British Politics And The Stamp Act Crisis

When Parliament sought to raise funds through the passing of the Stamp Act in 1765, they did not anticipate the protests and staunch opposition to the new law that would ensue in the colonies. Though the crisis was eventually resolved, the larger questions raised by Parliament’s action and colonial resistance remained unanswered. What started as a debate over taxation would end in a struggle for independence. The Stamp Act Crisis, 1765–1766, marks the transition in United States history from the Colonial Era to the Era of the American Revolution. The full narrative of the Stamp Act includes political, social, economic, and cultural histories on both sides of the Atlantic. This volume provides the reader with the opportunity to engage with the pamphlets, letters, speeches, legal documents, and other texts and images that people in the colonies and in London were themselves reading, debating, and reacting to at the time. The introduction incorporates recent scholarship and provides a fresh look at this key moment in American history, and the informative headnotes and rich annotations help orient the reader within the historical sources.

'Impressive! . . . The authors have given us a searching account of the crisis and provided some memorable portraits of officials in America impaled on the dilemma of having to enforce a measure which they themselves opposed.'--New York Times 'A brilliant contribution to the colonial field. Combining great industry, astute scholarship, and a vivid style, the authors have sought 'to recreate two years of American history.' They have succeeded admirably.'--William and Mary Quarterly 'Required reading for anyone interested in those eventful years preceding the American Revolution.'--Political Science Quarterly The Stamp Act, the first direct tax on the American colonies, provoked an immediate and violent response. The Stamp Act Crisis, originally published by UNC Press in 1953, identifies the issues that caused the confrontation and explores the ways in which the conflict was a prelude to the American Revolution.

This comprehensive documentary source book on the Stamp Act provides a case-study approach to American colonial history and serves as a problems source book on the key event in Anglo-American relations in the 1760s. Morgan has assembled sixty-five crucial documents on all phases of the crisis; on certain acute issues of the controversy nearly all of the relevant materials now extant are included.

The first book-length study of the Stamp Act in decades, this timely collection draws together essays from a broad range of disciplines to provide a thoroughly original investigation of the influence of 1760s British tax legislation on colonial culture, and vice versa. While earlier scholarship has largely focused on the political origins and legacy of the Stamp Act, this volume illuminates the social and cultural impact of a legislative crisis that would end in revolution. Importantly, these essays question the traditional nationalist narrative of Stamp Act scholarship, offering a variety of counter identities and perspectives. Community without Consent recovers the stories of individuals often ignored or overlooked in existing scholarship, including women, Native Americans, and enslaved African Americans, by drawing on sources unavailable to or unexamined by earlier researchers. This urgent and original collection will appeal to the broadest of interdisciplinary audiences.

Studying the British reaction to colonial resistance to Charles Townshend's taxes and other British policies, Peter Thomas proves that attitudes on both sides of the Atlantic hardened long before the Boston Tea Party.

Britain was victorious in the Second World War, and yet thirty years later she had many of the characteristics of a defeated nation. What went wrong? The Politics of Decline sets out the assumptions of the 1940s and clinically examines the records of successive Governments as they strove to run the country in the approved manner. The I.M.F. crisis of 1976 brought these efforts to a shuddering halt. Using original sources, this book marshals the evidence to support a compellingly written interpretation of events.

This is the first modern study to focus on the British dimension of the American Revolution through its whole span from its origins to the declaration of independence in 1776 and its aftermath. It is written by nine leading British and American scholars who explore many key issues including the problems governing the American colonies, Britain's diplomatic isolation in Europe over the war, the impact of the American crisis on Ireland and the consequences for Britain of the loss of America.