The Leading Facts of English History

by D. H. Montgomery

The mother country, however, was perfectly clear on three points:

1. That the American colonies were convenient receptacles for the surplus population, good or bad, of the British Islands. 2. That they were valuable as sources of revenue and profit, politically and commercially. 3. That, finally, they furnished excellent opportunities for the King's friends to get office and make fortunes.

Such had long been the feeling about India, and such too was the feeling, modified by difference of circumstances, about America.

Politically the English colonists in America enjoyed a large measure of liberty. So far as local legislation was concerned, they were in most cases preactically self-governing and independent. So, too, their personal rights were carefully safeguarded. On the other hand, the commercial policy of England toward her colonies, though severely restrictive, was far less so than that of Spain or France toward theirs. The Navigation Laws (S459) compelled the Americans to confine their trade to England alone, or to such foreign ports as she directed. If they sent a hogshead of tobacco or a barrel of salt fish to another country by any but an English or a colonial built bessel, they were legally liable to forfeith their goods. On the other hand, they enjoyed the complete monopoly of the English tobacco market, and in certain cases they received bounties on some of their products. Furthermore, the Navigation Laws had not been rigidly enforced for a long time, and the New England colonists generally treated them as a dead letter.

When George III came to the throne he resolved to revive the enforcement of the Navigation Laws, to build up the British West Indies, and to restrict the colonial trade with the Spanish and French West Indies. This was done, not for the purpose of crippling American commerce, but either to increase English revenue or to inflict injury on foreign rivals or enemies.

Furthermore, British manufacturers had at an earlier period induced the English Government to restrict certain American home manufactures. In accordance with that policy, Parliament had enacted statutes which virtually forbade the colonists making their own woolen cloth, or their own beaver hats, except on a very limited scale. They had a few ironworks, but they were forbidden to erect another furnace, or another mill for manufacturing iron rods or plates, and such industries were declared to be a nuisance.

William Pitt, who later became Lord Chatham (S538), was one of the warmest friends that America had; but he openly advocated this narrow policy, saying that if British interests demanded it he would not permit the colonists to make so much as a "horseshoe nail." Adam Smith, an eminent English political economist of that day, vehemently condemned the British Government's colonial mercantile system as suicidal; but his condemnation came too late to have any effect. The fact was that the world was not ready then—if indeed it is yet—to receive the gospel of "Live and let live."

550. The Stamp Act, 1765.

In accordance with these theories about the colonies, and to meet the pressing needs of the Home Government, the English ministry proceeded to levy a tax on the colonies (1764) in return for the protection they granted them against the French and the Indians. The colonists, however, had paid their full proportion of the expense of the French and Indian wars out of their own pockets, and they now felt abundantly able to protect themselves.

But notwithstanding this plea, a form of direct tax on the American colonies, called the stamp tax, was brought forward in 1765. The proposed law required that a multitude of legal documents, such as deeds, wills, notes, receipts, and the like, should be written upon paper bearing stamps, purchased from the agents of the Home Government. The colonists, generally, protested against the passage of the law, and Benjamin Franklin, with other agents, was sent to England to sustain their protests by argument and remonstrance. But in spite of their efforts the law was passed, and the stamps were sent over to America. The people, however, refused to use them, and serious riots ensued.