Period 3 Review

1754-1800

The French and Indian War

A conflict between the British and the French, and the French allied themselves with several groups of Native Americans

• A smaller conflict in the conflict of a larger, global conflict between the British and the French called the Seven Years’ War

Causes of the French and Indian War

• Colonists were encroaching on the land in the Ohio River Valley that the French laid claim to

  • George Washington was sent West to warn the French of British encroaching on their holdings

  • Led a surprise attack on Fort Duquesne, controlled by the same French commander that George Washington warned

• Territorial disputes in the Ohio River Valley

• Albany Congress

  • A congress that tried to figure out British colonial defense against the French and Indians

  • Become more organized

  • Benjamin Franklin introduced the Albany Plan of Union

    • Colonies would establish a council of representatives to decide on matters of defense, trade, etc.

    • Plan was ultimately rejected

    • Laid foundation for the future revolution

• British increased impressment

• British quartered troops in colonial homes

• Peace of Paris ended the war

  • Spain ceded Florida to the British

  • French were outside from the North American continent and Spanish were given control over former French lands west of the Mississippi

  • All land east of the Mississippi, Ohio River Valley, was granted to the British

Effects of the French and Indian War

• American colonist began to push westward which intensified conflicts with the NAtive Americans

  • Pontiac lead raids against encroaching colonists

• Proclamation Line of 1763

  • Forbade colonists from migrating west across the Appalachian moutains

  • Didn’t work, colonists migrated anyways

  • Debt doubled

  • Taxes were raised

Salutary neglect

Led colonists to believe that they were more independent of the British than the Kind and Parliament believed them to be

• Britain had political sovereignty over the colonies, but that’s not how it worked practically; Parliament left many of the day-to-day decisions to the colonists

• A consequence were the Navigation Acts

Navigation acts

Restricted the trade of the colonies to British ships and British merchants

• Effect was large scale smuggling and illegal trade with other nations

How did Britain plan to get control of the colonies again?

To regain control of the colonies, Prime Minister George Grenville implemented a three-step plan

1. Stricter enforcement of current laws

2. Extend wartime provisions into peacetime

3. Quartering Act of 1765 - kept British soldiers stationed in colonies, colonists responsible for soldiers’ food and housing

Sugar act

Imposed taxes on coffee and wine and various luxury items, and enforced taxes on molasses

Stamp act

A tax on all paper items produced in the colonies like newspaper and playing cards, etc.

Currency act

Prohibited colonial assemblies from printing their own paper currency

“No taxation without representation”

• The colonies thought it wasn’t fair to be taxed and not have a representative in Parliament

• Britain argued that they were represented through virtual representation

What occurred in response to the act, especially the stamp act?

• Sons of Liberty

• Daughters of Liberty

  • Make goods at home instead of buying British goods

• Vox Populi (Voice of the people)

  • Stamp Act Congress

Stamp act congress

• 27 delegates from 9 colonies

• Goal was to petition the British Parliament to repeal the Stamp act

  • Parliament actually repealed the stamp act and the sugar act, but passed the Declaratory act

Declaratory act

Affirmed that Parliament had the right to pass whatever law they wanted in the colonies

Townshend act

Levied taxes on items like paper, tea, and glass

Boston Massacre

British heard a shot and then fired their own guns killing 4 colonist and wounding 7

Boston Tea Party

Done against the Tea act and the Sons of Liberty wanted to avoid paying the tea tax and make a political statement that Boston would not be forced to take the crowns tea

• Parliament then passed to coercive acts

Coercive acts

Closed down the Boston Harbor until the lost tea was paid for

• Also passed with another Quartering act

• Both combined led to the Intolerable acts

What was the philosophical foundation of the revolution?

• Revolution was not a conclusion to most colonist until right before it took place

• Delegates who petitioned the stamp act met and had the stamp act Congress petition Parliament as loyal subjects to country and crown

  • Still true for the Continental Congress in 1774

• Delegates from every colony except Georgia deliberated about what the colonists ought to do regarding Britain’s increasing legislative tyranny

  • Revolution was not their answer

• Colonists longed for liberty and resisted any encroachment on it

Enlightenment

• John Locke had a work called Two Treaties on Government

  • Deeply influenced the leaders of the colonial delegations

  • A legitimate government can only exist by the consent of the governed

  • Human beings are endowed with natural rights

  • Self-rule

• Jean-Jacques Rousseau and his social contract

  • Argued that given the power to govern is in the hands of the people

    • In a social contract with their government

  • People willingly agree to give up some of their power to government as long as it protects their natural rights

• Montesquieu

  • His writings inspired colonial leaders to believe that a republican form of government was the best government to preserve people’s liberty

    • Split into three branches

Common Sense (Thomas Paine)

Used everyday language to argue powerfully for independence from Britain

Used biblical examples to show the folly of monarchy

Second Continental Congress (1776)

A formal resolution for independence was put on the floor and it was composed by Thomas Jefferson (Declaration of Independence)

Loyalists

• Opposed independence

• Remain loyal to the British

George Washington

• Appointed by the Continental Congress as the general of the Continental Army

  • Soldiers were poorly armed and poorly trained

  • Regionally minded

General William Howe vs. George Washington

• British general William Howe landed in New York with 10,000 experienced, well-trained troops

  • About 60,000 American loyalist joined their ranks

• Washington realized the only way to win this was to wage a war of attrition, to keep the battled going as long as possible so the British would tire out

  • Africans fought on both sides because they were promised freedom from both

  • 5,000 Africans fought for the Patriot cause

Battle of Saratoga

• Most important victory

• September of 1777

• Benjamin Franklin was able to persuade the French to ally with the Americans after they won this battle

• A year later, Spain and Holland joined the war

Battle of Yorktown (1781)

The final battle

Paris Peace Treaty (1783)

Signed by all parties in Paris

American society after the revolution

• Concern over societal inequality following Jefferson’s “all men are created equal” (slavery)

• Many northern states abolished slavery

• Continental Congress abolished the importation of enslaved laborers

• State legislation worked to universalize the right to vote without respect to title or nobility

• Women who experienced a greater degree of autonomy and freedom appealed for a more permanent expansion of roles

• Republican motherhood

  • Women were vital to a healthy democracy because they were able to raise sons well schooled in republican ideals

  • Women then needed to be educated

Global society after the revolution

• Inspired other revolutionary movements throughout the world

• French revolution

• Haitian revolution, a French colony

• Latin American countries rebelled against their colonizers, Spain and Portugal

The Articles of Confederation

• Ratified in 1781 to become the new governing document of the nation

• Influenced by existing state constitutions

  • Focused political power into the legislative branch

    • Makes the laws

  • Wanted the power of government answerable to the people

• The same people who came up with the state constitutions came up with the articles

  • Placed power in the legislativ ebranch

  • Directly answerable to the states

  • No executive power because of the past monarchy

  • No national supreme court

  • Each state had veto power

  • Problem was westward migration

    • To regulate the western territory, they passed the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 under the articles

      • Abolished slavery in the Northwest territory

      • Provided a means by which western territories could get a population and apply for statehood

    • Shays rebellion

      • Proved to many Americans that the articles was a flawed document in need of replacing

      • Farmers were in debt and had trouble paying back debts

      • No luck with a response for relief from the federal government

      • No president to send in an army

      • No army to send

The Constitutional Convention

• 55 delegates from the states met in 1787 for the convention in Philadelphia

• Purpose was to shore up the weaknesses of the articles

  • Decided to create a whole new Constitution

  • How would the voices of the people be represented

    • The Virginia Plan (large state

      • Strong centralized state

      • Bicameral legislature

      • Representation based on population

    • The New Jersey Plan (small states)

      • Unicameral legislature

      • Every state had equal representation

The Great Compromise

Decided on between the Virginia and the New Jersey plan’s

• A bicameral legislature

  • The House of Representatives - represented states by population

  • The Senate - each state equally by giving each two votes

Slave states vs. Free states

Three-Fifths Compromise

• 3/5ths of the enslaved population could be added to the population for purposes of representation

  • Convention agreed to take the ban of slavery off the table until the 1808 because Southern delegates wanted more assurance that slavery wouldn’t be messed with

Voting for representatives

House of Representatives

• Elected directly by the people

• Two year terms

Senate

• Elected by states legislatures

• Six year terms

Executive branch

• Elected by a process governed by the electoral college

• President would not be elected by the people, but by the states

How many states needed to agree with the Constitution to ratify it?

9 out of 13

Who wanted to ratify the constitution?

Federalists

Who did not want to ratify the constitution?

Antifederalists

• Were persuaded by the Federalists because a Bill of Rights was added to satisfy them

Main content of the Constitution

• Federalism

• Separation of powers

• Checks and balances

Federalism

The sharing of power between the national government and the state government

• Supremacy clause states national law trumps state law whenever they contradict

• Enumerated powers are the national laws that trump state laws

  • Declare war

• 10th amendment - “The powers not delegated to the United States are reserved to the states.”

Separation of powers

3 branches of government

• Legislative - makes the laws

• Executive - carrying out and enforcing laws

• Judicial - interprets laws to align with the constitution

Each has checks and balances

• Veto

• 2/3 majority vote

• Judicial review

Who was elected president?

George Washington unanimously elected as president

• Established executive departments

  • Treasury department

  • War department

  • State department

  • Justice department

• All headed by a secretary

  • Made up the Cabinet

Alexander Hamilton

• Washington’s secretary

• Establishment of a national bank

  • Unify and improve credit

  • Make a national debt

  • Argued using necessary and proper/elastic clause

International issues that George Washington faced

• French revolution

  • Does the U.S. aid the French?

  • Washington aligned against Jefferson that the U.S. was too young to get involved in a war

  • Proclamation of neutrality

• British seizing American ships and impressing sailors bound to France

  • Washington sent John Jay to the British agitators

    • Jay’s Treaty

• Spanish on the west got weird about America and Britain

  • Consolidating holdings

  • American minister sent to Spain, Thomas Pinckney, to negotiate the Pinckney Treaty in 1795

  • Spain agreed for Americans to use the Port at New Orleans for trade

  • Southern border of the U.S. would fall along the 31st patallel

National issues George Washington faced

Americans wanted to go and settle west

• Battle of Fallen Timbers

  • U.S. army clashed with a confederacy of Americna Indian tribes

  • Indian surrender of all land in Ohio River Valley

• Whiskey Rebellion

  • Pennsylvania farmers attacking federal tax collectors that taxed the whiskey due to Hamilton

What led to a two party system?

All of the international and national incidents

Federalists

• Led by Alexander Hamilton

• Strong central government

• Favored urban and elite interests

Democratic republicans

• Thomas Jefferson and James Madison

• States rights

• Rural and agricultural interests

Washington’s Farewell Address

Directed towards the American people and John Adams, the next president

John Adams

• A federalist

• Pro-British

  • War broke out between Britain and France

  • French would seize American ships and Adams sent a delegation but the Frenchment who met them demanded a bribe (three men known as X, Y, and Z)

    • XYZ Affair

• Encouraged Congress to pass Alien and Sedition Acts

  • Alien - possible to deport any non-citizen

    • Irish and Scottish

  • Sedition - illegal to criticize the government publicly

• Enraged Democratic Republicans

  • Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions

    • States had a right to nullify any law passed by the federal government beyond powers granted in the Constitution

Women’s Role

• Had a diminished role in early American society compared to today

• During this time, leaders though wives and others crucial to the establishment of a strong America

  • Republican motherhood

    • Educate sons so the mothers needed to be educated

    • More schools for white girls were created