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About 250 Years Ago … No Taxation Without Representation

As we approach the semiquincentennial (250th) anniversary of the forming of the United States, here is a brief summary of issues and actions that led to the Revolution and the Revolutionary War … this is about No Taxation Without Representation.

The settlers who migrated to and/or resettled in the colonies of Plymouth, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Connecticut paid little to nothing in taxes during the first few decades of their establishment. The English government imposed almost no taxes.

The chartered companies that established the colonies initially collected only quitrents, a land tax originally paid by freemen to the Crown or to the company that held a charter from the Crown. The quitrent, an annual payment of a fixed rate of several shillings for each hundred acres of land, secured a freeman’s title to his land; it was paid in lieu of the services traditionally required by feudal custom.

The early colonies were sparsely settled and even more sparsely administered. The few officials who served did not receive official salaries until sometime in the 1640s. Their compensation came from fees for services rendered. These included issuing court papers, keeping records, arresting and punishing criminals, and issuing licenses.

In the early years, voluntary contributions supported spending on civic activities and church ministers. Too many free riders induced leaders to make contributions compulsory.

Taxpayers were recognized for their contributions; in Dedham, for example, the largest taxpayers received the best seats in church.  The small sums collected by colonial governments were spent largely on roads, churches, and schools.

Reflecting the values of the day, a prominent nineteenth-century historian, Richard T. Ely, wrote that “one of the things against which our forefathers in England and in the American colonies contended was not against oppressive taxation, but against the payment of any taxes at all” (emphasis added).

But taxes were not long in coming.

Growing populations in the colonies necessitated defensive measures against Indians and other European intruders, along with the need to build and maintain roads, schools, prisons, public buildings, and ports and to support poor relief. A variety of direct and indirect taxes was gradually imposed on the colonists.

In 1638, the General Court in Massachusetts required all freemen and non-freemen to support both the commonwealth and the church. Direct taxes took two forms: (1) a wealth tax and (2) a poll, or head tax, which in some instances evolved into or included an income tax.

Taxation from the British Parliament

Many authors credit the phrase “No Taxation without representation” to the Boston lawyer and legislator James Otis, Jr. (1725-1783), based on how John Adams recalled Otis’s argument in the writs of assistance case in 1761.

Adams wrote a letter to Otis’s biographer William Tudor, Jr., in 1818. After quoting that letter at length Tudor wrote in his book:

“From the navigation act the advocate [Otis] passed to the Acts of Trade, and these, he contended, imposed taxes, enormous, burthensome, intolerable taxes; and on this topic he gave full scope to his talent, for powerful declamation and invective, against the tyranny of taxation without representation.”  (Emphasis added)

(As noted, Otis did raise the issue of where legislatures could fairly tax subjects – but he didn’t use the memorable words “no taxation without representation.”)

This was followed up by declarations at the Stamp Tax Congress in New York in October 1865.  The Stamp Act Congress passed a ‘Declaration of Rights and Grievances.’  This claimed that American colonists were equal to all other British citizens, protested taxation without representation, and stated that, without colonial representation in Parliament, Parliament could not tax colonists. In addition, the colonists increased their nonimportation efforts.

In part, they declared,

“That it is inseparably essential to the freedom of a people, and the undoubted right of Englishmen, that no taxes be imposed on them, but with their own consent, given personally, or by their representatives.”  (Article III)

“That the people of these colonies are not, and from their local circumstances cannot be, represented in the House of Commons in Great-Britain.” (Article IV)

“That the only representatives of the people of these colonies, are persons chosen therein by themselves, and that no taxes ever have been, or can be constitutionally imposed on them, but by their respective legislatures.” (Article V)

“No Taxation Without Representation,” in the context of British American Colonial taxation, appears in  the February 1768 London Magazine’s headline, on page 89, in the printing of Lord  Camden’s “Speech on the Declaratory Bill of the Sovereignty of Great Britain over the Colonies.”

Taxation Without Representation Led to War

The American Revolutionary War (1775-1783) was sparked after American colonists chafed over issues like taxation without representation, embodied by laws like The Stamp Act and The Townshend Acts. Mounting tensions came to a head during the Battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, when the “shot heard round the world” was fired.

It was not without warning; the Boston Massacre on March 5, 1770 and the Boston Tea Party on December 16, 1773 showed the colonists’ increasing dissatisfaction with British rule in the colonies.

The Declaration of Independence, issued on July 4, 1776, enumerated the reasons the Founding Fathers felt compelled to break from the rule of King George III and parliament to start a new nation. In September of that year, the Continental Congress declared the “United Colonies” of America to be the “United States of America.”

France joined the war on the side of the colonists in 1778, helping the Continental Army conquer the British at the Battle of Yorktown in 1781. The Treaty of Paris ending the American Revolution and granting the 13 original colonies independence was signed on September 3, 1783. (History-com)

Click the following link to a general summary about No Taxation Without Representation:

Click to access No-Taxation-Without-Representation-SAR-RT.pdf

Click to access No-Taxation-Without-Representation.pdf

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

About 250 Years Ago … Growth of the Colonies

As we approach the semiquincentennial (250th) anniversary of the forming of the United States, here is a brief summary of issues and actions that led to the Revolution and the Revolutionary War … this is about the Growth of the Colonies.

In the early 1600s, in rapid succession, the English began a colony (Jamestown) in Chesapeake Bay in 1607, the French built Quebec in 1608, and the Dutch began their interest in the region that became present-day New York.

Within another generation, the Plymouth Company (1620), the Massachusetts Bay Company (1629), the Company of New France (1627), and the Dutch West India Company (1621) began to send thousands of colonists, including families, to North America. Successful colonization was not inevitable. Rather, interest in North America was a halting, yet global, contest among European powers to exploit these lands.  (LOC)

By 1650, however, England had established a dominant presence on the Atlantic coast. The first colony was founded at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607. Many of the people who settled in the New World came to escape religious persecution. The Pilgrims, founders of Plymouth, Massachusetts, arrived in 1620.

In both Virginia and Massachusetts, the colonists flourished with some assistance from Native Americans. New World grains such as corn kept the colonists from starving while, in Virginia, tobacco provided a valuable cash crop. By the early 1700s enslaved Africans made up a growing percentage of the colonial population.

Here is a list of the thirteen colonies (now states) with the year they were founded and some notes on their formation:

  • Virginia (1607) – John Smith and the London Company.  This colony was named after Queen Elizabeth I, the “virgin queen” who married England instead of a husband. (West Virginia wasn’t a separate state until 1861.)
  • New Hampshire (1623) – The settlement of New Hampshire did not happen because those who came were persecuted out of England.  It was named by John Mason after the county of Hampshire in England (home of Jane Austen and Charles Dickens).
  • Massachusetts (1630) – Puritans looking for religious freedom. It was named after an Algonquian tribe, the Massachusett, which translates to something along the lines of “people of the great hill” or “at the place of large hills,” referring to the famous Blue Hills southwest of Boston.
  • Maryland (1633) – George and Cecil Calvert as a safe haven for Catholics who were persecuted in England.  Calvert, the second Lord Baltimore, received a charter from Charles I of England and the colony was to be named after Charles’ wife, Queen Henrietta Mary (she went by Queen Mary).
  • Connecticut (1636) – The Dutch were the first Europeans to reach Connecticut in 1614. But there were already Native Americans in what would become the Nutmeg State. The name Connecticut is derived from the Algonquian word “quinnehtukqut” that means “beside the long tidal river.”
  • Rhode Island (1636) – Italian explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano in the early 16th century referred to an island near the mouth of Narragansett Bay that he compared to the Island of Rhodes in the Mediterranean.  Some suggest Dutch explorer Adrian Block named it “Roodt Eylandt” meaning “red island” in reference to the red clay that lined the shore.
  • Delaware (1638) – The New Sweden Company was chartered and, in 1638, established The Colony of New Sweden at Fort Christina, in what is today Wilmington, Delaware. British took over in 1664.  The bay, river, colony and now state were named in 1610 by English explorer Samuel Argall (1580-1626) in honor of Virginia’s governor, Thomas West, Lord De La Warr.
  • North Carolina (1663) – Beginning in 1712, there were separate and distinct governments of the northeastern and southwestern parts of Carolina, and they were referred to as North and South Carolina.  Each received separate royal colonies in 1729.  Named after King Charles I. The Latin version of Charles is “Carolus,” from which “Carolina” is derived.
  • South Carolina (1663) – Beginning in 1712, there were separate and distinct governments of the northeastern and southwestern parts of Carolina, and they were referred to as North and South Carolina.  Each received separate royal colonies in 1729.  Named after King Charles I. The Latin version of Charles is “Carolus,” from which “Carolina” is derived.
  • New York (1664) – Originally founded by the Dutch (1614), it became a British colony in 1664. It was originally called New Netherland when the Dutch founded it — when the British took over in 1664 it received its present name that honors King Charles II’s brother, the Duke of York and Albany.  (The word York comes from the Latin word for city.)
  • New Jersey (1664) – The Dutch, Swedes, and Finns were the first European settlers in New Jersey.  First settled by the Dutch, the English took over in 1664.  In 1664 the Dutch lost New Netherlands when the British took control of the land and added it to their colonies. It was named for the island of Jersey in the English Channel in honor of Sir George Carteret.  (Carteret had been governor of the Isle of Jersey.)
  • Pennsylvania (1681) – The Swedes and Dutch were the first European settlers.  In May of 1680, William Penn petitioned King Charles II for land in the New World. Penn wished to call the land “New Wales,” or simply “Sylvania,” Latin for “woods.” King Charles II insisted that “Penn” precede the word “Sylvania”, in honor of William’s late father to create “Pennsylvania”, or “Penn’s Woods.”
  • Georgia (1732) – In the 1730s, England founded the last of its colonies in North America. The four-fold purpose in founding Georgia were to provide relief of the poor; to build a buffer colony against the Spaniards in Florida and the French in Louisiana; to promote trade of Great Britain; and to provide refuge for persecuted Protestants (and carry Christianity to the ‘Indians’).  Georgia is named for King George II. King George granted the charter in 1732, stipulating that the territory bear his name.  (The -ia suffix means ‘state of’ and comes from the Greek language.)

Growth in the Colonies

It took from 1607 to 1630 to reach a combined estimated population of 4,646 in six colonies: Maine, New Hampshire, Plymouth, Massachusetts, New York, and Virginia.

By 1640, new settlements had been placed or developed in Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Maryland, bringing the colonial population to 26,634. It nearly doubled to 50,358 by mid-century, with one new colony established in Delaware.

During the next three decades, the colonies of Carolina, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania were established. Maine joined with Massachusetts. Total estimated population of the colonies reached 151,507 in 1680. Of these, Negroes numbered 6,971, of which some 3,000 were in Virginia.  (The word “Negro” is used in the Census Bureau’s statistical tables.)

In the last two decades of the century, no new colonies were established. Plymouth merged with Massachusetts in 1691. The population of the colonies grew to 250,888 in 1700, of which Negroes numbered 16,729 (11.2 percent), as slavery provided labor for tobacco and other plantations.

The first American century consisted of coastal, sparsely populated settlements. For purposes of comparison with the mother country, the population of England in 1607 has been estimated at 4,303,043, rising modestly to 5,026,877 in 1700. During the 1600s, England encouraged migration to the colonies to help ward off French ambitions in the new world.

After an initial period of high mortality, the colonists soon acclimated to their new circumstances. Better economic conditions and the absence of wars and violent religious disputes attracted thousands of European migrants, freemen and indentured servants alike. The colonists enjoyed greater abundance and variety in their diets.

Low densities and dispersed settlements minimized the spread of communicable diseases and epidemics. Abundant forests provided heating fuel. Infant mortality rates quickly fell below those in Europe. A typical colonial family had eight children, double that of England and Europe. By 1700, colonial women routinely lived into their sixties despite risks of death in childbirth.

By the mid-1600s, the colonies were fast becoming lands of opportunity.

About three-quarters of the colonists were farmers. A typical farm often exceeded 100 acres. Farmers produced surpluses of grain that rivaled the output of tobacco. A colonial adult farmer consumed 150-200 pounds of meat a year; most corn was fed to livestock. Farm families supplemented agricultural work with handicraft production.

Most farmers owned their land. To encourage immigration, colonists often received free or almost free land. Land was readily available at low prices, and new land was accessible on the frontier. Many tenants acquired their own land after a short period of tenancy, a change in status that was virtually impossible in Europe.

In 1700, there were about 250,000 European settlers and enslaved Africans in North America’s English colonies.

By 1750, some 80 per cent of the North American continent was controlled or influenced by France or Spain. Their presence was a source of tension and paranoia among those in the 13 British colonies, who feared encirclement, invasion and the influence of Catholicism.

There was a huge increase in population in America during the 1700s

  • In 1700 there were 300,000 people in America; 20,000 blacks
  • By 1775 there were 2.5 million people in America; 500,000 were black
  • 400,000 were new immigrants; an additional 400,000 were black slaves
  • The rest was due to the natural fertility of Americans; colonists doubled their numbers every 25 years

Click the following link to a general summary about Growth of the Colonies:

Click to access Growth-of-the-British-North-American-Colonies-SAR-RT.pdf

Click to access Growth-of-the-Colonies.pdf

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

About 250 Years Ago … Benjamin Franklin’s ‘Examination’

As we approach the semiquincentennial (250th) anniversary of the forming of the United States, here is a brief summary of issues and actions that led to the Revolution and the Revolutionary War … this is about the Examination of Benjamin Franklin.

The French and Indian War (1754-1763) was the North American phase of a worldwide conflict between Britain, the French and Native Americans.

While the British won the war, the French and Indian War had been enormously expensive and left Great Britain with a heavy debt.  And, the expense of protecting the English possessions in America seemed likely to increase rather than diminish.

The war and the British government’s attempts to impose taxes on colonists to help cover these expenses resulted in increasing colonial resentment of British attempts to expand imperial authority in the colonies.

One of the early taxes to be imposed was the Stamp Act. 

On February 13, 1766, Benjamin Franklin appeared before the British Parliament’s House of Commons to advocate for a repeal of the Stamp Act of 1765.  (Archives)  Franklin provided evidence in the form of answers to 174 questions. The session, according to the Proceedings of Parliament, lasted for four hours.

Franklin shared his observations on the attitude of the colonists towards the British Empire before and after the imposition of the Stamp Act, and comments on issues of taxation, representation and the ability of the colonies to become economically independent from the mother country.   Here are some of Franklin’s responses:

 At the time, In North America there were about 300,000 white men from sixteen to sixty years of age.  The population increase of “the inhabitants of all the provinces together, taken at a medium, double[d] in about 25 years.”

“But their demand for British manufactures increased much faster, as the consumption is not merely in proportion to their numbers, but grows with the growing abilities of the same numbers to pay for them.”

Colonists’ Attitude to Britain

The “temper of America towards Great Britain before the year of 1763” was “The best in the world, they have submitted willingly to the government of the Crown, and paid, in all their courts, obedience to acts of parliament.”

“They had not only a respect, but an affection, for Great Britain, for its laws, its customs and manners, and even a fondness for its fashions, that greatly increased the commerce.”

“They consider themselves as a part of the British empire, & as having one common interest with it; they may be looked on here as foreigners, by they do not consider themselves as such.”

And, in 1763, “it is greatly lessened” which was due to “a concurrence of causes; the restraints lately laid on their trade, by which the bringing of foreign gold and silver into the colonies was prevented; the prohibition of making paper money among themselves; and then demanding a new and heavy tax by stamps; taking away at the same time, trials by juries, and refusing to receive & hear their humble petitions.

Their temper in 1766? … “O, very much altered.”

Parliament

Before 1763, there was no “objection to the right of [Parliament] laying duties to regulate commerce; but a right to lay internal taxes was never supposed to be in parliament, as we are not represented there.”

“But the payment of duties laid by act of parliament, as regulations of commerce was never disputed.”

Previously, “there was never an occasion to make any such act, till now that [Britain has] attempted to tax us; that has occasioned resolutions of assembly, declaring the distinction, in which I think every assembly on the continent, and every member in every assembly, have been unanimous.”

Taxes Versus Duties

The difference between external taxes and internal taxes “is very great.”

“An external tax is a duty laid on commodities imported; that duty is added to the first cost, and other charges on the commodity, and when it is offered to sale, makes a part of the price. If the people do not like it at that price, they refuse it; they are not obliged to pay it.”

“But an internal tax is forced from the people without their consent, if not laid by their own representatives.”

Colonists Were Willing to Pay Their Fair Share

“The Colonies raised, paid and clothed, near 25,000 men during the last war, a number equal to those sent from Britain, and far beyond their proportion; they went deeply in debt in doing this, and all their taxes and estates are mortgages, for many years to come, for discharging that debt. Government here was at that time sensible of this. The Colonies were recommended to parliament.”

“Every year the King sent down to the house a written message to this purpose. That his Majesty, being highly sensible of the zeal and vigour with which his faithful subjects in North-America had exerted themselves, in defence of his Majesty’s just rights and possession, recommended it to the house to take the same into consideration, and enable him to give them a proper compensation.”

“You will find those messages on your own journals every year of the war to the very last, and you did accordingly give 200,000 Pounds annually to the Crown, to be distributed in such compensation to the Colonies.”

“This is the strongest of all proofs that the Colonies, far from being unwilling to bear a share of the burthen, did exceed their proportion, for if they had done less, or had only equaled their proportion, there would have been no room or reason for compensation.”

“Indeed the sums reimbursed them, were by no means adequate to the expence they incured beyond their proportion; but they never murmured at that; they esteemed their Sovereign’s approbation of their zeal and fidelity, the approbation of this house, far beyond any other kind of compensation”.

“[T]herefore, there was no occasion for this act, to force money from a willing people, they had not refused giving money for the purposes of the act: no requisition had been made; they were always willing and ready to do what could reasonably be expected from them, and in this light they wish to be considered.”

If Great-Britain should be engaged in a war in Europe, I think North-America would contribute to the support of it, “as far as their circumstances would permit.”  The Colonists “consider themselves as a part of the whole.”

“Though the parliament may judge of the occasion, the people, will think it can never exercise such a right, till representatives from the Colonies are admitted into parliament, & that whenever the occasion arises, representatives will be ordered.”

“They will not find a rebellion; they may indeed make one.”

The pride of the Americans used to be “To indulge in the fashions and manufactures of G. Britain.”

What is now their pride? “To wear their old cloaths over again, till they can make new ones.” (Benjamin Franklin) (Information here is from Massachusetts Historical Society)

Repeal of Stamp Act

Delegates from the colonies convened in New York City at the Stamp Act Congress, where they drew up formal petitions to the British Parliament and to King George III to repeal the act. It was the first unified colonial response to British policy and it provided the British a taste of what would come soon thereafter.

Realizing that it actually cost more to enforce the Stamp Act in the protesting colonies than it did to abolish it, the British government repealed the tax in 1766. 

Click the following links to general summaries about Ben Franklin’s ‘Examination’:

Click to access Actions-After-the-French-and-Indian-War-Changed-Everything-SAR-RT.pdf

Click to access Benjamin-Franklins-Examination.pdf

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

About 250 Years Ago … Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania

John Dickinson, a Philadelphia lawyer and wealthy landowner, wrote twelve “Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania: to the Inhabitants of the British Colonies” began to appear in the Pennsylvania Chronicle and Universal Advertiser on December 2, 1767, under the simple pseudonym ‘a Farmer.’

Using constitutional argument laced with political economy, Dickinson sought to persuade everyone who read his words, on either side of the Atlantic, of both the economic folly and the unconstitutionality of ignoring the rights of Englishmen living in the American Colonies.

The letters first appeared in the newspapers over a period of ten weeks in late 1767 and early 1768.

Letter One (December 2, 1767) introduced the small, fictional farmer, with a few servants and a small amount of investments, and then launched into an attack on the threat to the New York legislature, warning the other colonies that without unity of resistance to such efforts, all may fall separately.

Letter Two (December 7, 1767) took to task the Revenue Act as unconstitutional. “The Farmer” went on to argue for free trade and the end of taxes on goods that the colonies are not allowed to manufacture and must import from the homeland.

Letter Three (December 14, 1767) appealed strongly for a peaceful and dignified settlement of arguments between colonies and Crown, and displayed Dickinson’s respect for order which marked all of his opinion in years to come.

Letter Four (December 21, 1767) discussed taxes and the right to representation before any taxes – internal or external – were to be levied.

Letter Five (December 28, 1767) asked why there was this sudden departure from the traditional since taxes were now being passed for the sole task of raising revenue from the colonies. “The Farmer” blamed those who had proposed them for alienating the affections of the Kings’ subjects.

Letter Six (January 4, 1768) remarked upon the ways that “all artful rulers” extend their power unconstitutionally and warned the colonies to be ever vigilant of what future actions from the Parliament might mean.

Letter Seven (January 11, 1768) reiterated that although taxes may be small and the burden tolerable in business terms, the precedent is the fatal danger that makes the colonists, in effect, slaves.

Letter Eight (January 18, 1768) reinforced the unconstitutionality of taxation without representation, especially concerning the way that the government spends the money raised, quite possibly in ways not helpful, or even dangerous, to those who pay them.

Letter Nine (January 25, 1768) lectured fellow colonists on the vital need for local representation and firmly established assemblies.

Letter Ten (February 1, 1768) was another warning, this time against the dangers of the current hostile atmosphere in the British Parliament and the logical progression of tyranny (citing Ireland), after precedent has been set and allowed to stand.

Letter Eleven (February 8, 1768) again dealt with precedent, and said that new unconstitutional designs of government must be recognized and halted immediately, before they become entrenched.

Letter Twelve (February 15, 1768) wound up the series with the common sense argument that all colonies and legislatures must be united in opposition to all attempts to install unconstitutional precedent, even though all interests may not be individually served.

Click the link to view the letters and/or hear an audio reading of each:  https://tinyurl.com/u3n8uyp9

The letters were quickly published in pamphlet form, reprinted in almost all colonial newspapers, and read widely across the colonies and in Britain.

There is little doubt that the flood of petitions and calls for boycotts on imported goods up and down the colonies owed much to these letters.  Perhaps most importantly, the concept of unity started to take root.

Dickinson himself blamed the New England colonies for escalating affairs to undignified violence and held the fleeting opinion later that Boston had brought its troubles on itself.

Nevertheless, the eventual result was the calling of the Continental Congress and the unity of purpose that John Dickinson had advocated, though certainly not in the directions that he had argued in his letters and would continue to argue at the Congress. (John Osborne, Dickinson University)

Click the following links to general summaries about Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania:

Click to access Letters-From-A-Farmer-SAR-RT.pdf

Click to access Letters-from-a-Farmer.pdf

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

About 250 Years Ago …Taxes, Taxes, Taxes

As we approach the semiquincentennial (250th) anniversary of the forming of the United States, here is a brief summary of issues and actions that led to the Revolution and the Revolutionary War … this is about Taxes, Taxes, Taxes.

The French and Indian War was a clash of British, French and American Indian cultures. American Colonists were British citizens and fought side-by-side with the red coats.

The war started as a struggle for control of the land west of the Allegheny Mountains in the Ohio River Valley. (It was waged from 1754 to 1763.)

As the conflict spread, European powers began to fight throughout the world.  It became a war fought on four continents: North America, Europe, Asia & Africa.

(The European portion of the war was called the Seven Years War.)

It ended with the removal of French power in North America.

The stage was set for the American Revolution. In a lot of respects, actions after the French and Indian war changed every-thing in the Colonies.

While the British won the war, it had been enormously expensive and left Great Britain with a heavy debt.

British government’s attempts to impose taxes on the Colonists to help cover those expenses resulted in increasing Colonial resentment.

The Colonists claimed they were equal to all other British citizens.

They felt they should be treated equally and argued that without representation in Parliament, Parliament could not tax them.

Parliament taxed and imposed import/export restrictions on the Colonies early and often (here are some):

Sugar Act (April 5, 1764)

Currency Act (April 19, 1764)

Stamp Act (March 22, 1765)

Quartering Act (Mar. 24, 1765)

Declaratory Act  (Mar. 18, 1766)

Townshend Acts (June 5, 1767)

Tea Act (May 10, 1773)

Intolerable Acts (Mar. 31, 1774)

Mounting tensions came to a head during the Battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, when the “shot heard round the world” was fired.

It was not without warning; the Boston Massacre on March 5, 1770 and the Boston Tea Party on December 16, 1773 showed the increasing dissatisfaction with British rule in the Colonies.

The Declaration of Independence, issued on July 4, 1776 stated the reasons the Colonists felt com-pelled to break from the rule of King George III and parliament to start a new nation.

In September of that year, the Continental Congress declared the “United Colonies” of America to be the “United States of America.”

France joined the war on the side of the Colonists in 1778, helping the Continental Army conquer the British at the Battle of Yorktown in 1781.

The American Revolutionary War in North America lasted from April 19, 1775 (with the Battles of Lexington and Concord) to September 3, 1783 (with the signing of the Treaty of Paris.)

It lasted 8 years, 4 months, 2 weeks and 1 day; then, the sover-eignty of the United States was recognized roughly by what is now Canada to the north, Florida to the south, and the Mississippi River to the west.

The Peace of Paris is a collection of treaties ending the American Revolution and signed by representatives of Great Britain on one side and the United States, France, and Spain on the other.

Click the following link to a general summary about Taxes, Taxes, Taxes.

Click to access Taxes-Taxes-Taxes-SAR-RT.pdf

© 2024 Hoʻokuleana LLC