-
Once the war ended, the British government was in an incredible amount of debt. This led them needing to tax the colonists, and here is a short timeline of how that went. -
This tax wasn't entirely made to just tax sugar, instead it halved it. the part that angered the colonists was that British courts could try and convict colonists of smuggling. -
This act made all printed material require a stamp, leading the British to profit off of all printed goods, such as newspapers. The colonists responded by boycotting British goods. -
After the Boycotts imposed due to the stamp act, the British passed the Declatory act which repealed the Stamp act, but allowed the British mainland to tax the colonies without representation. This was still seen as a victory by the colonists even though they were subject to taxation without representation. -
This set of acts created even more customs to stop smuggling, but this didn't quite work in the British's favor as they also imposed taxes on things like Paper and Tea. This led to even more boycotts and the so-called Daughters of Liberty called for home spun clothes to reduce reliance on the British mainland. -
This wasn't an increase of tax on tea, however they cut taxes on everything stated in the Townshend acts, leading to just a tax on tea. This did make tea cheaper, but the colonists did not approve of the tax so some members of the sons of liberty dressed up as Natives and threw the equivalent of millions of dollars worth of tea into the Boston Harbor. -
After the passing of the so called 'Intolerable Acts', John Adams wrote the Massachusetts resolutions, which stated three things; Disobey the intolerable acts, stop paying taxes, and prepare for war.