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In looking over "...thousands of pages of records" on this period, Dickerson writes that he couldn't find "a single instance" in enforcement of the Townshend Acts that the British "expressed the remotest interest in promoting the trade of the Empire." It was purely harassment and fundraising for the Empire, and the colonies now had one more solid reason to rebel.
CHAPTER #10: ENGLISH OPINION. While the colonies were rebelling against the new taxation regulations, England was the scene of "a violent controversy" in which people took sides for and against the treatment of the colonies. The bottom line was that everyone in England recognized that the colonies were growing fast, coming of age, and that Americans resented the repression of their "political liberties" (p. 272).
CHAPTER #11: WERE THE NAVIGATION ACTS A CAUSE OF THE REVOLUTION? Dickerson only had to go back and read his own book to answer the question posed at the start of this chapter, but as is his style and approach, he denies that there was any serious opposition with the Navigation Acts per se. Yes, there were objections, he reports, and "the...
293). Dickerson does admit (p. 295) that the Stamp Act and Townshend Revenue Act caused "organized opposition" (albeit not due to Americans' opposition to trade laws on the high seas) due to the fact that those later acts were actually "revenue laws." The Americans saw these unjust imperial laws as a threat to "their dearly-won powers of self-government" (p. 295). In his Bibliography, Dickerson blames historian George Bancroft (p. 302) - who "dominated the field of American history for about fifty years - for creating the notion that the Navigation Acts were the central cause of the Revolution. The next important historian to come along, Mellen Chamberlain, was "manifestly influenced" by Bancroft's version of the Revolution, but for his part, Dickerson is sticking to his guns that the Navigation Acts were not the sole cause of the Revolution. What was the main cause? It was "the heavy taxation, the excessive fees, and the seizures" - plus the fact that the customs managers were out for their…
Works Cited
Dickerson, Oliver M. 1951. The Navigation Acts and the American Revolution. Philadelphia:
Because under the first Navigation Act" all American exports had to pass through British ports, and other foreign traders were not allowed to come into American ports, the higher price of imports hurt most American consumers and American businesses. On page 16 Newton quotes from a book by Jeremy Atack and Peter Passell: "Americans paid higher prices and earned smaller incomes than would have been the case if they had
But by the year of the revolution, the "various forces of discord between Britain and American had combined, and," Adams continues on page 84, the result of those forces of discord "…did not take the direction which would have found a place for the thirteen colonies within the British Empire Commonwealth" (Adams, 84). The Trade acts and Navigation acts were "extremely galling," Adams comments on page 85, and King
Colonial life was like in two different areas. The writer compares and contrasts the way of life experienced during colonial times in the Chesapeake area and the new England area during Colonial America. The writer used ten sources to complete this paper. Each year as Thanksgiving approaches students throughout the nation dress in traditional colonial garb and put on skits and meals to portray colonial life in America. While this
American Revolution happened between 1775 and 1783 and to others it is known as the U.S. War of Independence while others call it the American Revolutionary War. It was not until the Seven Years' of War ended in 1783 that few colonists in the Northern Part of America gave objections to their position in the British Empire. The imperial system of the British people saw it reap many benefits and
During the 18th century there was a fierce competition between the British and the French colonial empires which ultimately led to The Seven Years War. The final result of the conflict favored the English who, nonetheless, were forced to make appeal to the force of the American colonies in order to defeat the French. Following such an action, the opponents of the British rule over the American territories would later
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