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Sep 18, 1215
Magna Carta
Was the first document forced onto a king on England, to proclaim certain liberties. It was important in the colonization of America as Englands legal system was used as a model for many of the colonies as they were developing their own legal system. -
Jamestown settled
First settlement of virginia colony. Founded in 1607. The Godspeed, The Susan Constant, and the discovery were three ships set out to on an expedition to settle on the virginia colony. No women went on the journey. 104 men and boys were on the ship and 1 passanger died during the journey. They chose jamestown because the virginia company told them the select a location that could easily be defended from attacks. -
Mayflower compact written
Was the first governing document of the plymouth colony. Written by saints, fleeing from religious persecution by King James. They traveled aboard the Mayflower in 1620. The compact was signned Nov 11, 1620. It was drafted to prevent dissent among puritans and non seperatist pilgrams who landed a few days later. -
Petiton of Rights.
Major English constitutional document that sets out specific liberties of the subject that the king is prohibited from infringing. Passed on June 7, 1628. The petition contains restrictions on non-parliamentary taxation, forced billeting of soldiers, imprisonment without cause, and restricts the use of material law. -
English bill or rights
It lays down limits in the powers of the crown and sets out the rights of parliament and the right to petition the monarch without fear of retribution. It reestabished the liberty of protestants the have arms for their defense within the rule of law. -
Albany plan of union
Was a proposal to create a unified goverment, suggested by Benjamin Franklin. They chose Franklins plan which was to develop a plan of defense related to hear term threats by France. -
Stamp Act
Imposed a direct tax by th british parliament, specifically on the colonies of British America, and it rewuired that many printed materials in the colonies be produced on stamp paper. They were legal documents, magazines, newspaper and other types of paper. -
Boston Massacre
An incident in which the British army killed 5 civilian men and injured 6 other. The officers said they were subjected to verbal threats and thrown objects. They then fired into the crowd without order. That instantly killed 3 people and then 2 died shortly after. -
Boston Tea Party
Was a political protest against the tax policy of the British Goverment that controlled all the tea imported into colonies. On December 16, 1773, officials in Boston refused to return 3 shiploads of tea to Britian. This led to a group of colonist that boarded the ships and destroyed the tea by throwing it into Boston Harbor. Colonist believed the tea act violated their rights as Englishmen to "No taxation without representation." -
First Continental congress
This was called in response to a passage of the Intolerable acts. Itwas called briefly to consider options, including an economic boycott of British trade, rights and grievences, and petitioned King George the third for redress of those grievances. -
Intolerable Acts
Passed by british parliament in 1774. It was a series of punititve laws realting to massachusettes after the Boston tea party. They stripped massachusettes of self goverment and historic rights triggering outrage in the 13 colonies. The were key developments in the outbreak of the American Revolution. -
Second Continental congress
This was called because their petition in halting enforcement of Intolerable acts was unsuccessful in the First one. This second one took place the following year in 1775 to organize the defense of the colonies at the onset of the American Revolutionary war. -
America Revolution
Was a political upheaval during the last half of the 18th century where the 13 colonies joined together and broke from the british empire. The british didnt like thatt so they reacted by sending in combat troops to reestablish royalist control.This became known as the revolutionary war. -
Decleration of Independence
It announced that the 13 colonies regarded themselves as independant states and no longer a part of the british empire. Insteas they formed a british union that would become a new nation, ther United States of America. -
Articles of confederation
An agreement among the 13 sates that esablished the United States of America as a confederation of sovereign states and served as its first constitution. -
Shays rebellion
Shays rebellion lasted from 1786 to 1787. It was an armed uprising that took place in central and western massachusettes. It started from financial difficulties brought by postwar economic depressio, credit squeeze caused by lack of hard currency and fiscally harsh goverment policies aimed to solve the states debt problems. The soldiers didnt get paid enough so they organized protests against economic positions. -
Constitution Convention
It went from May 25 to Sep 17, 1787. It took placec to address problems in governing the United States of America. It was intended to revise the articles of confederation. The intention from the outset of many was to create a new goverment rather than fix the old one. The result was the creation of the united states constitution -
Connecticut compromise
It was an agreement that large and small states reached during the Constitutional Convention. It defined the legislative structure and representation that each state would have under the U.S constitution. It required the upper house to be weighted equally between the states.
