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John Locke’s Social Contract
Locke maintained that people have natural rights to life, liberty, and property. Furthermore, he contended, every society is based on a social contract—an agreement in which the people consent to choose and obey a government so long as it safeguards their natural rights. -
French and Indian War
In the first battle of the war, the French delivered a crushing defeat to the outnumbered
Virginians and their leader, an ambitious 22-year-old officer named
George Washington. -
Writ of Assistance
In 1761, the royal governor of Massachusetts authorized the use of the writs of assistance, a general search warrant that allowed
British customs officials to search any colonial ship or building
they believed to be holding smuggled goods. -
Treaty of Paris 1763
British troops scaled the high cliffs that protected the city and defeated the French in a surprise attack. The British triumph at Quebec brought them victory in the war. The war officially ended in 1763 with the signing of the Treaty of Paris. -
Proclamation of 1763
The Proclamation of 1763 established a Proclamation Line along the Appalachians, which the colonists were not allowed to cross. However, the colonists, eager to expand westward from the increasingly crowded Atlantic seaboard, ignored the proclamation and continued to stream onto Native American lands. -
Sugar Act & colonists response
The new prime minister noticed that the American customs service, which collected duties, or taxes on imports, was losing money. Grenville concluded that the colonists were smuggling goods into the country without paying duties. -
Stamp Act & colonists response
In March 1765, Parliament passed the Stamp Act. This act
imposed a tax on documents and printed items such as wills, newspapers, and playing cards. A stamp would be placed on the items to prove that the tax had been paid. -
Sons of Liberty is formed & Samuel Adams
In May of 1765, the colonists united to defy the law. Boston shopkeepers, artisans, and laborers organized a secret resistance group called the Sons of Liberty to protest the law. Meanwhile, the colonial assemblies declared that Parliament lacked the power to impose taxes on the colonies because the colonists were not represented in Parliament. -
Declaratory Act
But on the same day that it repealed the Stamp Act, Parliament passed the Declaratory Act, which asserted Parliament’s full right “to bind the colonies and people of America in all cases whatsoever.” -
Townshend Acts & colonists response
Parliament passed the Townshend Acts, named after Charles Townshend, the leading government minister. The Townshend Acts taxed goods that were imported into the colony from Britain, such as lead, glass, paint, and paper. -
Boston Massacre
On March 5, 1770, a mob gathered in front of the Boston Customs House and taunted the British soldiers standing guard there. Shots were fired and five colonists, including Crispus Attucks, were killed or mortally wounded. Colonial leaders quickly labeled the confrontation the Boston Massacre. -
Boston Tea Party
On the moonlit evening of December 16, 1773, a large group of Boston rebels sguised themselves as Native Americans and proceeded to take action against hree British tea ships anchored in the harbor. In this incident, later known as the oston Tea Party, the “Indians” dumped 18,000 pounds of the East India ompany’s tea into the waters of Boston harbor. -
Tea Act
In 1773, Lord North devised the Tea Act in order to save the nearly bankrupt British East India Company. The act granted the company the right to sell tea to the colonies free of the taxes that colonial tea sellers had to pay. This action would have cut colonial merchants out of the tea trade by enabling the East India Company to sell its tea directly to consumers for less. -
Intolerable Acts – all 3 parts
One law shut down Boston harbor. Another, the
Quartering Act, authorized British commanders to house soldiers in vacant private omes and other buildings. In addition to these measures, General Thomas age, commander-in-chief of British forces in North America, was appointed the ew governor of Massachusetts. -
First Continental Congress meets
In response to Britain’s actions, the committees of correspondence assembled he First Continental Congress. In September 1774, 56 delegates met in hiladelphia and drew up a declaration of colonial rights. They defended the olonies’ right to run their own affairs and stated that, if the British used force gainst the colonies, the colonies should fight back. -
Midnight riders: Revere, Dawes, Prescott
Colonists in Boston were watching, and on the night of April 18, 1775, Paul Revere, William Dawes, and Samuel Prescott rode out to spread word that 700 British troops were headed for Concord. The darkened countryside rang with church bells and gunshots—prearranged signals, sent from town to town, that the British were coming. -
Battle of Lexington
The British commander ordered the minutemen to lay down
their arms and leave, and the colonists began to move out without laying down their muskets. Then someone fired, and the British soldiers sent a volley of shots into the departing militia. Eight minutemen were killed and ten more were wounded, but only one British soldier was injured. -
Minutemen
Minutemen—civilian soldiers who pledged to be ready to fight against the British on a minute’s notice—quietly stockpiled firearms and gunpowder. General Thomas Gage soon learned about these activities. In the spring of 1775, he ordered troops to march from Boston to nearby Concord, Massachusetts, and to seize illegal weapons. -
Battle of Concord
The British marched on to Concord, where they found an empty arsenal. After a brief skirmish with minutemen, the British soldiers lined up to march back to Boston, but the march quickly became a slaughter. -
Second Continental Congress
In May of 1775, colonial leaders called the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia to debate their next move. The loyalties that divided colonists sparked endless debates at the Second Continental Congress. Some delegates called for independence, while others argued for reconciliation with Great Britain. -
Continental Army
Despite such differences, the Congress agreed to recognize the colonial militia as the Continental Army and appointed George Washington as its commander. -
Battle of Bunker Hill
On June 17, 1775, Gage sent 2,400 British soldiers up the hill. The colonists held their fire until the last minute and then began to mow down the advancing redcoats before finally retreating. By the time the smoke cleared, the colonists had lost 450 men, while the British had suffered over 1,000 casualties. -
Olive Branch Petition
Most of the delegates, like most colonists, felt deep loyalty to George III and blamed the bloodshed on the king’s ministers. On July 8, Congress sent the king the so-called Olive Branch Petition, urging a return to “the former harmony” between Britain and the colonies. -
Publication of Common Sense
In a widely read 50-page pamphlet titled Common Sense,
Paine attacked King George and the monarchy. Paine, a recent immigrant, argued that responsibility for British tyranny lay with “the royal brute of Britain.” -
Declaration of Independence
By the early summer of 1776, the wavering Continental Congress finally decided to urge each colony to form its own government. While talks on this fateful motion were under way, the Congress appointed a committee to prepare a formal Declaration of Independence. Virginia lawyer Thomas Jefferson was chosen to prepare the final draft -
Loyalists and Patriots
Loyalists—those who opposed independence and remained loyal to the British king—included judges and governors, as well as people of more modest means. Patriots—the supporters of independence—drew their numbers from people
who saw political and economic opportunity in an independent America. Many Americans remained neutral. -
Washington’s Christmas night surprise attack
In the face of a fierce storm, he led 2,400 men in small rowboats across the ice-choked Delaware River. They then marched to their objective—Trenton, New Jersey—and defeated a garrison of Hessians in a surprise attack. The British soon regrouped, however, and in September of 1777, they captured the American capital at Philadelphia. -
Redcoats push Washington’s army across the Delaware River into Pennsylvania
Although the Continental Army attempted to defend New York in late August, the untrained and poorly equipped colonial troops soon retreated. By late fall, the British had pushed Washington’s army across the Delaware River into Pennsylvania. The British soon regrouped, however, and in
September of 1777, they captured the American capital at Philadelphia. -
Saratoga
While he was fighting off the colonial troops, Burgoyne didn’t
realize that his fellow British officers were preoccupied with holding Philadelphia and weren’t coming to meet him. American troops finally surrounded Burgoyne at Saratoga, where he surrendered on October 17, 1777. -
Valley Forge
While this hopeful turn of events took place in Paris, Washington and his Continental Army—desperately low on food and supplies—fought to stay alive at winter camp in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. -
Friedrich von Steuben and Marquis de Lafayette
Friedrich von Steuben, a Prussian captain and talented drill master, helped to train the Continental Army. Other foreign military leaders, such as the Marquis de Lafayette, also arrived to offer their help. Lafayette lobbied France for French reinforcements in 1779, and led a command in Virginia in the last years of the war. -
French-American Alliance
Although the French had secretly aided the Patriots since early 1776, the Saratoga victory bolstered France’s belief that the Americans could win the war. As a result, the French signed an alliance with the Americans in February 1778 and openly joined them in their fight. -
British victories in the South
At the end of 1778, a British expedition easily took Savannah, Georgia. In their greatest victory of the war, the British under Generals Henry Clinton and Charles Cornwallis captured Charles Town, South Carolina, in May 1780. Clinton then left for New York, while Cornwallis continued to conquer land throughout the South. -
British surrender at Yorktown
a French naval force defeated a British fleet and then blocked the entrance to the Chesapeake Bay, thereby obstructing British sea routes to the bay. By late September, about 17,000 French and American troops surrounded the British on the Yorktown peninsula and began bombarding them day and night. -
Treaty of Paris
Peace talks began in Paris in 1782. The American negotiating team included John Adams, John Jay of New York, and Benjamin Franklin. In September 1783, the delegates signed the Treaty of Paris, which confirmed U.S. independence and set the boundaries of the new nation. The United States now stretched from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River and from Canada to D
the Florida border.
