battle of Saratoga in October gave the patriots a victory and boost to morale.
The victory convinced the French to aid the Americans in

28. The War in the South
The focus of the war shifted to the South in 1778.
British commanders were unable to consolidate their hold on the South.

29. Victory at last
American and French troops surrounded General Cornwallis at Yorktown, where he surrendered in October 1781.
The Treaty of Paris was signed in September 1783.
The American delegation was made up of John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and John Jay.