Justin Wentworth
November 10, 2015
History 17A Tuesday 6-9pm
Exam 2
Many factors contributed to the American Revolution besides the American people themselves. Some influential ideas that contributed to the Revolution were Enlightenment ideas and the Enlightenment thinkers behind these ideas were John Locke and Voltaire. Economics and geography were other major factors that contributed to the American Revolution and the uprising of the American people. There were many ideas’s that provoked the American colonists to start the American Revolution. John Locke was very influential with his ideas of Consent of Cover and Limited Monarchy. Voltaire also had great ideas, which contributed to the American Revolution such as, that natural law should run the government, and God’s law should not.
It is a proven fact that in wartime the British economy was given a financial boost as we saw during the French and Indian Wars and in the Acts of Trade and Navigation that were passed in the American Colonies. These Acts forced the American Colonists to trade with Britain or with ships that were heavily taxed by England. In addition, in 1764 Parliament passed a law stating that sugar and molasses were to be taxed also. That was especially hard on the colonists who mostly relied on the barter system to procure sugar and molasses. The sugar tax only made the colonists angrier and added to a growing list of problems that led up to the Revolution.
Parliament was not done adding to this list of grievances and in 1765 passed yet another tax onto the American colonists in the form of the Stamp Act. This Stamp Act forced the colonists to pay a tax for an official seal that had to be affixed to all legal papers and playing cards. The Stamp Act tax could only be paid in cash, which furthered the colonist’s anger towards England. With England, passing all the new laws and taxes in the American colonies the colonists finally had enough and they organized themselves and boycotted all...