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Jun 15, 1215
Magna Carta
Fed up, in 1215 the barons rebelled and pressured the king into signing the Magna Carta, a list of 63 clauses drawn up to limit John's power. It was the first time royal authority officially became subject to the law, instead of reigning above it. -
Jamestown Settled
The first permanent English settlement in North America, founded in 1607 in Virginia. Jamestown was named for King James I of England. It was destroyed later in the seventeenth century in an uprising of Virginians against the governor. -
Mayflower Compact
The Mayflower Compact was the first governing document of Plymouth Colony. It was written by the male passengers of the Mayflower, consisting of separatist Congregationalists who called themselves "Saints", and adventurers and tradesmen, most of whom were referred to by the Separatists as "Strangers".M -
Petition of Right
The Petition of Right is a major English constitutional document that sets out specific liberties of the subject that the king is prohibited from infringing. -
English Bill of Rights
The English Bill of Rights is an act that the Parliament of England passed on December 16, 1689. The Bill creates separation of powers, limits the powers of the king and queen, enhances the democratic election and bolsters freedom of speech. -
Albany Plan of Union
The Albany Plan of Union was a plan to create a unified government for the Thirteen Colonies, suggested by Benjamin Franklin, then a senior leader and a delegate from Pennsylvania, at the Albany Congress. -
Stamp Act
The Stamp Act was an act of the British Parliament in 1756 that exacted revenue from the American colonies by imposing a stamp duty on newspapers and legal and commercial documents. Colonial opposition led to the act's repeal in 1766 and helped encourage the revolutionary movement against the British Crown. -
Boston Massacre
a riot in Boston arising from the resentment of Boston colonists toward British troops quartered in the city, in which the troops fired on the mob and killed several people. -
Boston Tea Party
The Boston Tea Party was a political protest by the Sons of Liberty in Boston, on December 16, 1773. -
Intolerable Acts
The Intolerable Acts were the American Patriots' term for a series of punitive laws passed by the British Parliament in 1774 after the Boston Tea party. They were meant to punish the Massachusetts colonists for their defiance in throwing a large tea shipment into Boston harbor. -
First Continental Congress
The First Continental Congress was a meeting of delegates from twelve of the Thirteen Colonies that met on September 5 to October 26, 1774 at Carpenters' Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, early in the American Revolution. -
American Revolution
The American Revolution was a political upheaval that took place between 1765 and 1783 during which colonists in the Thirteen American Colonies rejected the British monarchy and aristocracy, overthrew the authority of Great Britain, and founded the United States of America. -
Second Continental Congress
It succeeded the First Continental Congress, which met also in Philadelphia. The second Congress managed the colonial war effort, and moved incrementally towards independence, adopting the United States Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. -
Declaration of Independence
The Declaration of Independence is defined as the formal statement written by Thomas Jefferson declaring the freedom of the thirteen American colonies from Great Britain. An example of the Declaration of Independence was the document adopted at the Second Continental Congress on July 4th, 1776. -
Articles of Confederation
The original constitution of the US, ratified in 1781, which was replaced by the US Constitution in 1789. -
Shay's Rebellion
Shays' Rebellion is the name given to a series of protests in 1786 and 1787 by American farmers against state and local enforcement of tax collections and judgments for debt. -
Constitutional Convention
The gathering that drafted the Constitution of the United States in 1787; all states were invited to send delegates. The convention, meeting in Philadelphia, designed a government with separate legislative, executive, and judicial branches. -
Philadelphia Convention
the convention in Philadelphia of representatives from each of the former Colonies, except Rhode Island, at which the Constitution of the United States was framed. -
Connecticut Commpromise
The Connecticut Compromise was an agreement that large and small states reached during the Constitutional Convention of 1787 that in part defined the legislative structure and representation that each state would have under the United States Constitution.
