2,3,4 Road to Revolution and Enlightenment and State Governments

French and Indian War

1754–1763 conflict between Britain and France in North America, with many Native nations participating on different sides

Seven Years' War

Larger global conflict of which the French and Indian War was the North American theater

Navigation Acts

British laws regulating colonial trade to benefit Britain

Salutary Neglect

Britain's relatively loose enforcement of colonial trade regulations before the 1760s

Proclamation of 1763

British order restricting colonial settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains

Sugar Act

1764 tax and trade law targeting sugar and molasses and strengthening enforcement

Quartering Act

1765 law requiring colonies to provide supplies and accommodations for British troops under specified circumstances

Stamp Act

1765 tax requiring stamps on many printed materials

Tea Act

1773 law that gave the British East India Company advantages in selling tea in the colonies

British East India Company

British trading company that received special advantages under the Tea Act

Boston Tea Party

1773 protest in which colonists dumped British tea into Boston Harbor

First Continental Congress

1774 meeting of colonial delegates that coordinated resistance to British policies

Second Continental Congress

1775 meeting that managed the Revolutionary War and eventually declared independence

Common Sense

1776 pamphlet by Thomas Paine arguing that independence from Britain was necessary and logical

Declaration of Independence

1776 document announcing that the colonies were independent and explaining their justification

Thomas Jefferson

Primary author of the Declaration of Independence

Enlightenment

Intellectual movement emphasizing reason, natural rights, government by consent, and challenges to traditional authority

Natural Rights

Rights people possess simply because they are human, such as life and liberty

Social Contract

Idea that government exists through an agreement with the governed

Consent of the Governed

Principle that legitimate government derives its authority from the people

Three Branches of Government

Legislative, executive, and judicial branches

Gradual Emancipation

Process of ending slavery gradually rather than immediately

Abolition

Movement to end slavery

State Constitutions

Written frameworks establishing governments for individual states after independence

Republican Government

Government in which citizens exercise political power through elected representatives