The Stamp Act

The French and Indian war caused Great Britain to be in debt. Since Great Britain owed an enormous amount of money they decided to tax all the colonies. The colonists had to pay extra money on items that they never had to do before. Some of the taxes were on printed goods, tea, molasses and more. The colonists were furious because this had never happened before, they had to pay extra money, and they had taxation without representation. The colonists were so angry that they decided to protest. They roamed the streets yelling and causing disruption, they tar and feathered tax collectors, and caused many riots. Because of all of the colonist’s actions some of the acts got repealed. The Stamp Act and the Tea Act caused lots of tension
Parliament had ignored whatever the colonies said which made more and more tension between them. The colonists were enraged because they thought they shouldn't have to pay for something that had been free for many years. The colonists proclaimed that Parliament did not have any right to tax the colonies. Even though the stamp was not very much to pay, the colonist still refused. The purpose of the Stamp Act was not only to raise the revenue to pay the debt from the war, but to claim the British governmental dominance over American Colonies. Luckily, The Stamp Act did get repealed after all that. The colonists raged with hatred. First they started with the Stamp Act Congress. The Stamp Act Congress was a meeting held from October 7-25. The intention of the Congress was to come up with responses to the Stamp Act passed initially that year (Doc. 1). Since the Stamp Act upset the colonists, they wrote the Declaration of Rights and sent it to the king and Parliament (Doc. 1). In addition the colonists did much more than form the Stamp Act Congress. For example, the
1773, the colonists reacted in tremendous ways causing lots of damage to America. The British continued their tax on tea, so the colonists continued to boycott British Tea. Consequently Britain passed the Tea Act. The Tea Act was tea sold directly to the colonists from The British East India Company. For this reason, tea was cheaper. Even though it was cheaper the colonists were still mad because they thought Britain was tricking them to pay the tea tax. They decided to protest by organizing the Boston Tea Party. The Boston Tea Party was held on the night of December 16, 1773. About 50-60 men disguised themselves as Native Americans so the British wouldn’t know who did it. They boarded 3 ships, which were all loaded with 342 chests of tea. All of the colonists dumped the tea overboard and destroyed everything they could. This was worth one million dollars worth of tea in today’s money. The tea party lasted about three hours and after that everyone went home and pretended nothing happened. The identities were kept a secret by the other Bostonians. The Sons of Liberty were responsible for this event (Doc