Britain was also running short of credit with banks. Under huge pressure to curb spending, the British king and government believed that any further attempts to tax the homeland would fail. They thus seized upon other sources of income, one of which was taxing the American colonists in order to pay for the army protecting them.
Full Answer
Updated June 28, 2018. The attempts by Britain to tax its North American colonists led to arguments, war, the expulsion of British rule and the creation of a new nation. The origins of these attempts lay, not in a rapacious government, but in the aftermath of the Seven Years' War.
The Seven Years' War, also known as the French and Indian War, lasted between 1754 and 1763, and cost the British Empire millions of pounds. Because the war was so expensive and was fought largely in North America, the British government raised taxes on colonists.
Updated July 10, 2019 The attempts by Britain to tax its North American colonists in the late 1700s led to arguments, war, the expulsion of British rule and the creation of a new nation. The origins of these attempts lay, however, not in a rapacious government, but in the aftermath of the Seven Years' War.
The American colonies appeared to the British government to be heavily undertaxed. Before the war, the most that colonists had directly contributed to British income was through customs revenue, but this barely covered the cost of collecting it.
While Britain won the war and expanded its territorial control across the world, the nation needed a way to pay its finances. Its colonies abroad, including those in North America, presented a politically favorable way of generating revenue. Taxes were thus imposed as a convenient way to increase the country's income.
The Act resulted in violent protests in America and the colonists argued that there should be "No Taxation without Representation" and that it went against the British constitution to be forced to pay a tax to which they had not agreed through representation in Parliament.
The war provided Great Britain enormous territorial gains in North America, but disputes over subsequent frontier policy and paying the war's expenses led to colonial discontent, and ultimately to the American Revolution.
In short, many colonists believed that as they were not represented in the distant British parliament, any taxes it imposed on the colonists (such as the Stamp Act and the Townshend Acts) were unconstitutional, and were a denial of the colonists' rights as Englishmen.
Britain also needed money to pay for its war debts. The King and Parliament believed they had the right to tax the colonies. They decided to require several kinds of taxes from the colonists to help pay for the French and Indian War.
The British imposed new taxes on the colonies to pay off the large debt made from the French and Indian War.
Great Britain gained Canada, all lands east of the Mississippi, and Florida. France ceded Louisiana to Spain and evacuated Hanover. Under the Treaty of Hubertusburg all boundaries of the signees (Prussia, Austria, and Saxony) were returned to their 1748 status. Frederick retained Silesia.
The war dramatically expanded the borders of British America, and American colonists became angry when the British encouraged them to leave the East Coast to become settlers in the wilderness of the Ohio River valley.
The Treaty of Paris was signed on February 10, 1763, officially bringing an end to the French and Indian War. The British were awarded Canada, Louisiana and Florida (the latter from Spain), thereby removing European rivals and opening up North America for Westward expansion.
Most Americans today would agree that this was not an unreasonable request. The debt had been incurred on the colonies' behalf, and they should have to help pay for their protection. After all, Parliament reserved the right to tax any and every citizen of the British Empire, and the colonies were part of the empire.
March 22, 1765Parliament passed the Stamp Act on March 22, 1765, to pay down a national debt approaching £140,000,000 after defeating France in the Seven Years War (1763). A year earlier, Parliament passed the Sugar Act, their first revenue-raising measure. Both taxes promised dire consequences in a post-war economy.
The attempts by Britain to tax its North American colonists in the late 1700s led to arguments, war, the expulsion of British rule and the creation of a new nation. The origins of these attempts lay, however, not in a rapacious government, but in the aftermath of the Seven Years' War.
Before the war, the most that colonists had directly contributed to British income was through customs revenue, but this barely covered the cost of collecting it.
George Grenville’s Stamp Tax was designed to be subtle, but things didn't play out exactly as he had expected. The opposition was initially confused but consolidated around the five Resolutions given by Patrick Henry in the Virginia House of Burgesses, which were reprinted and popularized by newspapers. A mob gathered in Boston and used violence to coerce the man responsible for the Stamp Tax’s application to resign. Brutal violence spread, and soon there were very few people in the colonies willing or able to enforce the law. When it came into effect in November it was effectively dead, and the American politicians responded to this anger by denouncing taxation without representation and looking for peaceful ways to persuade Britain to scrap the tax while remaining loyal. Boycotts of British goods went into effect as well.
However, he suffered a heart attack before he could order this, and his successor resolved to find a way to repeal the Stamp Tax but keep sovereignty intact. The government followed a twofold tactic: to verbally (not physically or militarily) assert sovereignty, and then cite the economic effects of the boycott to repeal the tax. The ensuing debate made it quite clear that British Members of Parliament felt the King of Britain had sovereign power over the colonies, had the right to pass laws affecting them, including taxes, and that this sovereignty did not give the Americans a right to representation. These beliefs underpinned the Declaration Act. British leaders then agreed, somewhat expediently, that the Stamp Tax was damaging trade and they repealed it in a second act. People in Britain and America celebrated.
The aim was to start small and allow the charge to grow as the colonies grew, and was initially set at two-thirds of the British stamp tax.
The last one, the Cider Tax , had proved highly unpopular and many people were agitating to have it removed. Britain was also running short of credit with banks. Under huge pressure to curb spending, the British king and government believed that any further attempts to tax the homeland would fail.
Indeed, they had to be absorbed, because there simply didn’t seem to be any other way of paying for the army. Few in Britain expected the colonists to have protection and not pay for it themselves.