Committees of Correspondence
After the Boston Massacre, Samuel Adams, a cousin of John Adams, formed a Committee of Correspondence. He informed the colonists about what the British were up to. Other committees started to appear after Adams's first one. The committees helped the colonist find a common enemy, and unite against the British. A young House of Burgesses member, Patrick Henry, gave a speech that also United the colonies.
Intolerable Acts
The intolerable acts were made as punishment for the Boston Tea Party. The British Government passed four laws. One that closed the port in Boston, one that increased the powers of the royal governor, one that abolished the upper house of the Massachusetts legislator, and cut the power of citizens,
It was the Tea Act. This act stated that only the British East India Company could sell or transport tea. Members of parliament passed this act because many of them had stakes in the company. At the time the British India Company was going bankrupt. This act threatened all colonial businesses by creating a monopoly. In Boston, the colonists devised a plan to resist this act. Several colonists dressed as Indians to deceive the British. These colonists seized the imported tea and dumped it into the harbor. The colonists dubbed this “the tea party.” The British responded to these actions by creating four acts jointly called the Coercive Acts. These acts closed the Boston ports to all trade, increased power of Massachusetts governor, granted trials of royal officials in Massachusetts be tried elsewhere, and allowed the new governor rights to quarter his troops anywhere. These Coercive Acts only angered the colonists more. They have strengthened their non-importation of British goods. They have also begun the forming of local militia companies.
Protests in the streets against the British soldiers for this Townshend Tea Tax led to the first bloodshed early in the Revolution. The “Boston Massacre” was the killing of eleven citizens on the streets of Boston when a group of sixty colonists led by Crispus Attucks were protesting the new act. The news of this slaughter was spread throughout the colonies by the Committees of Correspondence set up by a rich politician named Samuel Adams. These committees made it possible for information on everything resistance-related to reach all of the colonies in due time. In this way was news of the Boston Massacre spread across the United States which created outrage across the country. As tea was shipped to America under the new tea tax, rebellion stirred in Boston. Colonists disguised themselves and pillaged the trade ships, ruining millions of dollars worth of tea. In response to this, Parliament passed the ‘Intolerable Acts’ which outraged the colonists even further by closing the Boston ports, placing Massachusetts under royal authority, and allowing the Catholic French to settle along the Ohio River Valley under the new policies. Thus continued Parliament to colonist battle as the First Continental Congress met to discuss their rights as subjects under the king and announce the changes they wanted made in the Declaration of Rights which argued that the natural rights of
The English government reacted to the "Tea Party" with outrage and passed the Coercive Acts, which closed the port of Boston and put the entire colony under what amounted to martial law.
They were able to place pass such laws because Parliament had approved the decision to collect them, and fair because the money was spent in the colonies. (pg.536) What started as a protest to the new higher taxes and restrictions, during the night, a group of colonist dumped a whole shipload of tea into the Harbor in protest, otherwise known as the “Boston Tea Party”. “In, response Parliament in 1774, they passed a series of Laws now known as the Intolerable Acts. This closed port of Boston, reorganized the government of Massachusetts, allowed troops to be quartered in their homes, and removed the trials of royal customs officials to England. In September 1774, committees were organized who were critical of the British policy, in hope to
As you can see Great Britain was not happy about the Boston Tea Party, and created strict punishments in the Intolerable Acts. Soon after English Parliament declared the Intolerable Acts Massachusetts was in a rebellious state.
The Intolerable Acts, otherwise known as the “Coercive” Acts, caused the most unrest among the colonies and led to the American Revolution during the 1700’s. In 1733, Parliament passed the Tea Act. This made it so that colonists could only buy tea from the British East Indies Company. Even though the Tea Act lowered the price of tea, the colonists thought of it as another restriction of their freedom. A group of opposers, dressed as American Indians, threw three-hundred forty chests of tea into the Boston Harbor. The British were enraged and passed the Intolerable Acts. This gave the British all control over Massachusetts and forced colonists to pay back the money for the tea they ruined. Although the Coercive Acts only applied to Massachusetts,
Once again, the colonists were angry that they were being taxed on basic needs. This anger only grew through the Boston Massacre incident, where five colonists were killed, and the Boston Tea Party, where enraged colonists dumped tea into the Boston Harbor. The last straw for the colonists seemed to be the passing of the Coercive Acts, otherwise known as the Intolerable Acts. These acts were created to regulate and basically restrict the colonists to make them realize that Parliament was in control. Colonists did not agree with this act, specifically the Quartering Act which required them to house British soldiers, as well as feed and clothe them. These acts and taxations, along with the violent incidents that occurred in Boston, and a lack of colonial representation in the Parliament caused the colonists to
Intolerable (Coercive) Acts was passed because of the tea boycotting that the colonists were doing. As a result of boycotting, you were, "...sentenced to the flames, and executed by the hands of the common hangman." (Document7C3) This was a harsh punishment to the colonists; however, the government could not tolerate the boycotting. It was a vicious cycle; the taxes on tea would rise, then the colonists would boycott, and after the boycotters would face death, the cycle
With the establishment of the first successful English colony of Jamestown by the Virginia Company in the New World and the creation of the other thirteen original colonies during the seventeenth-century, the colonists of America were originally immigrants from Europe who sought to escape hardships whether it be religious persecution or material gain. This created regional differences between the New England colonies of the north and the Chesapeake colonies of the south. The diverse population of these colonies continued to grow and prosper while under the rule of Britain. While the colonists were European in origin, they developed a uniquely American identity that was different from the mother country due to the abundance of land and the absence of Parliamentary authority. Although the colonists failed to
There were five acts that made up the Intolerable acts. The first was the Boston Port Act. The port of Boston was closed off to any form of trade. This was to make sure that there were no other good that could be purchased other than the British goods. The next act was the Massachusetts Government Act. This changed the government in the colonies. It made it so that you can not elect people for government. The king chose 12 to 36 representatives that he felt should be in a position of government. Another act that was passed was the Quartering Act. It stated that everyone needed to house and quater any British soldiers that were in the colonies. The next act was The Administration of Justice Act. This stated that all British officials were exempt from any criminal punishment, as long as their actions did not go against the kings rules for them. The last act that was passed was the Quebec Act. It was their way of explaining what happened when they tried to get Canada under British rule. The British expected the colonists to break apart and become un-unified. What happened was the colonists because the most unified that they had ever been. The defiance of the colonists against the British was one of the first times that the colonies came together, and were united as a
The Intolerable Acts was another long-term cause of the revolution. It was a punishment for the Boston Tea Party. These Acts comprised of four laws. Among them were that British officials were to be tried in British courts, a ban on the meetings in Massachusetts town and closure of the Boston
In response to the events of the Boston Tea Party, the British parliament passed a series of laws called the Intolerable (Coercive) Acts in 1774. These Acts were: the ‘Boston Port Act’, closing down all trade of Massachusetts; the ‘Massachusetts Government Act’, Massachusetts was no longer allowed to govern themselves; the ‘Administration of Justice Act’, any person charged with murder while trying to enforce the law would be tried in England; and the ‘Quartering Act’, allowing British troops to be housed in
The rebellion’s successfulness is a product of the results achieved by those taking a stand. In response to the colonists’ defiant actions, Parliament passed the Intolerable Acts (Wallace 1). The Intolerable Acts included the Boston Port Act. This bill “shut off the city’s sea trade” (“Boston Tea Party”). This act would hold strong until the colony paid its debt to the British East India Company. The Boston Port Act greatly burdened the colony and resulted with the additional twelve colonies sending supplies to Boston in an effort to provide assistance (“The Intolerable Acts”). The Intolerable Acts also included the Massachusetts Government Act. This act declared the government of the colony to be unfit, unqualified and in need of improvement (“The Intolerable Acts”). This rebellion was the first reaction leading to the Revolutionary War. The Revolutionary War began
BOSTON- King George III and the British government were outraged with the colonists who participated in the Boston Tea Party or the Boston Tea Party in general. Therefore, Parliament passed four very harsh laws called the Intolerable Acts, also known as the Coercive Acts. The first closed the port of Boston; two others increased the powers of the royal governor, abolished the upper house of Massachusetts legislature, and out the powers of town meetings, the fourth and final law strengthened the 1765 Quartering Act. On March 24, 1774, King George III passed four very harsh laws that were hated by the colonists.
The destruction of British tea further escalated the violence between the Patriots and the British parliament when the Massachusetts Assembly refused to pay for the losses. Great Britain took it upon themselves to punish the assembly by enacting the Intolerable Act, which prohibited town meetings, colonial assembly, and closing the Boston port to punish the colonist (Scott et al., 2006). Twelve colonies except for Georgia sent representatives to attend the First