Ex Post Facto

Wood’s opening section on the “Origins” of the American Revolution quite fittingly takes us back to the 1760s, to the end of the “French and Indian War,” which was actually a small part of a global war for empire between Britain and France and their respective allies.

As Wood shows us, that war may have ended with British victory in 1763, but rest of the decade was tumultuous both in British America and in the British Isles. In British North America, the war was followed by Pontiac’s Rebellion, the Paxton uprising, and the creation of the Proclamation Line, which assuaged American Indians but offended colonial land speculators and would-be trans-Appalachian settlers. Meanwhile, the colonial population was growing rapidly, and new settlements were being created at an astonishing pace. Conflicts between eastern and western colonists became a problem not only in Pennsylvania (the site of the Paxton uprising) but also in the Carolinas, where vigilante “Regulator” movements challenged established authority. (pp. 11-12.)

In the midst of this colonial tumult, a disordered imperial administration began imposing new taxes and regulations upon the North American colonies in an attempt to raise desperately needed funds. As the aggrieved colonists petitioned and protested against these new measures, it became clear that they had developed their own ideas about how they fit into the British empire, and their conception did not fit with Parliament’s vision of the how the empire should work.

The colonists began collectively expressing their understanding in 1765 with the “Declaration of Rights” of the Stamp Act Congress, which had been attended by delegates from 9 colonies. They spoke just as loudly (to British officials) via mob action that prevented the Stamp Act from going into effect. They also exerted economic pressure through consumer boycotts. These combined measures succeeded in swaying Parliament to repeal the Stamp Act, but Parliament also declared its right to legislate for the colonies “in all cases whatsoever” — leaving little doubt of their self-conceived supremacy. (pp. 28-30)

I see several important questions to ask about this section of the book:

If you would like to read another primary source on this subject, take a look at John Dickenson’s Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania (1767), which was very influential.  (See especially letter two.)