the stamp mact
Attempts to tax American colonist to recover money for seven years war
THE STAMP ACT of 1765
What was the stamp act ?
1. The Stamp Act was passed by the British Parliament on March 22, 1765. The new tax was imposed on all American colonists and required them to pay a tax on every piece of printed paper they used. Ship's papers, legal documents, licenses, newspapers, other publications, and even playing cards were taxed.
The apparent purpose was to raise £60,000 yearly in the colonies in order to help support the cost of maintaining British troops there, a cost totaling £350,000 annually. In fairness to the colonies, the money collected would remain in America, and Americans would be appointed stamp agents.
However, this small token of generosity from Parliament did little to cool the growing anger of the colonists who felt that this act impinged upon their rights as British subjects. The British Constitution accorded Englishmen the right of being taxed only by representatives of their own choosing. The colonists had no such representation in Parliament; therefore the Stamp Act was unconstitutional.
With this act, the colonists' anger reached the boiling point. The frustration was now to take the form of overt rebellion. The previous Molasses Act, Navigation Acts, and Sugar Act suddenly were seen as an ominous prelude to this final blow, the enslavement of British subjects by their own British government. The history of the period from the signing of the treaty ending the French and Indian War in 1763 to the first Continental Congress in Philadelphia is, Winsor believes, "a narrative of the attempt by the British ministry to enforce certain measures upon unwilling colonists, and of the resistance of the colonists to those measures" (Winsor VI:l9).
Bound with this is a copy of repeal of the Stamp Act, London, 1766.
Few colonists believed that they could do anything more than grumble and buy the stamps until the Virginia House of Burgesses adopted
THE STAMP ACT of 1765
What was the stamp act ?
1. The Stamp Act was passed by the British Parliament on March 22, 1765. The new tax was imposed on all American colonists and required them to pay a tax on every piece of printed paper they used. Ship's papers, legal documents, licenses, newspapers, other publications, and even playing cards were taxed.
The apparent purpose was to raise £60,000 yearly in the colonies in order to help support the cost of maintaining British troops there, a cost totaling £350,000 annually. In fairness to the colonies, the money collected would remain in America, and Americans would be appointed stamp agents.
However, this small token of generosity from Parliament did little to cool the growing anger of the colonists who felt that this act impinged upon their rights as British subjects. The British Constitution accorded Englishmen the right of being taxed only by representatives of their own choosing. The colonists had no such representation in Parliament; therefore the Stamp Act was unconstitutional.
With this act, the colonists' anger reached the boiling point. The frustration was now to take the form of overt rebellion. The previous Molasses Act, Navigation Acts, and Sugar Act suddenly were seen as an ominous prelude to this final blow, the enslavement of British subjects by their own British government. The history of the period from the signing of the treaty ending the French and Indian War in 1763 to the first Continental Congress in Philadelphia is, Winsor believes, "a narrative of the attempt by the British ministry to enforce certain measures upon unwilling colonists, and of the resistance of the colonists to those measures" (Winsor VI:l9).
Bound with this is a copy of repeal of the Stamp Act, London, 1766.
Few colonists believed that they could do anything more than grumble and buy the stamps until the Virginia House of Burgesses adopted