FREE ESSAY ON AMERICAN REVOLUTION

AMERICAN REVOLUTION

The American colonists rebelled because they had been denied their rights
Many events helped cause the American Revolution. It was a terrible war between the
colonies of America and the country of England. The three most important events that led
up to, and caused it, were the Boston Massacre, The Boston Tea Party, and The Stamp Act.

The Boston Massacre was an encounter on March 5, 1770, that was five years before the
American Revolution between British troops and a group of citizens of Boston that were
then in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. British troops were quartered in the city to
discourage demonstrations of American revolutionists who were protesting the Townshend
Acts, a tax on imports to the colonies. As a result of constant harassment by the
citizens, a squad of British soldiers that had been struck by snow and ice balls with
rocks inside thrown during a demonstration, fired into the crowd, killing five men. The
eight soldiers and their commanding officer were tried for murder and were defended by
John Adams, later president of the United States, and Josiah Quincy. Two of the soldiers
were declared guilty of manslaughter, and the others, including the officer, were
acquitted. The incident was skillfully exploited by the American patriot Samuel Adams to
create anti-British sentiment in the colonies. After the incident the patriots of
Massachusetts Bay were more and more agitated by the soldiers. They weren't going to take
much more.
The Boston Tea Party was an event that took place on December 16, 1773, by a group of
Boston citizens to protest the British tax on tea imported to the colonies. Although most
provisions of the Townshend Acts were repealed by Parliament, the duty on tea was
retained to demonstrate the power of Parliament to tax the colonies. The citizens of
Boston would not permit the unloading of three British ships that arrived in Boston in
November 1773 with 342 chests of tea. The royal governor of Massachusetts, Thomas
Hutchinson, however, would not allow the tea ships to return to England until the duty
had been paid. On the evening of December 16, a group of Bostonians, instigated by the
American patriot Samuel Adams and disguised as Indians, boarded the vessels and emptied
the tea into Boston Harbor. When the government of Boston refused to pay for the tea, the
British closed the port. The acts by the British with the tea provoked Bostonians.
Because of this they were pushed too far. After what happened with the Boston Massacre,
the Patriots wanted something that could push them over the edge to start the Revolution
and with the taxes this moved them a few steps closer. This should have taught the
British a lesson, but it didn't.
The Stamp Act was an act introduced by the British Prime Minister George Grenville and
passed by the British Parliament in 1765 as means of raising revenue in the American
colonies. It required all legal documents, licenses, commercial contracts, newspapers,
pamphlets, and playing cards to carry a tax stamp. The act extended to the colonies the
system of stamp duties then employed in Great Britain and was intended to raise money to
lower the cost of maintaining the military defenses of the colonies. Passed without
debate, it aroused widespread opposition among the colonists, who argued that because
they were not represented in Parliament, they could not legally be taxed without their
consent. The Stamp Act was the one that pushed the colonies over the edge.
Although The Boston Massacre, Boston Tea Party, and Stamp Act were only three events that
helped cause The American Revolution, they were major. Without them there might not have
been a Revolution. Let's hope nothing like The American Revolution ever happens again,
and no country puts stupid taxes on any other country.