1. What Experiences Led to the American Revolution?
Topic # 9
What Experiences Led to the American Revolution?
RAP: Explain the importance of each of these documents:
*Magna Carta
*Petition of Right
*English Bill of Rights
Lesson Goal:
How British ideas about government were put to use in the colonies.
Why the colonists came to feel that the British government threatened their rights.
How constitutional government developed in the colonies.
-Why the colonists decided to fight for their independence.

2. WOW Ideas American colonists used to establish a British colony.
Charter
Colonial Government
legal document needed to establish a British colony
granted land to a person or a company
did not define government
Based on two concepts that protect them from:
Abuse of power by the British government
Abuse of power by their colonial government

3. WOW Britain's control over colonies.
Britain was becoming a world power and was busy fighting wars
Not much time devoted to colonies
Long distances
Communication was slow because news traveled by ship
Orders took months to reach colonies
War against France was costly
Britain left with large national debt
Colonies should pay their share with increased taxes
Tightened trade restrictions between colonies and other countries
Britain’s neglect of colonies
Britain’s renewed interest

4. New British law’s that affected the colonies
WOW
New British law’s that affected the colonies
- Proclamation of 1763
- banned settlement west into Indian territory
- British able to withdraw army and reduce costs
- Sugar Act of 1764
- stop smuggling of goods in and out of colonies
- taxes on all incoming sugar, coffee, wine, and
cloth
- Gave British Navy “writs of assistance” (search
warrants) to search colonial ships
- all colonial trade ships had to go directly to
Britain

5. WOW - Stamp Act, 1765 - taxes on every legal document, newspaper,
pamphlets, deck of cards coming into the
colonies
- Quartering Act, 1765
- British Army moved into colonial cities
requiring innkeepers and public officials to
house and feed British soldiers
- Declaratory Act, 1766
- gave Parliament the right to pass laws for the
colonies in “all cases whatsoever” to remind
colonist they were subject to the king.

6. WOW - Tea Act, 1773 - forced colonies to buy tea from
The East India Company to keep the British company from going broke

7. Colonists’ view of laws
WOW
Colonists’ view of laws
- Colonist felt British Parliament was threatening their rights.
- New tax and trade laws meant that colonists would lose money.
- Parliament’s laws went against colonists’ belief in representative government.
- Colonists believed if they had no right to elect representatives to Parliament, Parliament had no right to tax the colonists.

8. Rally Cry for Colonists
WOW
Rally Cry for Colonists
- “No Taxation without Representation”
- believed tax laws should be passed only by the colonial legislature
- King George felt colonists were acting like ungrateful children
King thought that since the well-being and safety of colonies was due to British protection the taxation was fair
Parliament didn’t understand representation because they represented the whole nation no matter where and not individuals
- growing conflict in beliefs

9. Colonies Resist British Control Committees of Correspondence
WOW
Colonies Resist British Control
Between
1763 – 1775
Committees of Correspondence
- tension growing
- colonist organized town meetings and wrote
angry letters to the newspapers
- Small groups of volunteers that made sure each colony knew about events and opinions of other colonies
- raised spirits of people
- united and linked all colonies together

10. WOW - organized resistance to the Stamp Act 1765 Sons of Liberty
Daughters
of Liberty
- organized resistance to the Stamp Act
- mobs attacked tax collectors’ homes
- burned effigies (straw people) of royals
- marched in streets and some committed violent acts
- formed by women
- helped boycott British trade
- instead of buying British goods they made their own
- gave up drinking tea

11. WOW
1770
Boston Massacre
1773
Boston Tea Party
- British troops opened fire on protestors and killed 5 colonists.
- Colonists believed British government would use military force to make them obey laws
colonist tried to stop cargo of tea in the Boston Harbor
dumped 342 chests of tea
- British closed the harbor
Fall 1774 – colonists decide to take united action and committee of correspondence calls for representatives from each colony to meet and deliberate on general interests of all colonists.

12. WOW First Continental Congress April 19, 1775
Representatives from 12 of 13 colonies met in Philadelphia to decide on best response to actions of British government.
- start of unified American government
- agreed to impose ban on trade
- hope of change in British policies
- beginning of Revolutionary War
- fighting broke out
- British troops marched on to Lexington and
Concord, Massachusetts to capture guns and supplies by surprise
- system of signals warned colonists and they fired on British forcing them back to Boston

13. WOW - Representatives again met in Philadelphia a few weeks later
- Congress organized new Continental Army and called colonist to send troops
- George Washington selected to lead troops
- a year later, Congress drafts document to explain why they should be free from British rule
- this document later becomes the
“Declaration of Independence”
Second
Continental
Congress
Declaration of
Independence

14. WIO :
Create a timeline of the important events in this lesson. Explain the significance of the event and include drawings that help depict each event.