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Sep 14, 1297
Magna Carta
Was an English charter. Included the most direct challenges to the monarch's authority. Required King John of England to proclaim certain liberties, and accept that his will was not arbitrary. -
Jamestown Settled
Settled in 1607, thirteen years before the Mayflower arrived at Plymouth Rock and is the site of the first permanent English settlement in the New World. -
Mayflower Compact Written
The Mayflower Compact is a written agreement composed by a consensus of the new Settlers arriving at New Plymouth in November of 1620. -
Petition of Right
A major English constitutional document that sets out specific liberties of the subject that the king is prohibited from infringing. The Petition of Right was produced by the English Parliament in the run-up to the English Civil War. -
English Bill of Rights
The Bill of Rights was passed by Parliament in December 1689. It was a re-statement in statutory form of the Declaration of Right presented by the Convention Parliament to William and Mary in March 1689, inviting them to become joint sovereigns of England. -
Albany Plan of Union
It is proposed that humble application be made for an act of Parliament of Great Britain, by virtue of which one general government may be formed in America, including all the said colonies, within and under which government each colony may retain its present constitution, except in the particulars wherein a change may be directed by the said act, as hereafter follows. -
Stamp Act
A direct tax imposed by the British Parliament specifically on the colonies of British America. The act required that many printed materials in the colonies be produced on stamped paper produced in London and carrying an embossed revenue stamp. -
Boston Massacre
An incident that led to the deaths of five civilians at the hands of British troops on March 5, 1770, the legal aftermath of which helped spark the rebellion in some of the British American colonies. -
Boston Tea Party
A direct action by colonists in Boston, a town in the British colony of Massachusetts, against the British government. -
First Continental Congress
A convention of delegates from nine of the thirteen North American colonies that met on September 5, 1774, at Carpenters' Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, early in the American Revolution. -
Intolerable Acts
Are names used to describe a series of five laws passed by the British Parliament in 1774 relating to Britain's colonies in North America. The acts triggered outrage and resistance in the Thirteen Colonies that later became the United States, and were important developments in the growth of the American Revolution. -
American Revolution Begins
The political upheaval during the last half of the 18th century in which thirteen colonies in North America joined together to break free from the British Empire, combining to become the United States of America. -
Second Continental Congress
A convention of delegates from the Thirteen Colonies that met beginning on May 10, 1775, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, soon after warfare in the American Revolutionary War had begun. -
Declaration of Independence
It announced that the thirteen American colonies then at war with Great Britain were now independent states, and thus no longer a part of the British Empire. Written primarily by Thomas Jefferson. -
Articles of Confederation
Was the first constitution of the United States of America and specified how the national government was to operate. -
Shay's Rebellion
An armed uprising in central and western Massachusetts (mainly Springfield) from 1786 to 1787. The rebellion is named after Daniel Shays, a veteran of the American Revolution who led the rebels, known as "Shaysites" or "Regulators". -
Connecticut Compromise
Also known as the Great Compromise. Was an agreement between large and small states reached during the Constitutional Convention of 1787 that in part defined the legislative structure and representation that each state would have under the United States Constitution. -
Philadelphia Convention
In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to address problems in governing the United States of America, which had been operating under the Articles of Confederation following independence from Great Britain. -
Constitution Convection
In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to address problems in governing the United States of America, which had been operating under the Articles of Confederation following independence from Great Britain.