By Stefanie Kunze
The Stamp Act of 1765 was ratified by the British parliament under King George III. It imposed a tax on all papers and official documents in the American colonies, though not in England.
King George III imposed a tax on official documents in American colonies
Included under the act were bonds, licenses, certificates, and other official documents as well as more mundane items such as plain parchment and playing cards. Parliament reasoned that the American colonies needed to offset the sums necessary for their maintenance. It intended to use the additional tax money to pay for war expenses incurred in Great Britain’s struggles with France and Spain.
Many American colonists refused to pay Stamp Act tax
The American colonists were angered by the Stamp Act and quickly acted to oppose it. Because of the colonies’ sheer distance from London, the epicenter of British politics, a direct appeal to Parliament was almost impossible. Instead, the colonists made clear their opposition by simply refusing to pay the tax.
Prominent individuals such as Benjamin Franklin and members of the independence-minded group known as the Sons of Liberty argued that the British parliament did not have the authority to impose an internal tax. Public protest flared and the ensuing violence attracted broad attention. Tax commissioners were threatened and quit their jobs out of fear; others simply did not succeed in collecting any money. As Franklin wrote in 1766, the “Stamp Act would have to be imposed by force.” Unable to do so, Parliament repealed the Stamp Act just one year later, on March 18, 1766.
American separatist movement grew during protest of Stamp Act
The colonists may well have accepted the stamp tax had it been imposed by their own representatives and with their consent. However, the colonists’ emerging sense of independence — nurtured by the mother country and justified by their multiple interactions with other trading nations — heightened the colonists’ sense of indignation and feelings of injustice. Even had they submitted to it, there is little doubt that many would have been troubled by the negative impact of a tax on the free press.
Scholars contend that the American separatist movement gained a great deal of influence as a result of its success in protesting the Stamp Act.
Stamp Act aftermath influenced constitutional safeguards, First Amendment
The act and the violence that erupted with its passage remained fresh in the young country’s memory. The crafters of the Constitution were careful to include safeguards against usurpations of freedom and the violence such acts could breed. Article 5 provides for a constitutional amending process, allowing for changes in the laws without resort to violent revolution.
The First Amendment secures freedom of speech, the right to peacefully assemble, and the right to petition government. It also protects the freedom of the press.
This article was originally written in 2009. Stefanie Kunze has a PhD in Political Science and is a Lecturer in the Department of Sociology at Northern Arizona University. Dr. Kunze specializes in perpetrators of ethnocide, and more specifically Native American experiences with settler colonialism.
Send Feedback on this articlePage 2
Sweezy v. New Hampshire (1957) stands as the first U.S. Supreme Court case to expound upon the concept of academic freedom though some earlier cases mention it.
Most constitutional academic freedom issues today revolve around professors’ speech, students’ speech, faculty’s relations to government speech, and using affirmative action in student admissions.
Although academic freedom is regularly invoked as a constitutional right under the First Amendment, the Court has never specifically enumerated it as one, and judicial opinions have not developed a consistent interpretation of constitutional academic freedom or pronounced a consistent framework to analyze such claims.
Passed on March 22, 1765, the Stamp Act, which required all paper goods to be taxed, caused an uproar in the American Colonies. Many colonists believed this was “Taxation without Representation” since Parliament issued the Act without communication with Colonial Government. The same day that the British Parliament repealed the Stamp Act, they also passed the Declaratory Act reasserting their control over the American colonies to the colonies’ frustration. Whereas an Act was passed in the last session of Parliament entitled, An Act for granting and applying certain stamp duties, and other duties in the British colonies and plantations in America towards further defraying the expenses of defending, protecting, and securing the same; and for amending such parts of the several Acts of Parliament relating to the trade and revenues of the said colonies and plantations as direct the manner of determining and recovering the penalties and forfeitures therein mentioned; and whereas the continuance of the said Act would be attended with many inconveniencies, and may be productive of consequences greatly detrimental to the commercial interests of these kingdoms; may it therefore please your most excellent Majesty that it may be enacted; and be it enacted by the king's most excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, that from and after the first day of May, one thousand seven hundred and sixty-six, the above-mentioned Act, and the several matters and things therein contained, shall be, and is and are hereby repealed and made void to all intents and purposes whatsoever.
Repeal of the Stamp Act. Although some in Parliament thought the army should be used to enforce the Stamp Act (1765), others commended the colonists for resisting a tax passed by a legislative body in which they were not represented. The act was repealed, and the colonies abandoned their ban on imported British goods. Declaratory Act. The repeal of the Stamp Act did not mean that Great Britain was surrendering any control over its colonies. The Declaratory Act, passed by Parliament on the same day the Stamp Act was repealed, stated that Parliament could make laws binding the American colonies "in all cases whatsoever." Resistance to the Quartering Act in New York. New York served as headquarters for British troops in America, so the Quartering Act (1765) had a great impact on New York City. When the New York Assembly refused to assist in quartering troops, a skirmish occurred in which one colonist was wounded. Parliament suspended the Assembly's powers but never carried out the suspension, since the Assembly soon agreed to contribute money toward the quartering of troops.
Townshend Acts. To help pay the expenses involved in governing the American colonies, Parliament passed the Townshend Acts, which initiated taxes on glass, lead, paint, paper, and tea.
Nonimportation. In response to new taxes, the colonies again decided to discourage the purchase of British imports.
"Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania to the Inhabitants of the British Colonies." Originally published in a newspaper, this widely reproduced pamphlet by John Dickinson declared that Parliament could not tax the colonies, called the Townshend Acts unconstitutional, and denounced the suspension of the New York Assembly as a threat to colonial liberties.
In acting to remove the principal American grievance, the Rockinghamites made no constitutional concessions to the colonists. They said the Americans ought to have respected parliamentary law, and they wished the power of Parliament to be solemnly asserted in a formal resolution, as did the many foes of repeal of the Stamp Act. The result was the Declaratory Act of March 1766, passed by overwhelming majorities despite the opposition of Pitt; in effect it proclaimed the authority of Parliament in America to be the same as it was in Britain. The ministry also coupled with repeal a demand that the colonial assemblies compensate the supporters of the Stamp Act in the colonies who had suffered property losses as the result of mob action. Still further, in the Revenue Act of 1766, the ministry secured reduction of the duty on molasses from threepence to one penny per gallon, extending it, however, to cover British as well as foreign molasses. While this step was financially pleasing to the Americans, it should be observed that the revised duty, collected upon both British and foreign molasses, looked very much like a tax for revenue. The Rockingham people thus agreed to set aside the stamp duties and to permit the Americans to trade with the foreign islands in the West Indies but to make no other substantial concessions in fact or theory. Even so, repeal of the stamp tax was bitterly opposed in London. To mollify the enemies of repeal, the ministry defined the American constitutional position regarding taxation as narrowly as possible. At least some of the American protests against the Bute-Bedford-Grenville policy, notably one from the lower house of the New York assembly, had condemned parliamentary taxation of whatever sort for revenue as unconstitutional. The ministry preferred to believe that the colonists would be content with the removal of the stamp duties. Although the Rockingham people kept their concessions to a minimum and although they did everything possible to reduce the importance of those concessions, repeal would have been defeated had it been opposed by George III. The king told his personal followers who held offices connected with the ministry that they must in honour support it; he advised his other friends that they were free to do as they chose. The result was a narrow victory for the ministry, the Commons and the Lords giving reluctant consent. The grievances of the Americans were by no means fully removed, and the concessions that were made were offered grudgingly. Nevertheless, the colonists very generally accepted them as a basic settlement of the crisis. They joyfully celebrated the repeal, and they enthusiastically reaffirmed their allegiance to Britain. They also eagerly resumed buying goods from the merchants of London, Bristol, and Liverpool. They were happy to escape from the crisis so easily and so creditably. For a time they had little to say about the grievances that continued. Of course, they would not be permanently satisfied with the situation as it was in the spring of 1766, their ideas of their rights within the empire would inevitably enlarge with the passage of time, and further concessions on the part of Britain would have been necessary to preserve a more or less permanent peace within the empire. Given time, the Rockingham people might have been able to establish a basic principle of conciliation in British policy. They were not granted the opportunity, being deprived of it by Pitt and George III, who drove them from power and established the ministry of “All the Talents” in July 1766. Augustus Henry Fitzroy, 3rd duke of Grafton It is difficult to say whether Britain and America would have found a modus vivendi had Pitt enjoyed both health and authority for a few years after 1766. The majesty of Britain meant much to him, and the warmly friendly language he had become accustomed to use regarding the colonists does not constitute proof that he would not have undertaken measures that were repugnant to them. Certainly, the constitutional position he had assumed did not preclude steps obnoxious to the Americans. Pitt inadvertently assisted in bringing into office men inclined toward the American philosophy of Bute, Bedford, and Grenville. Some historians have observed that they and their monarch were somewhat more moderate with respect to America than has been generally recognized. Nevertheless, this new group of officeholders, including Charles Townshend and the 3rd earl of Hillsborough, supplied impetus in the ministry of “All the Talents” toward a second attempt to tax the colonists for revenue and also toward the use of the army for repression in America. Although Pitt’s friend, Augustus Henry Fitzroy, 3rd duke of Grafton, continued as its head until 1770, Pitt’s people never actually controlled the ministry. Their leader was too sick to supply leadership and resigned from the cabinet in 1768. Except for the earl of Shelburne, they did not very vigorously protest against governmental measures that brought on a second Anglo-American crisis. Charles Townshend The Grafton ministry adopted an energetic American policy, thanks in part to Townshend, who pushed through Parliament in the spring of 1767 his famous duties on tea, glass, lead, and papers. These import taxes were forthrightly declared to be for the purpose of raising revenue. Thus, Townshend revived a great constitutional issue without hope of collecting more than a small fraction of the funds necessary to maintain the army in America. Moreover, the first proceeds from the duties were to be used to pay the salaries of British officials in America, toward buttressing British authority there, rather than to defray military expenses. Townshend was also responsible for an act setting up an American Board of Customs Commissioners, which zealously functioned at Boston after November 1767. The Grafton ministry further antagonized the colonists by securing the passage, in May 1767, of the Suspending Act, which prohibited the New York legislature from conducting any further business until it complied with the provisions of the Quartering Act. In addition, three more admiralty courts were created in 1768, at Boston, Philadelphia, and Charleston. In the spring of that year, the same ministry established a new western limit upon American expansion, a boundary described in part by the courses of the Ohio and Kanawha rivers; it permitted settlement well beyond the Proclamation Line of 1763.
Much more serious was a cabinet decision, announced simultaneously, to redistribute the army in America. Its commander in chief, Gen. Thomas Gage, had hitherto employed it against the colonists on only one occasion. In 1765 he had ordered a detachment at Fort Pitt to drive away pioneers who had settled beyond the Proclamation Line of 1763. He had carefully avoided using troops against the Stamp Act rioters, although he had brought 450 men into the settlements in order to make a show of strength in the event that American resistance became rebellion. By 1768 the stationing of large numbers of British troops in the settled parts of the colonies was risky. Nevertheless, toward securing economy and efficiency, the army in America was reduced to 15 regiments, and Gage was ordered to station “large bodies, in the provinces of Quebec, Nova Scotia, East Florida and in the middle colonies…to serve effectually upon any emergency whatever.” In consequence, Gage’s army was concentrated on the eastern coast of North America. The phrase “any emergency whatever” included one in which British soldiers would be used against the colonists.
Townshend Acts
Confronted by these actions by Parliament, which collectively became known as the Townshend Acts, the Americans again resisted, but with less unanimity than in the time of the Stamp Act troubles, for many cautious colonists, especially men of property who had been alarmed by the rioting of 1765–66, were not disposed to struggle vigorously. The Americans had not earlier made it clear that their argument against taxation without representation applied to duties collected at their ports as well as the stamp tax. Following the leadership of John Dickinson, whose Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania, to the Inhabitants of the British Colonies appeared in many colonial newspapers, they now defined their constitutional position with greater precision. Both internal and external levies for revenue were unconstitutional; only duties to control commerce were within the powers of Parliament.
public acknowledgement of nonimportation agreement violation
The colonists demanded repeal of the Townshend duties. They also denounced the proposed use of part of the proceeds of the duties to pay the salaries of royal officials as subversive of their established system of government. The Americans were also unhappy because their commerce was increasingly cramped. The American commissioners of the customs after November 1767, and the new admiralty courts after 1768, displayed zeal and energy. British rules governing shipping were enforced almost to the last burdensome technicality, with the result that colonial ships and cargoes were frequently seized for minor violations. Since various British officials received shares of the profits of such seizures, they were accused, and with a show of reason in some cases, of despoiling American merchants. Toward securing the repeal of the Townshend duties, the colonists again resorted to a boycott upon British goods. As they hoped, British manufacturers and merchants asked Parliament for repeal. The colonists also again employed minor physical violence and the threat of it to coerce British officials and those colonists who supported them. In the spring of 1768, the unpopular customs commissioners in Boston claimed that they were gravely menaced and asked for military protection. The ministry ordered Gage to put two regiments in the city and sent two more from Ireland.
Paul Revere: engraving of British warships
The British government moved vigorously in the summer of 1768. There was then, and for many months thereafter, much talk in London about compelling the colonists to obey. However, sentiment in the ministry was quite divided. Townshend was no longer alive to insist that his duties be collected, and his successor, Lord Frederick North, disliked extreme measures. In the spring of 1769 Gage was given authority to remove the troops from Boston, and it was announced that the Townshend duties would be substantially withdrawn. On March 5, 1770, North introduced a bill repealing all of the duties except that on tea. He said that the Townshend taxes were injurious to trade and therefore ought to be set aside. However, he declared that the duty on tea had to be retained in order to assert the right of Parliament to impose external taxes for revenue. Parliament complied, conceding enough to put an end to the second Anglo-American crisis.