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Proclamation of 1763
Purpose: This document reserved all the territory west of the Appalachian Mountains for use by the native people in order to control the colonists' westward expansion and keep them under the complete authority of the British. Reaction: Colonists had become accustomed to sparse control from the British over their government and society. This meant that a sudden measure to restrict territory left them feeling that fundamental rights to occupy western lands were being disregarded. -
Sugar Act
Purpose: This act outlawed the importation of foreign rums, lowered the duty on molasses, and placed taxes on silk, coffee, wine, and other luxuries. They enforced this act strongly in an effort to reduce the smuggling of goods and make the colonists reliable on them. Reaction: Merchants were outraged because these tariffs would be ruinous to their trade business. The slogan “no taxation without representation” soon became popular and colonial legislatures protested the law. -
Currency Act
Purpose: Parliament enacted this law to prevent the colonies’ bills of credit/money to be considered legal tender in trade with the mother country.
Reaction: The colonies were already lacking in healthy trade because of the other acts imposed upon them by Parliament. This document only furthered economic failure by outlawing any other separate currency. -
Stamp Act
Purpose: This document imposed a direct tax on printed materials in the colonies. It further required all these materials to be produced on printed paper made in London.
Reaction: American colonists were even more outraged at the British heavily taxing such essential goods which had to be imported. Because of the extreme distance between the colonies and Britain, there was no way to fairly argue against these taxes. Instead, the Americans made their opposition very clear through protest. -
Quartering Act
Purpose: The Quartering Act required colonists to provide room and board for British troops occupying New England. Reaction: Colonists RESENTED this act as it meant they had to house and support soldiers from an empire they did not agree with. -
Declaratory Act
Purpose: Parliament imposed this act after the repeal of the Stamp Act to state that their taxing authority was the same in America as in England. Reaction: Because of the small victory of the repeal the colonists were even more outraged. Further so because it hinted there would be more acts coming. -
Boston Massacre
Purpose: This was an event in which 9 British soldiers visited Boston and faced an angry mob of colonists. 5 were killed. One of the dead was a free black man. Reaction: ANGER. The colonists were done dealing with oppression and abuse. -
Townshend Act
Purpose: This law taxed almost every item that was imported to the American colonies. Reaction: The colonists thought this was a huge abuse of Britain's power as they still didn't have any representation in Parliament. -
Boston Tea Party
Purpose: This was a protest against the heavy, heavy taxing from the British government. Pounds and pounds of British tea was thrown into the Boston harbor to show the Crown that everyone was fed up of them. Reaction: The British reacted only by enacting even more acts and rules. They made the colonists pay for every crate of tea they destroyed. -
Intolerable/Coercive Acts
Purpose: These were a series of several acts/laws that stemmed as a result of the Boston Tea Party. Reaction: The colonists were getting even more riotous and continued to rebel. They were being pushed to the end of their wits. -
Quartering Act
Purpose: This was an expansion on the first Quartering Act which allowed people in power in America to determine where troops were going to be stationed. Reaction: More and more and more outrage on the part of the colonists. Their homes and lives were being invaded and they had no say in anything. -
Quebec Act
Purpose: This document instituted a more permanent government in Canada and gave the french in Quebec a little more religious freedom.