The Destruction Of The British Colonies In America After The Revolutionary War

Parliament virtually represented the British colonies in America from across the mid-Atlantic ocean. In 1760 George III became king of England at the young age of twenty-two and elected George Grenville to be his prime minister. The circumstances of the Seven Years War resulted in a large debt that needed to be taken care of. American colonies were scarcely affected by the wake of the war; they did not send men or supplies to aid the British in victory against France. To the American’s, Britain was in control of their fate and would be well equipped to ensure a future for themselves, as the Americans had struggled to do. Imperial authority looked to the West for support from their British subjects in the New World colonies. Grenville began to investigate import sales and revenues among customs officers and saw that customs officer’s salaries were four times what were collected in revenues. Discovering that a large part of the shortage was due to smuggling and bribery he enforced stricter
accounting policies and closely monitored the collection of duties. By this, Grenville imposed and implemented the Molasses Act of 1733 which taxed 6 pence per gallon on any purchase of non-British molasses. This normal procedure of imperial dominance quickly stirred the American colonist and raised concerns about whether or not the British government possessed the right to tax. The British Empire presumed British-Americans had grown too accustomed to the liberties and freedoms they derived from themselves. Accusers caught of smuggling faced royal court trials with a royally appointed judge, instead of trial by local elected civil court judges. On many levels the American’s felt attacked and oppressed by the British government because freedoms and liberties that were once had without the interference of British rule or taxation, were being stripped away one by one. However the British government, being the number one world power, was only exercised its “appointed” power over its British subjects and saw that taxation was a “free gifts of the people”. American’s believed they were experiencing a mal-manipulated form of imposing power of the British government that held no real regard for them, and used them as a means to rejuvenate the self-serving British Empire. Colony leaders were beginning to feel independent from England and preferred to be without the tyranny of the British Empire raining down on them. The stubborn British Empire, was determined to prove that Americans still had dependencies on English trade goods such as tea, paint, glass, paper, and lead, passing a series of policies that blatantly expressed the impact it’s executive power. Resistance grew, riot assemblies and revolts against the House of Commons broke out, making it very clear they neither wanted nor needed British rule any longer. Imperial interference caused Americans to boycott against British imposed trade and taxation policies. Thus, Grenville imposed The Stamp Act that proved Britain’s imperial power to tax its subjects, forcing Americans to “suffer” under the hand of imperial authority. Subsequently, feeling taken advantage of and altogether enslaved, the American’s banded together against the British Empire resisting a series of imposing acts. Collectively the American people denied the power of Parliament and sought to damage the British Empire further by refusing British cargo from being unloaded.
They believed that the British Empire solely used them for revenues. Some Americans rebelled peacefully by practicing non-consumption of British import goods and began to adapt to life without British merchandise. Others damaged thousands of dollars worth of trade-goods, an example of this is what happened in the Boston Harbor fall of 1773 when Bostonians disguised as Indians destroyed 90,000 pounds of teas in the harbor. These actions lead the British Empire to raise alarm, fearful of losing any more power, and passed the Intolerable Acts, consisting of four laws meant to punish Americans for destroying the tea and forced repayment for what had been lost. At this point Britain lost all influence with the American’s and the American’s knew they were truly meant to be left to their own liberty under colonial
control. Truly, the British Empire bullied Americans from across the mid-Atlantic ocean, in a failed attempt to rein over a body people from across the globe. The British Empire had low expectations of the American people and looked at them as a means for capital not realizing exactly how sternly and seriously the Americans were taking the unjustified imperial regulations. Britain’s yearning for total World order and domination blinded its judgment and pushed American’s into solidifying their internal bonds among each other in an effort to resist the oppression from the British government. The American people had outgrown the need for British rule and turned their allegiance toward one another, they were willing fight for themselves with the intention if gaining independence as a nation separate from Britain.