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Oct 10, 1215
Magna Carta
The 1215 Charter required King John of England to proclaim certain liberties, and accept that his will was not arbitrary, for example by explicitly accepting that no "freeman" (in the sense of non-serf) could be punished except through the law of the land, a right which is still in existence today. Magna Carta was the first document forced onto an English King by a group of his subjects, the feudal barons, in an attempt to limit his powers by law and protect their privileges. -
Petition of Rights
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. Passed on 7 June 1628, the Petition contains restrictions on non-Parliamentary taxation, forced billeting of soldiers, imprisonment without cause, and restricts the use of martial law. -
English Bill of Rights
The Bill of Rights was passed by Parliament on 16 December 1689.[3] It was a re-statement in statutory form of the Declaration of Right presented by the Convention Parliament to William and Mary in March 1689 (or 1688 by Old Style dating), inviting them to become joint sovereigns of England. -
Albany Plan of Union
The Albany Plan of Union was a proposal made at the Albany Congress back in 1754 aimed at a formation of a strong union of the colonies under one single government and direction. The need was justified because of the necessity for defense against the threats and consequences posed by the infamous French and Indian War. -
Second Continental Congress
The Second Continental Congress was a convention of delegates from the Thirteen Colonies that started meeting on May 10, 1775, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, soon after warfare in the American Revolutionary War had begun.The second Congress managed the colonial war effort, and moved incrementally towards independence, adopting the United States Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. -
Boston Massacre
The Boston Massacre, called the Boston Riot by the English, was an incident on March 5, 1770, in which British redcoats killed five civilian men. British troops had been stationed in Boston since 1768 in order to protect and support crown-appointed colonial officials attempting to enforce unpopular Parliamentary legislation. Amid ongoing tense relations between the population and the soldiers, a mob formed around a British sentry, who was subjected to verbal abuse and harassment. -
Boston Tea Party
The Boston Tea Party was a direct action by colonists in Boston, a town in the British colony of Massachusetts, against the British government and the monopolistic East India Company that controlled all the tea imported into the colonies. On December 16, 1773, after officials in Boston refused to return three shiploads of taxed tea to Britain, a group of colonists boarded the ships and destroyed the tea by throwing it into Boston Harbor. -
First Continental Congress
The First Continental Congress was a convention of delegates from twelve of the thirteen North American colonies that met on September 5, 1774, at Carpenters' Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, early in the American Revolution. It was called in response to the passage of the Coercive Acts (also known as Intolerable Acts by the Colonial Americans) by the British Parliament. The Intolerable Acts had punished Boston for the Boston Tea Party. -
Declaration of Independence
This document, one of the most important in American history, set forth the reasons for the decision of the 13 American colonies to separate from England in the late 1700's. It also stated the principles under which the new nation would be governed. -
Articles of Confederation
The Articles of Confederation, formally the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, was an agreement among the 13 founding states that legally established the United States of America as a confederation of sovereign states and served as its first constitution.It was drafted by the Continental Congress in 1776-77, went into use in 1777 and was formally ratified by all 13 states in 1781. -
Shay's Rebellion
The rebellion started on August 29, 1786, over financial difficulties and by January 1787, over one thousand Shaysites had been arrested. A militia that had been raised as a private army defeated an attack on the federal Springfield Armory by the main Shaysite force on February 3, 1787, and five rebels were killed in the action. -
Virginia Plan
The Virginia Plan (also known as the Randolph Plan, after its sponsor, or the Large-State Plan) was a proposal by Virginia delegates for a bicameral legislative branch. The plan was drafted by James Madison while he waited for a quorum to assemble at the Constitutional Convention of 1787. -
New Jersey Plan
The New Jersey Plan (also widely known as the Small State or Paterson Plan) was a proposal for the structure of the United States Government proposed by William Paterson at the Constitutional Convention on June 15, 1787. The plan was created in response to the Virginia Plan's, calling for two houses of Congress, both elected with apportionment according to population -
Connecticut Compromise
The Connecticut Compromise (also known as the Great Compromise of 1787 or Sherman's Compromise) was an agreement between 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.
