UNIT FOUR
THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION
Road to Revolution
The French and Indian War, 1754-1763
By the 1750’s, the population of the thirteen colonies had grown to the point that many colonists wanted to move into the Ohio Valley, which is located to the west of the Appalachian Mountains. England claimed this land, as she did the eastern coast, based on John Cabot’s trip. However, her claim to land that far from the coastline was rather shaky. After all, Cabot never set foot on that land. The French also claimed the Ohio Valley, and they actually had a better claim, as their nationals had actually traveled over the land they were claiming. The French, as you will recall, made a living by hunting and trapping fur bearing animals, and they got along well with Indians, who were doing the same thing. When the English colonists moved into the Ohio Valley, they wanted to make farms and that meant clear the trees from the land. That, in turn, meant the animals would leave! so the French and the Indians wouldn’t be able to make a living any more. That made the French and the Indians mad. They retaliated against the English colonies by putting up no trespassing signs and when that didn’t work, they raided the English settlements. The English colonists then complained to England and asked for protection. In 1754, shooting commenced and the "French and Indian War", as the English colonists called it, got started. This war in America was only part of a much larger war between France and England called the Seven Years War. At first, the British did not do well in this war, but leadership in England changed, plans for war were changed, and eventually the British won. The French and the British signed the Treaty of Paris in 1763; by this treaty, as far as America was concerned, France lost most of her claims to the land. This is something France was extremely mad about and we’ll see how she gets revenge later. For Britain, the war was a triumph! She was now undisputed #1 European nation, and she had increased her land holdings quite a bit. She now had a large empire. On the other hand, she now had more responsibility and she had a humungous (as far as she is concerned) national debt! It was 140 million pounds. It sounds like nothing today, but nations then didn’t think you should tolerate national debt. Britain’s point of view on this debt was that everyone in the Empire benefited from the war, now it was up to them to help pay the debt, including the her American colonies, of course, who, in her mind, quite possibly benefited the most.
Britain changes her policy toward the colonies in America
As you will recall, Britain had maintained a policy toward her colonies called "salutary neglect". This policy had given the colonists right much freedom to handle their own affairs and had overlooked it when the colonists broke the trade and navigation laws.
In 1763, Britain adopted a new policy. It was made to deal with the financial problems Britain now had as a consequence of the war, and it was made to try to deal with the Indians in the Ohio Valley, who were having trouble adjusting to the French loss. The policy called for more British troops in America to patrol the Ohio Valley and it called for the colonies to help pay the cost of this army and to help pay off the debt. It also advised that the colonists be prohibited from settling in the Ohio Valley. The extra troops would also enforce this rule. The new policy was recommended by the Earl of Shelburne, head of the Board of Trade in London which advised the British government on colonial affairs.
The Proclamation Act of 1763
On the advice of the Earl of Swinburne, the Proclamation Act was passed in 1763. This act specifically forbade the colonists to move into the Ohio Valley. The reason for it was as mentioned above; Britain wanted a chance to get a handle on the Indian situation before allowing more colonists into the area; in other words, to Britain’s mind, this was done to protect the colonists and keep them safe from Indian attack. The only problem was that Britain did not realize that colonists were quite used to dealing with hostile Indians by now, and they felt they did not need this protection. Britain also used this occasion to station more troops in America. Again, the colonists felt they did not need them. To hear the colonists tell the story, they had won the French and Indian War all by themselves! Such well-organized efficient fighters did not need extra protection! The colonists also suspected (correctly) that the troops would be used to keep them from moving into the Ohio Valley. The colonists also were upset because they believed they had fought the French and Indian War for the privilege of going to the Ohio Valley. What had been the point if now they could not go there? However, while the Proclamation Act upset the colonists, it did not produce major furor. The colonists simply ignored it! They knew many ways through the Appalachian Mountains and the British could not possibly patrol them all.
The next problem was to find a way to collect money from the colonies to help pay for the extra troops now stationed in America and to help pay on the national debt. The British at home could not be taxed any more than they were already being taxed. The colonists should be willing to pay this money was the British point of view. They benefited from being part of the largest empire in the world; they should be willing to "play ball" and cooperate. The man in charge of collecting the money was George Grenville, as he was the king’s chief minister in Parliament and the head of the Treasury. Grenville decided to tax the colonies directly.
The Sugar Act, 1764
Parliament passed the Sugar Act in 1764. The Sugar Act put a tax on molasses, and other imports, such as wine. The other thing it did was to make admiralty court legal. This means that if a merchant were caught smuggling, the British officials could take the ship and the goods and punish the offender without the usual jury trial to which British citizens were entitled by right. The British now patrolled the coastline more carefully so that it was harder to smuggle but, again, the British did not know the coastline as well as the colonists did, and smuggling flourished anyway. The colonists got upset, however; many protests were sent to London asking for repeal (removal) of the Sugar Act. The Sugar Act particularly hurt the New England colonies, and they began to question Britain’s right to tax them for revenue. Many colonists feared worse to come. The British were apparently very surprised by this protest, but they did not remove the Sugar Act.
The Stamp Act, 1765
George Grenville was disappointed with the amount of money coming in from the Sugar Act. Parliament , with Grenville’s advice, then passed the Stamp Act in 1765. The British people were already paying a stamp tax. This act put a tax on many kinds of legal documents and publications. The act required you to buy a stamp to put on the documents and/or publications; it also, in some cases, made you buy a certain kind of stamped paper. The kinds of documents taxed ranged from marriage licenses and wills to newspapers, magazines, advertisements and pamphlets. Again, violators could be brought before admiralty court. This meant that there was little way a person could avoid paying the stamp tax. The stamp tax also raised a question that the Sugar Act hadn’t really raised. The Stamp Act was an internal tax, as opposed to something like an import duty or a tariff. Internal taxes affect everyone. The question was, did Parliament have the right to charge such a tax if the colonies had no representatives in Parliament? For years now, no British citizen had paid any kind of internal tax that his representative had not voted on in Parliament. The colonists would have answered this question "No"; they thought they were British citizens and they had the right to vote. Parliament did not necessarily agree on this issue. However, had Britain wanted to spare herself trouble at this point, she could have given the colonists their representatives - they would have been outvoted, anyway. However, she did not. The colonial leaders passed resolutions saying Parliament had no right to tax them in response to the Stamp Act.
During the summer and fall of 1765, the colonists looked for ways to get Parliament to remove the stamp tax. In October of 1765, representatives from nine of the colonies met in New York to plan what to do about the tax. This meeting was called the Stamp Act Congress. This was the first time the colonists had actively worked together for political action. They declared their united opposition to the stamp tax, and they called on Parliament to remove the tax.
Meanwhile, merchants in Boston, Philadelphia and New York agreed to stop buying British goods. This is called a boycott. By doing this they hoped to make British merchants hurt financially until they begged Parliament to repeal the tax.
While some colonists were trying legal and peaceful means to get the stamp tax removed, others were not so patient. They took to violent means to get rid of the tax. Mobs formed in the streets and vandalized the homes of the British who were supposed to sell the stamps. Some colonists attacked the stamp sellers themselves, tarring and feathering them. There were riots in many of the colonies. In one instance, colonists set fire to the special stamped paper. As a result of the violence, many stamp distributors resigned, so there were not enough people to sell stamps when November came and the act was supposed to go into effect.
When the act went into effect in November, the colonists carried on as if the act had never been passed. At this point, a group of men formed an organization that called itself the "Sons of Liberty". The Sons of Liberty organized itself so that there were "chapters" of it in every colony. It met secretly and the various chapters kept in touch by writing letters. Those who wrote the letters were called "committees of correspondence". Other people were commissioned to run messages from one colony to another. The Sons of Liberty were willing to use whatever means it took to accomplish their goals, including violence, vandalism and riots. In the case of the Stamp Act, the Sons of Liberty undermined British authority by threatening violence if they tried to enforce it. The British army would have been needed at this point to enforce the act, and the Sons of Liberty said they’d fight if the army were used to enforce the law.
The uproar in the colonies caused the British government to fall. You don’t take this literally - it means that the party in power in Parliament no longer had the confidence of the citizens so an election was called. This can happen at any time in Britain, unlike the United States that has scheduled elections. The British merchants had been complaining about the act because the colonists were still boycotting their goods, so their clamor had been added to the colonists’ clamor over the act. There were two parties in Britain at this time, the Whigs and the Tories. These parties had started during the reign of Charles II of the Stuart family. ‘Whig’ and ‘Tory" were both pejorative nicknames for the real names of the parties - the Abhorrers and the Petitioners. Whigs were far friendlier to the American colonies than the Tories were. In the election that was held, the Whigs won. The Marquis of Rockingham replaced Grenville as the king’s chief minister in Parliament and pushed through Parliament a repeal of the Stamp Act. At the same time, however, Parliament passed the Declaratory Act. This said that Parliament did have the right to tax the colonies. This act was not publicized; most colonists did not know it existed.
There was much rejoicing in the colonies. They had gotten their way at last! The lesson they learned out of this whole thing was unfortunate from Britain’s point of view: if you fuss hard enough and long enough, you’ll get your way. Cause enough trouble and the British government will have an election. In Britain, what to do with the colonies became a political issue on which the parties took sides and argued with each other. The colonists were quick to figure this one out, too. However, for the time being, things quieted down in the colonies. Relationships improved and trade was resumed. The colonies accepted the restoration of British authority.
The Quartering Act, 1765
The background for this act was that George Grenville decided he might save some money by making each colonist take in a certain number of British soldiers and give them room, board, candles and firewood. That way he would not have to spend money to build barracks for the soldiers. There was some precedent for this in Britain; Charles II had quartered the military with the civilians. The Quartering Act was passed at about the same time as the Stamp Act, so it didn’t attract quite as much attention from the colonists. However, they did object strenuously to the Quartering Act. They called it taxation in an indirect from. However, their main objection was that having the soldiers there invaded their privacy, and they were sure the soldiers were there to spy on them to see if they were smuggling. The whole idea of the military being quartered on the civilians bothered the colonists so much that when the Bills of Rights was written to our Constitution, one of the rights included was that the military cannot be quartered with civilians. (Bill of Rights, Amendment 3) The Quartering Act was not repealed.
Leading up to the final break between Britain and her colonies
The Townsend Acts, 1767
The ministry of the Earl of Chatham, William Pitt, and the Duke of Grafton was more sympathetic to the colonies. However, Chatham was ill, and Charles "Champagne Charlie" Townsend seized control of the ministry. The British government still needed money and they still thought the colonists should help to pay. Charles Townsend boasted that he could ‘pluck feathers from the colonial goose without its squawking’; that is, collect money without any of the uproar that the Stamp Act had caused. To this end, he got Parliament to pass the Townsend Acts in 1767. The Townsend Acts put a tax on five items; items which Charlie thought the Americans would have to import. These items were glass, lead, paper, paint and tea. The acts also set up a new customs system, extended the powers of admiralty courts and made writs of assistance legal. A writ of assistance gave the British officials the right to search a colonist’s home without a warrant. The writ of assistance also violated a right that the colonists thought they had not to be searched unless the person searching had a warrant.
The colonists reacted to the Townsend Acts the way they had to the Stamp Act, only not quite as violently. They revived the boycott that they had instituted against the Stamp Act, and they sent protests to Britain again saying Britain had no right to tax them. One of the reasons that they did not protest so violently was that they found they could make a number of the taxed items, such as the glass, paint and paper. That way they did not have to buy those items. They also found that they could smuggle tea.
Britain suspends the New York Assembly, 1768
The New York Assembly had been refusing to provide for British troops as required under the Quartering Act, so Parliament responded by denying the assembly powers of legislation until it obeyed the Quartering Act. The Assembly yielded, but this incident further angered the colonists against Britain.
The Liberty Affair, 1768
On the coast near Boston in June, 1768, the British officials seized the Liberty, a ship belonging to the wealthy merchant, John Hancock. It was smuggling Portuguese wine. When the British seized a ship, they took it and its contents, and brought the captain before the admiralty court. This often resulted in the captain and the men being taken into the British navy whether they wanted to go there or not.
When the news got out about the Liberty, there were riots in Boston in support of Mr. Hancock. As a result of the riots, the board of tariff officials in Boston asked the British government to send more troops to Boston to protect them. The British government did send the troops, who patrolled the streets and set up curfews. To all intents and purposes, the British put Boston under martial law. The colonists in Boston bitterly resented this; it punished all of them when not all were guilty of the riots the previous June. They reacted to the British patrolling the streets by making fun of them. They called the British soldiers "Redcoats" and "Lobsterbacks", referring to the red coats of the British Army uniform. Now the young men in these troops weren’t very old and they weren’t Britain’s best men. They weren’t up to the harassment they got. It was in this tense atmosphere that the next incident happened.
The Boston Massacre, 1770
It was cold and snowy on this March day in 1770 in Boston. Some people were in the street having a snowball fight. The British soldiers, as usual, were walking up and down the streets. A mob of about 50 people began to harass the British soldiers and to throw snowballs at them. The soldiers were desperate and didn’t know what to do, so they shot into the crowd to disperse it. Unfortunately, they hit and killed five people, including one black man, Crispus Attucks. The general British policy in cases like this was to take the men back to Britain for trial, but the colonists insisted the men be tried in America. Two of the soldiers were found guilty of manslaughter. Their punishment was discharge from the military service and being branded on the hand. The British then withdrew the troops from Boston proper to an island in Boston Harbor.
The Sons of Liberty were not about to let this incident pass. It was a great opportunity to work up the people against the British. The Sons of Liberty managed to have newspaper stories printed which exaggerated the story until it seemed like hundreds had been killed instead of just five. They referred to the incident as the "Boston Massacre"! The name suggested large-scale killing. Paul Revere did an etching that showed British soldiers gunning down the people to go with the story. The Sons of Liberty also made sure that the other colonies got news of the event. This way they would get the Sons of Liberty’s story.
On the same day as the Boston Massacre happened, the Parliament repealed the Townsend tariffs on paint, glass, and paper. The Townsend Acts had been unsuccessful in raising revenue; that is why they were repealed, not because of anything the colonists did. The Townsend - Grafton - Chatham ministry fell, and the Tories won. The new chief minister in Parliament was Lord North. The tariff on tea was kept as a reminder that Parliament had the right to tax the colonies. Few of the colonists objected to the small tax, even though they did not think Parliament had a right to charge it. Most of the other taxes imposed in those years by the British government were gone.
For the next three years, relations between Britain and the colonies were calm. The colonies and Britain had no showdowns because neither side brought up the touchy issue of Parliament’s authority over the colonies. Sam Adams of the Sons of Liberty was getting pretty frustrated trying to stir up trouble. However, he did have the committees of correspondence write letters to keep people worked up about the right to tax.
The Tea Act, 1773
The calm was bound not to last forever, simply because the issue of Parliament’s control over the colonies was still not solved. Lord North, who was the new chief minister in Parliament, was an able politician; he had the confidence of the king, and a strong majority in Parliament. His point of view was that the colonies should be happy to be a part of the great British Empire and that they should be happy to cooperate.
In December of 1773, Parliament passed the Tea Act. The Tea Act gave a certain British trading company the right to be the only company selling tea in America; in other words, the company would have a monopoly over the sale of tea in America. The name of the company was the British East India Tea Company and it was a pretty big corporation. It was going bankrupt due to financial mismanagement. The Parliament wanted to help it because of the great amount of unemployment that would be caused in Britain if the company went under. This unemployment would have a bad effect on the British economy. The colonies were supposed to cooperate and help save this company. Lord North figured it would be o.k. because the tea was going to be sold at a cheap price and the colonies ought not to mind.
Colonial reaction to the Tea Act was not what North expected. The East India Company’s price would make it so that the tea company was underselling American tea merchants. Smuggling tea became unprofitable because the smugglers had to ask a higher price for their tea because of the risk. American tea merchants couldn’t make any money selling tea. To the colonists, the act looked like a cheap trick to make the tea tax more acceptable.
The colonists got to work. It was decided that the colonists were not going to buy that tea because it was never going to get to the store. When the ships arrived in colonial ports, mobs prevented the unloading of the tea. Most of the ships turned back to Britain. Those that stayed had various things happen to the tea. In Annapolis, the tea and the ship were burned. In Charleston, the tea was unloaded into a damp warehouse and allowed to rot. A Boston town meeting declared that anyone who tried to land the tea was an ‘enemy of America’. Sam Adams and Sons of Liberty secretly made plans to dump the tea in the harbor. At a mass protest rally on December 16, 1773, he gave the signal for a group of men dressed as Indians to sneak onto the ships. There in the darkness they threw 342 chests of tea in the harbor! This event became known as the "Boston Tea Party".
The Coercive or ‘Intolerable’ Acts, 1774
The British government was now in an embarrassing position. They had promised to help the British East India Tea Company and now there had been all this vandalism; tea had been destroyed; the company was now out thousands of dollars, and this was a loss they financially could not stand. The company was expecting Parliament to do something.
It was decided to punish Boston as an "example" to other colonies. It would have been difficult to punish all the places that vandalism had happened, and Boston’s event was probably the best known to all the colonists. Also, the British had begun to figure out that the headquarters of the Sons of Liberty was in Boston or around it somewhere. They hoped by punishing Boston severely to "smoke out" the leaders of the Sons of Liberty. Therefore, the Coercive Acts were passed in early 1774. In the colonies, these acts were referred to as the "Intolerable" Acts. There were four of them:
The colonists everywhere were outraged by the Coercive Acts. They felt first of all that it was unfair for the British to punish Boston when all of the colonies had been more or less involved. They also thought the punishment was way out of proportion to the crime. They felt that their ways of self-government were threatened.
The Quebec Act, 1774
The Quebec Act was passed to provide a permanent government for the French Canadians in Quebec. The British government felt it to be the better part of wisdom to let the French Canadians keep their own ways. Accordingly, the Quebec Act allowed the French Canadians to keep their Catholic religion and it set up a French type government there. This type of government had no representative assembly. It also provided that the land area west of the Appalachians and north of the Ohio River be governed as part of Quebec. The British did this because they thought the French Canadians knew better how to deal with the Indians in this area.
The Quebec Act struck the colonists as positively unfair! It seemed the French Canadians, who had been their enemies in the French and Indian War, were getting special privileges that they weren’t getting, and they also didn’t like the idea that French Canadians were getting all that land. They didn’t like the extension of the Catholic religion to land that was so close to them. In addition, they didn’t like the precedent set by the French Canadians’ government with no representative assembly. Coming as it did on the heels of the Coercive Acts, it seemed a slap in the face to the colonies, although it was not intended to be that by the British.
The First Continental Congress, September-October, 1774
The most memorable response to the Coercive Acts was the calling of the First Continental Congress. This was managed by the committees of correspondence. The First Continental Congress met in Philadelphia in September, 1774, to consider ways to get the British to repeal the Coercive Acts and to listen to their other grievances. Twelve of the colonies sent delegates; only Georgia did not. There were 55 delegates, among them colonial leaders who had already distinguished themselves, such as John Adams, Samuel Adams, Patrick Henry and George Washington, and some new people who were beginning to play a larger role in colonial affairs. This congress was an important event: this was the first time this many colonies had cooperated on anything.
The First Continental Congress deliberated for seven weeks. It was not a legislative body but a consultative one. The Congress heard Joseph Galloway’s Plan of Union, which would have given the Americans a kind of home rule; that was defeated, however, by the narrowest of margins. The First Continental Congress then adopted some other measures they felt would make the British government listen to them. One was that they agreed to cut off all trade with Britain. This agreement was called The Association, and it was to be a complete boycott of British goods; no one would import, export or buy any goods that might benefit Britain. Another was that the Congress declared the Coercive Acts unconstitutional. The First Continental Congress sent Britain a ringing declaration of their rights and insisted Parliament had no authority over the colonies except to regulate trade. Colonists were advised to arm themselves. There was to be no shooting, however, unless the British provoked it first. As the meeting ended, the group decided to meet again in May of 1775 if the Coercive Acts were not repealed by then, or if some emergency came up.
Lexington and Concord, April, 1775
Trade with England was cut off. In New England and Virginia, the militia trained and guns and ammunition were collected. Virginia closed the courts, so British merchants could not collect their debts. The British made their military commander in the colonies, General Gage, the governor of Massachusetts. Back in Britain, the Parliament rejected the petitions and statements made by the First Continental Congress. Everything was very tense as people waited to see what would happen next.
For some time, the Massachusetts militia had been hiding guns and ammunition in Concord and Lexington, small towns not far from Boston. The British also found out that leaders of the Sons of Liberty were hiding there, too. They sent a detachment of men out to Concord and Lexington to get the guns and ammunition, and to hopefully "bag" the Sons of Liberty leaders, Sam Adams and John Hancock. The Sons of Liberty spies, hearing the British talk about this move, alerted the colonists in these towns that the British were on their way, so that when the British got to Lexington and Concord, the Sons of Liberty leaders had split and there were the "Minutemen" all lined up. The "Minutemen" were militiamen who had been trained for just such an encounter as this one. The "Minutemen" had been told not to fire first. A shot was fired, however; nobody knows who was really responsible. At any rate, there was more shooting and killing and the British retreated. On June 17, 1775, there was more fighting at Bunker Hill. This fighting changed the situation drastically as the colonies had now fired at their mother country. It didn’t take a lot of guesswork to figure out that she would do something about it. The colonies had to be prepared.
The Second Continental Congress, May 1775
The Second Continental Congress convened May 10, 1775, as they had planned to do if things did not improve. The Congress remained in session throughout the war for independence that was about to ensue. By this time , many people’s mood had changed from hope for a settlement to a readiness to use force. The first thing the Second Continental Congress did was to choose George Washington to be the Commander in Chief of the newly set up Continental army. The Congress also began to issue paper money, called Continentals, to pay for the army.
In July, the Congress passed two resolutions in one last appeal to the British government. One was a petition to the king, asking him to urge his ministers in Parliament to give up the oppressive measures. The other said that if the British would respect colonial rights, the colonists would lay down arms; if the British didn’t, the colonists would have no recourse but to fight. King George ignored the American petition and declared that the colonies were in a state of open rebellion against Britain. Parliament sent 25,000 more British troops to the colonies.
The Second Continental Congress at this point had a decision to make. It was obvious that Britain was not going to give in and she wasn’t interested in conciliation. Either the colonists gave in at this point or they made a break with Britain. This was a scary thing to even consider. If they decided to declare independence, they would be taking on the biggest and strongest empire in the world. Their chances of winning such a confrontation didn’t look too good. They had neither the people, the money nor the military expertise for such a confrontation. No one had ever done this before. They would need help, that was certain, but would any self-respecting nation help a group of colonies revolt against their mother?; it would set a bad precedent. They would also be giving up a lot, and the more moderate of the delegates knew it. They would be giving up the protection of the British navy, for example, and a guaranteed market for their goods. They would also be in their own - no help from "mamma" when things got hard or didn’t go right.
At this time, a publication appeared that helped the delegates in the decision they had to make. It was called Common Sense. It was written by Thomas Paine, an Englishman who had just come to America. Payne attacked monarchy as a form of government. He denounced George III as a tyrant and asked why the colonies were still loyal to him. He pointed out that other nations might help to break up the British Empire. Lastly, he said it was time for America to reject the traditions, superstitions and quarrels of the Old World.
The Declaration of Independence, July, 1776
In June, 1776, the Virginia delegation at the Second Continental Congress introduced the following resolution: "that these colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain is and ought to be totally dissolved." The Congress did not act immediately on the resolution, but instead voted to form a committee to write a document which would declare the colonies’ independence and also explain the reasons why the colonies were taking the independence step. It was necessary to make it clear to other nations that the colonies were independent; they felt they’d be more likely to receive help that way. The explanation was the honorable way to do things at that time. You always stated your reasons for a step as big as this. The men on the committee were John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman and Robert Livingston. Because he was the youngest, had less of a reputation already than some of the others, and because he was a Southerner, Thomas Jefferson was given the "privilege" of writing this document. Thomas Jefferson was strongly influenced by the ideas of Rousseau and John Locke, in particular, and by the rest of the Enlightenment thinkers in general. He worked for a month on the document, and it was presented to the full Congress on July 1, 1776. The Declaration of Independence, as it was called, was hotly debated. Southerners in particular objected to the paragraph dealing with slavery and threatened to walk out when Jefferson would not remove the paragraph. Ben Franklin saved the day by talking with Jefferson, and by getting Jefferson to see that forming the nation then was more important than arguing over slavery at that point. Jefferson agreed, reluctantly, to remove the paragraph, but he commented to Franklin that if the country did not deal with slavery then, it would deal with it later. The Congress had made a rule that all the colonies must vote "yes" on independence or the resolution would fail. This was necessary because they couldn’t have colonies backing out as the last minute or when the going got hard. After hours of argument, with the slavery paragraph removed, the Declaration of Independence was adopted by unanimous vote. John Hancock, president of the Second Continental Congress, signed his name in large writing, supposedly so that "fat George could read it without his spectacles". One by one the other delegates signed it and the bell was rung. (This is the bell that is today known as the "Liberty" bell.) The colonies had done it now, and there was no turning back. The Declaration was reprinted and sent to all the colonies, Britain and France.
No other document in our history has had as much influence on the rest of the world as the Declaration of Independence. In the process of the colonies’ trying to get help for their cause, the Declaration was spread to many European countries. In some, it was banned, and the people were not allowed to read it. That shows you how dangerous to their safety some of the governments thought it was. In others, France particularly, it circulated along with other Enlightenment literature. Like the other literature, it was discussed at the salons. Most Frenchmen were pretty familiar with what it said. It was an Enlightenment document; the ideas in it are Enlightenment ideas: the "all men are created equal" idea, for example, is based in the Enlightenment, as is the idea of men’s having natural rights. Jefferson describes government as a contract: "government is instituted to protect peoples’ rights", and if it doesn’t protect peoples’ rights, it hasn’t done its job. New with Jefferson was the idea that if a government is not doing its job, the people have the right "to alter or abolish" it; however, that thought is implied in the contract theory of government; Jefferson just said it in words. Nearly all revolutionary movements since the Declaration was written owe something to it. Also, many nations and groups of people seeking freedom have used it as a precedent and have copied its ideas. For the United States, it has always been our philosophy and it has set us goals to work for, as we have not yet reached the goals it sets in its philosophy. At times, it has even made us embarrassed as other nations pointed out to us that we have not fulfilled its goals.
The Declaration of Independence did not give the United States its independence from Great Britain. A hard and bitter war had to be fought first. The next section will deal with that war.
The War for Independence
Patriots and Loyalists
The Declaration of Independence meant that the colonists were in open rebellion against Great Britain. This development forced the colonists, each one, to make a decision. The decision was whether to remain loyal to Britain, to support the cause of American independence, or to try to remain uninvolved. This was not always an easy decision and sometimes the decision split families as it did in Benjamin Franklin’s case where his son remained loyal to Britain. Those who supported American independence were called "Patriots". Those who remained loyal to Britain were called "Loyalists". They were also sometimes called "Tories". Exact figures are not known, but roughly one third of the colonists were Patriots, one third were Loyalists, and another third were undecided. The Patriots included most of the leaders who had protested against British policies and had worked for independence for the past several years. Support for independence was particularly strong among the people of New England, Virginia planters, and the Scots-Irish in North Carolina. Loyalists were numerous in the Middle Colonies, the Carolinas and among minority groups who felt threatened culturally or economically by the Patriots. Loyalists suffered from discrimination as the war began; mobs looted their homes and mistreated them. Many Loyalists emigrated to Canada.
American advantages and disadvantages
The Americans had certain advantages as they took on the British Empire; while the situation looked impossible, it was not as bad as it appeared on the surface. First, they were blessed with unusual leadership. It is very uncommon to have so many great leaders appear at the same time. These leaders were able to inspire people and keep them going even when all seemed lost. Second, the Patriots were able to find help from European nations, especially France. France was anxious to get Britain back for the Seven Years War (French and Indian War to the colonists). To help the British’ American colonies revolt against their mamma seemed to be a particularly cruel joke to play. From the beginning, France helped secretly; later, she openly joined the American side. Third, many European officers came over to help, including the French Marquis de Lafayette, the German Baron von Steuben, and the Polish Thaddeus Kosciusko. Fourth, for the Americans, it was a defensive war. They did not need to win to prove their point; all they needed to do was not get defeated. A tie would do just fine. Fifth, the Americans knew that the war against them was not popular in Britain; if they could hang in there long enough, maybe there would be an election; the present party in power, the Tories, would lose and the other party would come into power. The other party, the Whigs, was friendlier to them. Also to their advantage was the size of America. From Massachusetts and New Hampshire to Georgia was a distance of 1200 miles; from the Appalachians to the seacoast about 600 miles. The British had to conquer that to win - and the colonists could wear them out traveling from one colony to the other. The colonists knew this land; the British did not. In addition, the Americans were fired up about the righteousness of their cause. They would fight much harder to win. The Americans were favored in that they were mainly self-sustaining - they could grow what they needed to eat. The same traits that had helped them survive the colonial experience were still very much a part of what every American was taught - self-reliance, ingenuity, inventiveness, individuality, resourcefulness - and these traits came to their aid in the war. The Americans could make do in the woods a lot better than the British could. Finally, the American soldier might not look like much, and he probably had never seen a military school, but he’d been hunting a lot in his life and he could aim and shoot a moving object. If an American aimed at your head, you were as good as dead. The British simply weren’t as good shots.
However, there were also SERIOUS obstacles for the Americans to overcome. The British had a professional army of about 50,000 men. George II was able to hire 30,000 more from Hesse in Germany. George Washington had a volunteer army. At best he had maybe a couple of thousand men. He never knew how many he could really count on; if something happened at home and a volunteer needed to leave, he did, just like that. Planting time came in the spring, half the army said, ‘See you later, George,’ and went home and planted the crop. At harvest time, it was the same scenario. The men weren’t trained in how to behave during a battle; they did not know how to take orders without arguing nor how to deal with it when it’s a person you’re shooting and not a squirrel, and that person has a gun aimed at you! These volunteers, by the way, were really very patriotic; half the time, George Washington had no money to pay them, so they certainly weren’t risking their lives for the money. Most of the war, Washington was outnumbered by British about 3 to 1. There were economic difficulties also. Wars cost money. The Second Continental Congress operated as a government throughout the war, but it was not a legal government and it could not tax. It had to beg for donations from the colonies to have any money at all. The Second Continental Congress was forced to print worthless paper dollars called "Continentals". The resulting inflation made prices get very high and the families of the soldiers at the front were hard hit. Jealousy reared its ugly head as the colonies quarreled and argued over appointments of military leaders. The colonies, ever watchful of encroachments on their "freedom", resented the attempts of the Second Continental Congress to exercise its weak powers. Basic military supplies were low, especially firearms and gunpowder. There was often not enough food for the soldiers; it wasn’t that the food wasn’t grown, but there was no way to get it to the front where the soldiers were. Manufactured goods were in short supply as were clothes and shoes. There were times the soldiers went barefoot, even in the winter!
British Advantages and Disadvantages
The colonies had taken on the largest empire on earth. The British outnumbered them 3 to 1. Britain had the largest and most powerful navy on earth. Her government might not have a lot of money, but her people did, so we say that Britain was a wealthy nation. The potential was there to be able to spend a lot of money. Britain had a professional army of some 50,000 men and she had the capability to hire more. The British also had the loyalty of one third of the colonists who would be willing to fight in her army. There were also Indian tribes she could enlist, though she could not trust them to necessarily stick around when the going got hard. It was also an advantage to her to have Canada to use as a base of operations and to have control of the colonial coastal waters.
Britain was weaker than she appeared at first glance, however. She had a big empire, true, but that big empire was a drain on her treasury and it had to be kept in order. That meant Britain could concentrate neither army nor navy in one place. Some of her other possessions were restless and rebellious, too; the Irish, for example, hated Britain and were just looking for an opportunity to revolt. Britain could not forget the French, either. They were seething and wanted revenge against Britain in the worst way. For that reason, Britain had to keep her best army officers and men at home. The war against the colonies was unpopular in Britain; many British did not want to fight Britishers in America. Some even thought the colonists were fighting their fight because they, too, considered George III tyrannical. The Whig Party even cheered colonial victories so that they could embarrass their political rivals who were in power, the Tories. The British had to conquer the colonies; a draw (tie) would not do; it wouldn’t prove her point. This would be very hard to do, given the size of the colonies, the fact that they were 3000 miles away in days when transportation and communications weren’t that good, and that the colonies had no main center, that, if you knocked that out, you had the rest. The British captured every city of any size, yet they made little more than a dent in the entire country. The British also had to be careful what they did to America; if they tore up the countryside, they would just ruin what they considered to be their land, and they would turn more colonists against them.
The strategies or war plans of each side
The British
The British had decided to try to do the following things to win the war in America. First, she would divide the colonies by cutting New England off from the rest of them. She would do this by capturing and occupying New York. She would try to do the same in the Southern colonies by occupying South Carolina. She could conquer and try to hold colonies with large numbers of Loyalists - this why she picked New York and South Carolina. She would conquer them and set up ‘puppet’ governments with Loyalists in control. She would use a combination of land and sea operations to capture colonial coastal cities. Last, she would try to make it so that Washington would have to come out in the open and fight a battle on the battlefield, the way the British thought you were supposed to.
The Americans
George Washington was smart enough to know he could not beat the British in open pitched battle. He had too few men and they were not as well trained as the British. He concentrated instead on a kind of warfare we call today "guerrilla" warfare. You practice a kind of hit and run approach to the enemy. The colonists had picked up this kind of warfare from the French and the Indians in the French and Indian War. Guerrilla warfare is effective because it wears down the enemy’s morale. The enemy keeps getting hit from all directions, yet he can’t seem to find the people hitting on him. He never has the satisfaction of winning a huge battle. After awhile, he gets frustrated and then he gets discouraged. The people back home don’t hear of any big victories, and they get frustrated and discouraged, too. Before long, the enemy hasn’t much spirit left to fight. Guerrilla warfare is often used when a group of people have to fight an enemy that outnumbers them. George Washington made the British come looking for him. He knew they weren’t very comfortable away from their home bases, and they certainly did not like to go through the woods. In the Southern colonies, the Americans carried on their activities near the swamps; the British were afraid of pursuing them into the swamps, too.
British try to cut off New England
In July of 1776, an awe-inspiring British fleet stood off New York City. It consisted of 500 ships and 35,000 men. Washington, by contrast, had only 18,000 poorly trained troops to defend America from the invaders. The Americans lost the Battle of Long Island, and Washington retreated across the Hudson River to New Jersey, and finally reached Delaware with the British close at his heels. The Americans then crossed the Delaware River to safety, because the British had no boats there. At this point, the British general, General Howe, could have probably taken Washington and his army with little trouble. However, Howe did not pursue the Americans. He was no military genius, and he remembered the bloodshed at Bunker Hill; also, it was just a lot more pleasant to stay in New York with his girlfriend than to go out and campaign. Washington and his men remained where they were and recouped.
The British, in the meantime had hired a group of German soldiers from Hesse, a state in Germany. These guys were called Hessians, and it really irritated the Americans that the British had brought these guys into what they considered a sort of family quarrel. The Hessians, for their part, did not care a whole lot who won. To them, this was a meal ticket, that was all. There was a group of these Hessians encamped on the other side of the Delaware River from Washington. Christmas, 1776, came, and the Hessians celebrated in time - honored German fashion. They paid absolutely no attention to the fact that Washington was across the river from them. At Trenton, on December 26, 1776, while the Germans slept, Washington and his men stealthily crossed the icy river, and took the 1000 Germans prisoner. Washington then stole down to Princeton and inflicted a defeat on a British detachment at Princeton. These victories were important because they gave the Americans, who were getting very discouraged, some hope.
The British then proceeded with their plan for capturing the state of New York. To them, this was vital as it would not only cut off New England, but also give them a way to transport goods and supplies down the Hudson River. The plans were that three British armies would meet at a place called Saratoga which is in up-state New York. Howe would go west from New York, General Burgoyne, another British general, would move down the Hudson from Canada. A third British general, St. Leger, would move east from Lake Ontario and the Mohawk Valley. It was important to the success of the plan that the three British armies meet there at the same time.
Things began to go wrong with the plan almost from the start. First, General Howe did not get started up the Hudson River soon enough. He decided he had time to capture Philadelphia and still make it to Saratoga on time. Howe captured Philadelphia and settled there, and he never made it up the Hudson to help the other two generals. Washington had moved his army to the area around Philadelphia but he was unable to defeat Howe. Again, Howe did not pursue Washington. Washington camped at Valley Forge for the winter. Meanwhile, Burgoyne started south along the Hudson. Here he ran into American general Benedict Arnold. Arnold had prevented Burgoyne from capturing Lake Champlain earlier, and Burgoyne needed to have control of it. He finally got it, but it slowed him down. Also, the Americans pursued him and harassed him with guerrilla tactics. He had an army composed of British, Canadians, some Germans and Indians. When the guerrilla warfare didn’t stop, a lot of his men deserted him. In the meantime, Americans had been able to stop the advance of St. Leger and his army. Thus, Burgoyne was in Saratoga by himself! He was finally surrounded, and he surrendered October 17, 1777. This victory at Saratoga was the turning point of the war, because after it, the French began to believe the Americans just might win this thing, after all, and they openly joined the American side. France was afraid that the British might want to make up with Americans at that point, and that did not suit her purposes at all. In the winter of 1777-1778, the British actually offered to renounce their right of taxing the colonies and to repeal the Coercive Acts as a basis for peace, so the French had good reason to fear this. The Americans weren’t interested in the British offer, however, and they did sign a treaty with the French. French intervention in the war on the American side made the war a lot more difficult for Britain who now had to deal with two enemies at once, one of whom was in a geographical position to stab her in the back quite easily if she wasn’t watching. It also wasn’t long before some more of Britain’s enemies joined the French, and it was only then, after she had to deal with a multi-power war, that Britain was willing to let her colonies go.
The British in the Southern colonies
The plan for New York had turned out to be a disaster for the British, so they proceeded to see what they could do about South Carolina. If they could conquer it, then, again, they would have divided the colonies and maybe they could drive north from there. In 1778-1779, Britain overran Georgia; then, in 1780, she attacked Charleston and captured it. The surrender of the city to the British meant that they came into the possession of 400 cannon, which was a great loss to the Americans, as was the capture of 500 men. Warfare intensified as the British tried to take the Carolinas. The Americans took to the mountains and the swamps where they harassed the British, again with guerrilla tactics. An American general named Francis Marion operated out of the swamps, so much so that he got the nickname of "Swamp Fox". Captain Nathaniel Greene distinguished himself by his stategy of delay. Standing and then retreating, he wore out the British general, Lord Cornwallis, in vain pursuit. The turning point in the war in the Southern colonies came in late 1780 and early 1781, when American riflemen wiped out the British at King’s Mountain and again at Cowpens. Greene then proceeded to clear the British out of Georgia and South Carolina.
Cornwallis, in spite of losing at King’s Mountain and at Cowpens, continued north toward Virginia. The British commanding general had told Cornwallis not to proceed too quickly lest he not be able to hold the territory he captured and lest he not get to far away from his supply lines, which came from Charleston. Cornwallis disregarded these orders; he believed he could win a quick victory by marching ever northward toward Virginia. He lost many troops on the way, and he was not able to maintain his supply lines from Charleston. He ended up at Yorktown, Virginia, on a peninsula, where he hoped the British navy would soon bring him some supplies. Strategically, though, this peninsula was a bad place to be! Unless he could escape by sea, Cornwallis could be trapped there very easily, because the peninsula was not very wide! In May, 1781, Washington heard that the French were sending a fleet of ships over to the French West Indies to protect them from the British. This fleet would also be able to help Americans. Washington sent a message to Admiral de Grasse, the commanding officer of the fleet, to meet him at Yorktown. De Grasse did, and in October of 1781, the combined American and French forces were able to trap Cornwallis on his little peninsula while he waited vainly for the British to rescue him! (Yorktown is not far from here, perhaps a 3-hour trip in a car. It is well worth your while to see it. That peninsula is so small there you can almost walk across it. Once you see the place, you can easily understand how Cornwallis was trapped.) Cornwallis surrendered 7000 troops to Washington.
The war in the Ohio Valley and at sea
The Ohio Valley, termed "the West" by Americans at that time, was ablaze during much of the war. The British encouraged their Indian allies to attack and raid colonial settlements. Yet, in spite of this, the colonists continued to settle there. In the wild area now called Illinois, the British were open to attack, because they held certain posts they had taken from the French. A bold frontiersman, George Rogers Clark, decided to seize these forts by surprise. With the blessing of Virginia, he got together some men, and they floated down the Ohio River. He captured three forts in rapid succession, Kaskaskia, Cahokia, and Vincennes. This had the effect of also quieting the Indians in the area. It is possible that Clark’s occupation of this area helped America get the Ohio Valley when peace was made.
The American "navy" consisted of only a handful of nondescript ships. They were commanded by daring officers, the best known being a hard fighting young Scots immigrant named John Paul Jones. The chief contribution of the American navy was in destroying British merchant shipping, and thus carrying the war into the waters around the British Isles. The Congress also legalized some privately owned ships to prey on British shipping. They captured some 600 British prizes, but this was not easily done, and if the British caught the American privateer instead, they took the men and the ship. They did hurt British shipping enough for merchants to begin to put pressure on Parliament to end the war.
The peace treaty
The French-American victory at Yorktown was a decisive blow to the British war effort. The British government was tired of the war, and British public opinion turned against continuing the war after Yorktown. In 1782, there was an election in Britain, and Lord North, his ministers and the Tories fell from power, and the Whigs won. The king was forced to accept new ministers who wanted peace with America. Rockingham began peace negotiations at once.
The Americans sent a peace commission to meet with the British in Paris. On the commission were John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, John Jay, and Henry Laurens. Their goals were to get the British to recognize formally their independence, and to press for the western boundary of the new country to be the Mississippi River. That would give the new country the Ohio Valley. The British agreed to their terms.
The peace treaty was signed in September, 1783. The Americans had had to wait until the French were ready to end the war by the treaty they had signed with France after Saratoga in 1778. In this treaty, the Americans got their independence and the Ohio Valley; the French neither gained nor lost territory in America, and Spain, whom France had induced to help her in the war, got Florida back. Three months later, the last British troops moved out of New York. The colonies had won their independence.
Questions
UNIT FIVE-The Constitution