SUMMARY
1. After the French and Indian War Great Britain determined to enforce the laws of trade.
2. It also decided that the colonies should bear a part of the cost of their defense, and for this purpose a stamp tax was levied.
3. The right of Parliament to levy such a tax was denied by the colonists on the ground that they were not represented in Parliament.
4. The attempt to enforce the tax led to resistance, and a congress of the colonies (1765) issued a declaration of rights and grievances.
5. The tax was repealed in 1766, but Parliament at the same time asserted its right to tax.
6. The Townshend Acts (1767) tried to raise a revenue by import duties on goods brought into the colonies. At the same time the arrival of the troops for defense of the colonies caused new trouble; in Boston the people and the troops came to blows (1770).
7. The refusal of the colonists to buy the taxed articles led to the repeal of all the taxes except that on tea (1770).
8. The colonists still refused to buy taxed tea, whereupon Parliament enabled the East India Company to send over tea for sale at a lower price than before.
9. The tea was not allowed to be sold. In Boston it was destroyed.
10. As a punishment Parliament enacted the five Intolerable Acts.
11. The First Continental Congress (1774) thereupon petitioned for redress, and called a second Congress to meet the next year.