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stamp act of 1765
the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act to help pay for British troops stationed in the colonies during the Seven Years' War. The act required the colonists to pay a tax, represented by a stamp, on various forms of papers, documents, and playing cards. -
Boston massacre
a group of nine British soldiers shot five people out of a crowd of three or four hundred who were abusing them verbally and throwing various missiles. click here -
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intolerable acts (coercive acts)
a series of four laws passed by the British Parliament to punish the colony of Massachusetts Bay for the Boston Tea Party. -
Boston tea party
a political protest at Griffin's Wharf in Boston, Massachusetts. American colonists are angry at Britain for imposing taxation without representation, dumped 342 chests of tea. -
second continental congress meets
appointed George Washington commander in chief of the army. It later approved the Declaration of Independence and prepared the Articles of Confederation. which granted certain powers to the Congress. -
declaration of independence adopted
it was a call for the right to statehood rather than individual liberties, says Stanford historian Jack Rakove. Only after the American Revolution did people interpret it as a promise for individual equality. -
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articales of confederation
The Articles created a loose confederation of sovereign states and a weak central government, leaving most of the power with the state governments.
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battle of yorktown
After three weeks of non-stop fighting, both day and night, from artillery, Cornwallis surrendered to Washington in the field at Yorktown effectively ending the War for Independence. -
treaty of Paris signed
between the American colonies and Great Britain, ended the American Revolution and formally recognized the United States as an independent nation. -
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constitution convention
The point of the event was decide how America was going to be governed. Although the Convention had been officially called to revise the existing Articles of Confederation, many delegates had much bigger plans. -
3/5 compromise
compromise agreement between delegates from the Northern and the Southern states at the United States Constitutional Convention that three-fifths of the slave population would be counted for determining direct taxation and representation in the House of Representatives. -
great compromise
Their so-called Great Compromise provided a dual system of congressional representation. In the House of Representatives each state would be assigned a number of seats in proportion to its population. -
constitution is ratified
the Constitution became the official framework of the government of the United States of America when New Hampshire became the ninth of 13 states to ratify it. -
bill of rights adopted
On October 2, 1789, President Washington sent copies of the 12 amendments adopted by Congress to the states. By December 15, 1791, three-fourths of the states had ratified 10 of these now known as the Bill of Rights. click to view
