-
The Stono Rebellion
On a Sunday morning while planters attended church, a group of enslaved people from the Carolinas set out for Spanish Florida burning plantations and killing white settlers as they marched. They were headed for Fort Mose, a free Black settlement on the Georgia-Florida border, emboldened by the Spanish Empire’s offer of freedom to anyone enslaved by the English. However, the local militia defeated the rebels in battle, capturing, executing, and selling the enslaved people. -
Ending of the Seven Years' War
The Seven Years’ War ended with the peace treaties of Paris and Hubertusburg in 1763. France surrendered her North American possessions east of the Mississippi to Britain. However, Britain was deeply in debt at the end of the war. -
The Royal Proclamation of 1763
The British Crown issued the Royal Proclamation of 1763 which created the proclamation line marking the Appalachian Mountains as the boundary between the British colonies and land held controlled by Native Americans. It was an attempt by the king to limit costly wars with Native Americans. -
The Sugar Act
The Sugar Act, which was a form of indirect tax, sought to combat widespread smuggling of molasses in New England by cutting the duty in half but increasing enforcement. -
The Stamp Act
The act required that many documents be printed on paper that had been stamped with an official revenue stamp to show the duty had been paid. This included newspapers, pamphlets, diplomas, legal documents, and even playing cards. The Stamp Act directly affected many groups throughout colonial society, including printers, lawyers, college graduates, and even sailors who played cards. -
The Virginia Resolves
The most famous of the anti-Stamp Act resolutions were the Virginia Resolves, passed by the House of Burgesses on May 30, 1765, which declared that the colonists were entitled to “all the liberties, privileges, franchises, and immunities . . . possessed by the people of Great Britain.” -
The Stamp Act Repealed
After widespread protest in the colonies and all the original twelve stamp distributors resigned, Parliament was forced to repeal it, for since they had no one to distribute the stamps, the act became unenforceable. -
The Townsend Acts
The Townsend Acts were Britain’s next attempt to draw revenues from the colonies. They created new customs duties on common items, like lead, glass, paint, and tea, instead of direct taxes. Creating and strengthening formal mechanisms to enforce compliance, these acts also increased the presence of the British government in the colonies. -
The First Continental Congress
The First Continental Congress convened on September 5, 1774. Over the next six weeks, elite delegates from every colony but Georgia issued a number of documents. One of the documents repeated the arguments that colonists had been making since 1765: colonists retained all the rights of native Britons, including the right to be taxed only by their own elected representatives as well as the right to a trial by jury. -
Thomas Paine Published Common Sense
This small forty-six-page pamphlet published in Philadelphia argued for independence by denouncing monarchy and challenging the logic behind the British Empire. -
The Birth of the Methodist Denomination
After its leaders broke with the Church of England to form a new American denomination in 1784, the Methodist Episcopal Church (MEC) achieved its growth through innovation. They grew from fewer than one thousand members at the end of the eighteenth century to making up 34 percent of all American church membership by the middle of the 1800s. -
The Ratification of the Constitution
The first state to ratify the Constitution was Delaware of December 7, 1787 and the last state was Rhode Island who ratified it on May 29, 1790. However, on July 2, 1788, Congress announced that a majority of states had ratified the Constitution and that the document was now in effect. -
Charter for the Bank of the United States
In 1791 Congress approved a twenty-year charter for the Bank of the United States and George Washington signed it into law on February 25, 1791. The bank’s stocks, together with federal bonds, created over $70 million in new financial instruments. -
The Invention of the Cotton Gin
Eli Whitney developed the cotton gin in 1794 for deseeding cotton. The cotton gin, a simple hand-cranked device designed to mechanically remove sticky green seeds from short staple cotton, allowed southern planters to dramatically expand cotton production for the national and international markets. -
Jay's Treaty
John Jay signed a “treaty of amity, commerce, and navigation” with the British. This treaty required Britain to abandon its military positions in the Northwest Territory by 1796. Britain also agreed to compensate American merchants for their losses. The United States, in return, agreed to treat Britain as its most prized trade partner, which meant tacitly supporting Britain in its current conflict with France. -
Alien Act
The Alien Act allowed the federal government to deport foreign nationals, or “aliens,” who seemed to pose a national security threat. -
The Sedition Act
Sedition Act allowed the government to prosecute anyone found to be speaking or publishing “false, scandalous, and malicious writing” against the government. President Adams signed it into law on July 14, 1798. -
George Washington's Death
George Washington, America's first president, founding father, and general in the American Revolution, is thought to have died from a tracheal inflammation.