history Essay

Meaning when a tax is placed on a certain item, whiskey, in this demand model the producer, the farmers, would pay most of the tax. At the time the federal government saw whiskey as a luxury and so placed the tax on the distillers, raising the price of production in return decreasing the amount produced. They saw they could pay off their debt, by taxing the whiskey, and the producers of whiskey would pay for the debt for them. Therefore, the National debt incurred during the Revolutionary war and, the supply and the demand of whiskey are related. It was shown that only the distillers who produced less would pay more because of the tradeoff of equity end efficiency, meaning that because of the debt from the war, the government needed a way to pay for the debt and taxed whiskey. Concluding that the supply and demand elasticities of whiskey are completely due to the taxation put on the whiskey to pay for the

Slaughter divides The Whiskey Rebellion into three principal sections entitled Context, Chronology, and Consequence. The first section begins with a comprehensive assessment of the anti-excise tradition which follows late seventeenth-century British philosophy and traces its progression from Walpole's excise battle in 1733, through the Stamp Act crisis of 1764 and on through the Anti-Federalist account of the tax provisions of the Constitution of 1787. In the second section, Slaughter details the debate over the excise, its implementation and the outbreak of both peaceful and violent opposition to it; opposition that occurred not only in Pennsylvania but along the entire frontier. In his final section, and with a trace of personal bias, Slaughter describes the outbreak of violence in the summer of 1794 for which he holds John Neville largely accountable. Slaughter continues in the final section with Hamilton and Washington deciding to make an example of western Pennsylvania despite the fact that the excise had gone uncollected all along the frontier, and the Watermelon Army fiasco which the Federalists

Towards the end of the 16th century, the United States government experienced continuous changes in laws(taxes) and several problems(battling and removal of Indians) associated with westward expansion. Conflict was created in response to the rising taxes issued by the government on goods such as whiskey. Most affected by the heavy taxation were the creators and distributors of whiskey - the average poor white farmer. An incident that occurred in 1794 involving enraged farmers in western Pennsylvania, threatened the tax collectors lives as well as the authority of the government. This incident came to be known as the Whiskey Rebellion.

In Federalist No. 2, written by John Jay, includes much important information about how the nation needs to be united. He also lets the people supporting the division of the United States know that their way is not the right way for the country. It would completely weaken and disarm the country. Jay's message in all of this essay is about the importance of the nation's unity. This is still very important today and is why the United States of

In 1791, under the advisement of Alexander Hamilton, congress passed the whiskey tax. This tax, put a twenty-five percent tax on whiskey. Hamilton created this tax in hopes of the federal government gaining more money to help pay of the nation’s debt. However, in doing so, this angered many people, especially farmers in western Pennsylvania, because they distilled the extra grain they had to make whiskey and sell it to make extra income. These small operations in western Pennsylvania rebelled by erecting liberty poles and taring and feathering tax collectors. George Washington, who was president during this time, saw the outburst and decided to take action against the angered farmers. Washington gathered about 13,000 men from the militia to put an end to this rebellion. In doing so, Washington showed that the government help the power over the citizens. In The Whiskey Rebellion, by Thomas Slaughter, he describes different consequences that arise from the whiskey tax. Slaughter presents three main points, which include conflicts between the east and west, two political systems that begin to develop, and the actual rebellion.

Shortly after Alexander Hamilton created the tax on whiskey which was used to pay off the Revolutionary war debt, some farmers started to cause issue in the wilderness. After the tax was passed a group of farmers went out in the woods they captured a tax collector they , stripped him naked, shaved off his hair, poured hot tar all over his body, covered the tax collector in feathers, and finally strapped him to a tree in the middle of the night which caused the rebellion to start. According to “American History: The Whiskey Rebellion: From the August 2014 Issue”,”A group of armed men accosted whiskey tax collector Robert Johnson in a lonely stretch of forest in western Pennsylvania in 1793. They pulled Johnson off his horse and ordered him to strip, cut off his hair, poured hot tar on his body and dumped chicken feathers over the tar.” Then shortly after the tarring, more farmers were joining the Whiskey Rebellion against the whiskey tax.

Hamilton was able to persuade Congress into passing a twenty-five percent tax increase on such products. This did not go over all too well in the west, especially concerning small farmers in Pennsylvania. At the time, farmers processed their corn and grain into whiskey, since it was less complicated to transport their crops in liquid form rather than in bulk. Whiskey was also used as barter at this time. In retaliation to this tariff, farmers took it upon themselves to harass the federal tax collectors, and showed their hostility and disdain by stopping judicial proceedings. In response to this, Congress attempted to lift the most severe proclamations of the levy, but this was to no avail in the farmers' eyes. Since a majority of the farmers' used the barter system, they simply could not come up with the money necessary to pay the tax. Their vexation mostly stemmed from their belief that the "unresponsive government" lacked to "understand the hardships they faced" since the government quite clearly did not grasp the concept of a deficiency of affluence (Encyclopedia of American History: Revolution and New Nation, 1761 to 1812). Throughout 1771 to 1773, the farmers' resistance was noticeable although not yet notable until 1774, where they then decided to handle the complication themselves.

The Whiskey Rebellion occurred soon after an excise tax was placed on Whiskey. Many people living in Western Pennsylvania and Maryland produced Whiskey from their homes, which they then sold or used as a form of currency. A fairly large group of men protested in an extremely violent way. The men attacked a tax collector, formed mobs, attacked arsenals, and “raised liberty poles” (Document A). Rumors about rebels negotiating with England and Spain frightened the federal government, as stated in Document A. As a response to this destructive behavior, President Washington led an army of 12,950 militiamen to suppress the rebellion. It is evident that George Washington’s response to the Whiskey Rebellion showed that the Constitution had fixed the

The Whiskey Excise Tax hit rural farmers especially hard, and they started crying foul almost immediately after passage. It was criticized for being an “unreasonable economic hardship and as an ominous intrusion by central authorities into local affairs” (Gould, 1996, 405). These “westerners” felt as if they were being unjustly victimized by this tax. Most farmers during this period in American history worked extremely hard just to make ends meet, so operating a whiskey distillery offered them a source of extra income. In the minds of these western farmers this tax left them at a competitive disadvantage with eastern farmers. Western small-time farmers generally had small whiskey distillers. These frontier distillers could not run as efficiently as the larger distillers in the east, so their tax burden was much greater. For this reason many of the western farmers felt that Secretary Hamilton had set up a system that was giving tax-breaks to the larger eastern-based distillers. This sentiment is often echoed in today’s world- that the federal government promotes “big business” (Holt, 2004, 30). The cause of much of this rile and frustration, however, stems from the age-old

Federalist’s views on economy were based off internal and foreign connections. Internally, Hamilton’s economic plan included three main parts- paying off all war debts, raising government taxes, and creating a national bank. This plan would result in the nation’s debt, which was a result of the Revolution, being paid in full by the wealthier states paying states debts for the poorer states. This was not accepted because the richer southern states disagreed to pay for the poorer northern states. Another plan by Hamilton was to tax farmer who made alcohol, resulting in funds to pay off the nations debt. Most of these farming citizens where part of the opposing Republican Party who strongly disagreed with the new tax causing the Whiskey Rebellion. Internationally, Hamilton wanted a strong economic relationship with Great Britain. He developed the Jay Treaty that insured a diplomatic agreement from peaceful trading with Britain. The Jay Treaty included decisions of debt payments, country boundaries, and Britain occupation of forts in newly independent America. Hamilton believed in a strong central economy that was aided by foreign affairs and national strength.

David O. Whitten’s article in the Agricultural History journal discusses the perceived and actual economic impact of the excise tax on the western Pennsylvanians that decided to rebel against it. Similarly, Stephanie and Cynthia L. Krom’s article considers not only the economic impacts of the Whiskey Rebellion, but also the political interworking of western Pennsylvanian society and the timeline of the revolts and their

The two historical documents, Narrative of Lavinia Bell written by an anonymous author in the Montreal Gazette and the Letter to an English Abolitionist by James Henry Hammond, shared their strong opinions on the important issue of slavery. These documents were written in the 1800’s during an era of progressive changes. One can identify similarities and many differences in their opinions, motives, and goals for their writings. I believe Bell’s account was written to show the perspective of slaves’ brutal view, compared to Hammond’s letter justifying slavery and the rights of the slaveholders.

Superficially, it may have been deemed an act of censorship to the Constitution’s critics; however, the tax on whiskey initially implemented helped create a better America by reducing the national debt to concentrate money into the securing of the nation’s individual liberties. A new, national militia helped secure the individual’s liberty, preventing other countries from controlling the United States, especially under the proclaimed tyrannical rule of Britain. The so-called censorship of the Whiskey Rebellion helped other individuals claim their liberty after the civil unrest caused by the uprising.

In the U.S. whiskey actually fomented a revolution. Late in the 18th century, after the fledgling U.S. had just beaten the British and sent them back to England it was faced with massive debt. The country had taken so much from allies during the war that it was difficult for or the US to pay its bills. The response then was to levy taxes on

The two Governments declare that France and Great Britain shall no longer be two nations but one Franco-British Union. The constitution of the Union will provide for joint organs of defense, foreign, financial, and economic policies. Every citizen of France will enjoy immediately citizenship of Great Britain, every British subject will become a citizen of France.