1. United States is a democracy.
It is said that the
United States is a democracy.
What does that
mean to you?

2. Democracy
A system of government in which political control is exercised by all the citizens, directly or indirectly.
Our country is a democratic republic.

3. Magna Carta
A document written in 1215 that it set a precedent which changed England forever, by establishing that the King was not above the law.
King John of England was required to follow the demands of the Magna Carta.

4. Parliament The supreme legislative (lawmaking) body in England
Parliament made unjust laws and taxes on the colonies.

5. English Bill of Rights
A document that declared that Englishmen had certain civil and political rights.
It reduced the power of the monarch and strengthened the role of Parliament.

6. Mercantilism
The economic policy of European nations during the era of discovery and colonization of the America’s, designed to make Europe rich and powerful.

7. Salutary neglect
A hands-off policy of England toward its colonies during the first half of the 1700s
The colonies got used to acting on their own during the time of salutary neglect.

8. Assembly A lawmaking group of People elected to represent
the rights of those who
elected them
Assemblies were created
by the colonists to create a
form of representative
government.

9. French and Indian War
A conflict from involving the French and their Native American allies against the British. This war was part of a broader European conflict know as the Seven Years’ War.

10. Albany Plan of Union
A proposal by Benjamin Franklin to unite the colonies, that was approved by the Albany Congress in 1754, but was later rejected by colonial legislatures.

11. Treaty of Paris
The agreement that ended the Seven Years’ War and gave Great Britain control of almost all of North American lands east of the Mississippi.

12. Stamp Tax
An unpopular 1764 British law that placed new taxes on American colonists.

13. Grievances
Formal complaints made usually in the from of a petition on the basis of something that somebody feels is unfair