Chapter 5 Lecture Notes: Colonial Resistance and the Road to Revolution

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering Native uprisings, imperial British taxation reform, colonial protests, and the rise of unified American political governance.

Neolin

A Delaware (Lenni Lenape) prophet living in Ohio who in 1762 preached a vision from the Master of Life, urging Native tribes to wage war and drive European settlers off their lands.

Three Fires Confederacy

An alliance of Native tribes in Michigan—comprising the Ottawa, Ojibwa, and Potawatomi—who were urged by Neolin to expel the British and join Chief Pontiac's uprising.

Pontiac's Rebellion

A 1763 conflict where Chief Pontiac led a coalition of Native tribes in sieges of Fort Detroit and Fort Pitt and captured 8 of 11 British forts in the Ohio valley.

Proclamation of 1763

A British boundary line set along the Appalachian Mountains that prohibited American colonists from settling further west in an effort to prevent conflict with Native tribes.

Paxton Boys

A mob of Scots-Irish settlers in Pennsylvania who viewed all Native Americans as savages and attacked the peaceful Conestoga tribe.

Mercantilism

An economic system operated on the belief that colonies exist primarily to increase the mother country's wealth.

Salutary Neglect

An unofficial British practice of laxly enforcing trade and navigation laws, which ended after the French and Indian War when Britain sought tighter control over imperial trade.

Currency Act of 1764

A measure pushed by Prime Minister George Grenville that prohibited the colonies from printing paper money, forcing them to pay British merchants in gold and silver.

Sugar Act of 1764

Also known as the American Revenue Act of 1764, it was the first direct taxation enforced by the Crown to regulate trade and allowed customs officials to try violators in Vice Admiralty courts without juries.

Vice Admiralty Courts

British military courts that operated without juries, used by the Crown to try colonial violators of trade and tax laws.

Quartering Act of 1765

A revenue bill requiring the American colonies to find or pay for the lodging expenses of British soldiers stationed in the colonies.

Stamp Act of 1765

The first direct tax on domestically produced printed paper in the colonies, requiring tax stamps to be purchased with scarce sterling coin.

Stamp Act Congress

A 1765 gathering of delegates from nine colonial assemblies that drafted formal petitions to King George III and Parliament deeming the Stamp Act a violation of their rights.

Sons of Liberty

A radical group formed in the summer of 1765 (originally known as the Loyal Nine) consisting of artisans, shopkeepers, and merchants who organized public protests and opposition to British taxation.

Daughters of Liberty

Colonial women who protested British tax laws by boycotting imported British goods, drinking tea made from local herbs, and spinning their own homespun cloth.

Declaratory Act

A 1766 law passed upon the repeal of the Stamp Act, asserting that Parliament's authority was supreme and that colonial laws contrary to parliamentary law were void.

Townshend Acts

Measures passed in 1767 that placed import duties on consumer goods brought into British North America, triggering the second major colonial crisis.

Massachusetts Circular

A 1768 letter authored by Samuel Adams urging colonial legislatures to unite and boycott British goods due to unconstitutional taxation without representation.

Crispus Attucks

A local dockworker of mixed racial heritage who was killed during the Boston Massacre, considered the first casualty in the fight for American independence.

Gaspée Affair

An incident on June 9, 1772, where Rhode Island citizens boarded and burned the grounded British customs schooner HMS Gaspée after it harassed colonial shipping.

Tea Act of 1773

A law passed to protect the British East India Company from bankruptcy by giving it a monopoly on tea sales in North America and undercutting Dutch tea smuggling.

Coercive Acts

Four punitive measures passed by Parliament in 1774 to punish Massachusetts for the Boston Tea Party, including closing Boston Harbor and placing the colonial government under crown control.

Quebec Act

A 1774 act that expanded Quebec's border westward and granted religious tolerance to Roman Catholics, which colonists lumped together with the Coercive Acts as the "Intolerable Acts."

First Continental Congress

A gathering of elected representatives from 12 of the 13 colonies in Philadelphia from September to October 1774 to organize a response to the Intolerable Acts.

Suffolk Resolves

A set of resolves drafted by Dr. Joseph Warren that declared the Coercive Acts void, called for a boycott of British goods, and advised Massachusetts to form a militia.

Continental Association

A system created by the First Continental Congress establishing a non-importation, non-exportation, and non-consumption pact to boycott all British goods.