Study Guidefor Review # 3

Exploration

  • England began exploring in the 15th and 16th centuries because she felt she was falling behind her rivals, France and Spain – other motivations included competition for empire, economic and religious motivations
  • Columbian Exchange - the movement of plants, animals and diseases between the Americas and Europe

Founding the 13 Colonies

  • Jamestown, Virginia - founded in 1607
  • Founded by a joint stock company for profit
  • First permanent English colony in North America
  • House of Burgesses – first representative government in America
  • Plymouth founded 1620
  • Founded by the Separatist/Pilgrims for religious reasons
  • Wrote the Mayflower Compact to govern the colony by consent of the governed
  • Massachusetts Bay Colony
  • Founded by the Puritans for religious reasons
  • Rhode Island
  • Founded by Roger Williams for religious freedom
  • Established the idea of separation of church and state
  • Anne Hutchison moved fled there for religious reasons
  • Maryland
  • Established for Catholics
  • Pennsylvania
  • Established for Quakers to worship without harassment

Economic Development of the Colonies

  • New England
  • Long cold winters – rocky soil – short growing season
  • Large forest – natural harbors – rich fishing ground in Atlantic ocean
  • Subsistence farming – small farms that produce enough for the family
  • Middle Colonies
  • Warmer climate with longer growing season- fertile soil - Large rivers with harbors
  • Cash crop is wheat – known as breadbasket colonies
  • Cities like New York and Philadelphia became trade centers
  • Lots of immigrants from Europe = a climate of tolerance in the region
  • Southern Colonies
  • Year round growing season – very fertile climate – large rivers
  • Plantations used slave labor
  • Crops = indigo, tobacco, rice
  • Backcountry
  • The area that ran along the Appalachian Mountains

Colonial Trade

  • Mercantilism
  • Colonies provide the mother country with raw materials
  • The mother country would take the raw materials and manufacture products to be sold
  • Navigation Acts
  • Passed by Parliament - a series of trade laws designed to help England make money off colonial trade
  • Triangle Trade
  • Colonial trade with 3 stops: from North America rum & iron taken to Africa, traded for slaves that are brought to the West Indies and the Americas (known as the Middle Passage), back to North America with molasses and sugar.

ColonialGovernments and Influences on American Democracy

  • Magna Carta (Great Charter 1215): was the first step in limiting the power of the king
  • King needed money to pay for his wars – borrowed from noblemen – king agreed to certain terms
  • Property could not be seized – not taxation without agreement – no trial without jury and witnesses
  • Early Colonial Government:
  • Virginia House of Burgesses (1619) – each plantation sent representatives to make laws for the colony
  • Mayflower Compact (1620) – colonists agree to abide by majority rule (self-government)
  • Fundamental Orders of Connecticut (1639) – provided representative government, expanded voting right to non-church members
  • Voting rights were limited to white men who owned property
  • Great Awakening
  • A religious movement in the colonies
  • As people began to question the old religious authority, they also began to question political authority
  • Parliament: made laws for England and the colonies
  • Englishmen had the right to representation in Parliament
  • The colonies were not represented
  • Colonists were given local control because of the distance between America and Britain
  • House of Burgesses, town meetings and colonial assemblies made local laws for the colonies
  • English Bill of Rights (1689): government was to be based on laws made by Parliament, not the king
  • Only Parliament could impose taxes
  • No excessive fines or cruel punishment - People had the right to complain about the government and not be arrested
  • Influential European Philosophers (thinkers):
  • Baron Charles de Montesquieu – separations of powers and checks and balances
  • William Blackstone – people have the right to security – property – liberty
  • John Locke – people have natural rights (life, liberty and property) – purpose of government is to protect those natural rights – a good government is by consent of the governed (the will of the people) – if a government does not protect people’s rights then the people should abolish that government
  • Freedom of expression: was not considered a right of Englishmen
  • John Peter Zenger, newspaper, was jailed for 10 months in 1735 for publishing statements that the New York governor was corrupt–at trial his defense was based on the truthfulness of what he printed – he was found not guilty – the case helped establish freedom to publish true statements

French and Indian War

  • Began over disputed land in the Ohio River Valley between France and England
  • Benjamin Franklin tried to unite the colonies against the French treat with the Albany Plan of Union
  • Tried to gain support for the plan with the political cartoon –Join or Die
  • Colonial assemblies rejected the plan because they did not want to give up power to a central Congress
  • Results of the war (Britain won)
  • France lost all its land in North America
  • England was in debt and decided to make the colonies pay for the cost of protecting the colonies

A New Colonial Policy

  • The period of salutary neglect ended – a time when England did not enforce laws and pretty much left the colonies alone to govern themselves
  • Parliament passed the Proclamation of 1763 to stop the colonists from moving across the Appalachian Mountains in order to stop Indian uprisings like Pontiac’s Rebellion

Causes of the American Revolution

  • A major reason the colonies in North America declared independence in 1776 was because of taxation without representation– belief that the colonists should have a say in government (consent of the governed)
  • Stamp Act
  • Required a stamp on all legal and commercial documents to prove the tax had been paid
  • Colonial reaction – Sons of Liberty formed, colonists boycott (refusal to buy)British goods, Stamp Act Congress petitioned Parliament to repeal the act
  • Quartering Act
  • Required colonists to house and feed British soldiers
  • Townshend Acts
  • Taxed glass, lead, tea
  • Colonial reaction: - more boycotts, Daughters of Liberty formed
  • The Boston Massacre by Paul Revere, helped the Patriot cause
  • Propaganda designed to create anti-British feelings among the colonists
  • The Intolerable Acts
  • restricted Boston’s economic and political activities by closing the port of Boston and banning town meetings

Winning the Hearts and Minds of the People

  • Common Sense by Thomas Paine
  • convinced many of the colonists tosupport independence from England
  • Declaration of Independence
  • a formal statement declaring the thirteen colonies free and independent states from England
  • states that people have unalienable rights/natural rights that cannot be taken away – these are Life Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness
  • government should be based on the consent of the governed

Chronological order of events:

French and Indian War - Proclamation of 1763 – Sugar Act – Quartering Acts - Stamp Act – Stamp Act Congress – Declaratory Act – Townshend Acts – Tea Act – Boston Tea Party – Intolerable Acts – First Continental Congress – Lexington & Concord – Bunker Hill – Common Sense – Second Continental Congress – Declaration of Independence

American Revolution

  • Loyalistsdid not want to break away from England
  • The Battles of Lexington and Concord were the first battles of the American Revolution
  • The Crisis,written by Thomas Paine,inspire his troops to be strong in the face of defeat
  • Valley Forge was where George Washington’s troops endured a harsh winter
  • The British tried to separate New England from the other colonies during the Hudson River Valley campaign
  • TheMarquis de Lafayette, Baron Friedrich von Steuben, Comte de Rochambeau, Bernardo de Galvez were all foreigners who help the Continental Army during the American Revolution
  • James Armistead, Wentworth Cheswell, Haym Salomon were minorities that played important roles in the American Revolution
  • The Hessian mercenaries wereprofessional soldiers from Germany who were hired to fight for Britain
  • Saratoga was a turning point that convinced the French to form an alliance with the colonies.
  • The last major battle of the Revolutionary War was Yorktown
  • The Treaty of Parissigned in 1783 ended the American Revolution