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The Anglo-American Tax struggles

The British government decided that the American colonists should contribute financially to the protection of this new expanded empire. It imposed certain new taxes on the colonists to pay for the British armed forces in America.

• In 1765 Britain passed the Stamp Act, which put a stamp duty (tax) on various documents and items. This included all legal documents, which upset lawyers, and playing cards, which upset sailors. There were major riots in the colonies against the tax, and in 1766 the British cancelled it.
• In 1767 the British introduced more new taxes known as the Townshend Acts. In 1770 there was a riot against these duties in Boston and several American protesters were killed by British soldiers – this became known as the ‘Boston Massacre’.
• In 1773 Britain introduced a new tea duty, and a disturbance broke out, again in Boston, when a group of colonists dressed up as Native Americans and tipped a cargo of taxed tea into the sea in protest. The British reacted very fiercely to this ‘Boston Tea Party’. They passed the Coercive Acts in 1774 to punish Boston by closing the port to any trade until the cost of the tea was repaid. The Acts also took away some of the democratic rights of Boston's citizens.

The War of the American Revolution

By 1775 relations between Britain and the colonies had deteriorated badly, and a war broke out between them. This eventually became known as the War of the American Revolution or the American War of Independence. The initial aim of the colonists was to have more control over their own affairs, especially taxes, but they did not want to be independent. By 4 July 1776 they had changed their minds, and severed their ties with Britain by signing the Declaration of Independence.

One of the key things that helped change their minds on independence was the book Commonsense written by the English radical thinker Tom Paine in 1776. Paine persuaded many American colonists that they owed nothing to their British masters. The war ended after Lord Cornwallis’ surrendered at Yorktown in 1781. The Peace Treaty was then signed in September 1783 at Versailles. The 13 American colonies became the independent United States of America.

After America became independent, Britain remained in control of Canadian territories. Thousands of loyal colonists from the 13 American colonies migrated to Canada or Europe. They wanted to build a new nation that would grant them ‘English liberties’ but still have them obey the King of England, from a distance. As a result of the disintegration of Britain’s American empire, the British decided to pursue colonies elsewhere. The most notable example would be Australia, which was used as a base to incarcerate criminals who were sentenced to be ‘transported’ to the colonies.