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>> today we're moving from the colonial era which we've been talking about into o talking about the revolution, the tension that comes out of the colonial wars and more than the colonial wars. this is the sort of transition class period. we're spending weeks talking about the ideological justification for it, the actual fighting in the wake of it, what do we do having this freedom and not knowing how to set up a democracy so we will be going that direction. we covered the founding of jamestown massachusetts and the middle colonies and last time we were talking about how diverse the colonies were, not just reddish but many different people. how much more population, how much they were growing, how much the economy would and

great awakening was dividing colonies one from another or people within the colonies but also providing a common experience so this is where we've come from, where we are going and today we're talking about wars and we're talking about tensions. the theme of today is the colonists were whining freeloaders getting all the benefits of british citizenship without putting any of the cost. the motherland fought to protect them. they then osobjected to carrying any of the burden for paying theirfair share of the cost of protecting them . we're going to talk about war, the situation at the end of the last war, what the solutions are encouraging including freeloading colonists. stay with me on this. europe european nations were at war over and over and by

the time you get to george washington is telling america don't get involved in europe, they're going to war with each other and so forth and the history coming up to the revolution is experienced enough of that. queen anne's war, king george's war, over and over for reasons having to do with colonial empires . some colonies are thriving and the nations that own them are enriching themselves. others are jealous of all of that and this is providing extra fuel to the already burning fires of tension between the european nations so there's sort of an extra set of reasons. these are happening, they subject the colonies to some degree or another but this is the one that affects the colonies a lot and in some

ways sets the stage for the divisions we are talking about. we call it the french and indian war. fighting started in the ohio river valley in the 1754 but it was officially started and that's why it's called the seven years war. the british and french are at each other notjust in north america but all over the place . this is a very big war, a costly war. in erterms of the seven years war and north america there is fighting in newfoundland. there's fighting in qucbec city, montrcal, for niagara and western pennsylvania. the french are winning, the british are winning . it's a real contest and one of the big turning points is the iroquois confederation. taking the side of the

british and in that way turning the tables on the french allowing the british to succeed. and the french back off and the winnings aretremendous . for the colonists who are settled not much in maine, maine is part of massachusetts and it is sparsely settled but what role are they playing? 40 percent of the people fighting are colonial troops. in the british send an army over? yes, the redcoats fighting, trained british army, 40 percent are tcolonial troops at this time. the colonies were contributing. however the colonial army was very informal let's say. so our professional troops,

that is what one the war along with the native american allies. what do the colonial troops do? they fought when it was close to their home. when harvest time came they left the battlefield. and so one of the lessons coming out of the seven years war is what's going to win a future conflict is going to be our regular army and what's really important is that native american connections that we've got. what were the effects of the seven years war? territory. the french controlled all this territory and claimed a lot of territory all the way down to indiana . in 1763 in the piece that ends the seven years war gets

all of the territory. east of the mississippi. a huge part of north america, much larger than the 13 colonies that we had to start with. it's way more than double. so what did we win out of the seven years war? a massive amount of land. eight huge destiny. what else are the effects of this war? debt. this was a big war fought in the caribbean, north america, other places on c and on land . this is a very big war. france is in debt, britain is in debt. colonial losses, it's not like we didn't lose people

over here. british losses, divergent views of what happened. what this person did fighting over here, not really in his field of vision so competing ideas even of the experiences we went through. the seven years war is something like the great awakening that affected an entire set of colonies that had common experience, all

the colonists were fighting against the french, fearing what was going to happen on the frontier with american tribes so it's bringing us together but also setting up a little bit of a divide between our perceptions about how the war is being fought and who is contributing. things make sense so far? do ask questions if something is unclear. i can be unclear. in 1763 the french settled by seeding these territories. now one thing is clear to the british to us, to the british is that things have to change . look at what just happened with this war and the lessons from it. we can't keep going on the way we've gone on and in particular there are three things we need to make sure

that have to happen, one is we cannot have any more fighting. we are in debt. we have had a huge victory. we need toconsolidate our games and we have an empire that is worldwide , we need to make sure we do not go to war again with the native american tribes in the ohio rivervalley . so they set up a proclamation line. your textbook as a nice nap of it. along the appalachian mountains saying we can settle up to that line but we are not going to go past that the cause we cannot possibly have another war right now. so peace with native americans absolutely essential for the whole empire and the british north american colonies s.

the second thing is it's so clear that colonies cannot take care of themselves, look how they were fighting, so casual. when fighting got rough they went away. we have to have a standing army. if we're going to hold on to these games. we have to have a standing army in north america. don't fight native americans, standing army and the third one is we are deeply in debt and the entire empire needs to pay for the gains that we've got . that doesn't mean taxing people in north america, just taxing people in britain or in bermuda, it meanseverybody . but we can't single anyone out for special treatment.

this we must not do. we are all british so we have to be equitable and how we are fashioning these taxes and how we are getting people to pay their share of what was for the entire empire, sure, the british colonies got a lot of gain from this. they had enemies on all sides and now they don't. what an amazing thing for the first time in the history of british colonialism they have peace on their borders. that's a huge thing that the british empire did for north american colonists but we should make them pay more than fair share but they should pay their share. so starting in 1764 there is a series of acts. the war is just over, the proclamation line of 1763, there was fighti seven

years before that so right after this the sugar. we've had navigation acts, those are the ways the british connected the empire and in essence made money if you were violating them you would pay fees but mostly it was to guide trade to britain you have to trans ship things through british ports to get to the colonies and that way they tmade money and they were exported to the rest of europe and that way they made money. they were about orienting trade, now they are about making money off of the colonists. the fraying the expenses of securing the colonies. the colonies had hardly been taxed at all before this . were we taxing people in britain? of course we were, taxes on legal documents, certainly

real estate, on all kinds of things. was parliament taxing the north american colonies? hardly at all, mostly through navigation act stop . parliament understanding they had the right to tax, everybody is british, we are just taxing parts of the empire. the next year they didn't have enough money, the sugar didn't do it . this is on legal documents so the stamp made us think about postage stamps, no, it is watermarks on paper. if you're citing deed, all kinds of things, laying cards have to be on watermarked paper and that's how they kept track and you paid a tax on the watermark paper. another attempt to get the colonies to pull their weight

. were they after this paying more than the british, they still aren't paying as much. but at least they're paying a little bit more. they are contributing to all the security we gave them when our army came and with the iroquois wereable to push away the french . and we buckled, what a mistake. parliament backed down when unreasoning colonial opposition flared up. and as of british person i have to say a dramatic mistake. because what this does is it teaches them that there's something special, that they are not british like the rest of us. we are paying our taxes, we

are not rebelling. they can get upset and back down, what good is that going to do? you need to teach them a lesson . along with this we tried to teach them a lesson, the declaratory act , it dsn raise money and that's a problem because we're not getting enough money to pay our debt from the last war. parliament coupled the repeal with an act that clarifies let's make it clear vethat parliament has sovereignty over the colonies in all cases whatsoever, the rightto make laws, tax , if you are in fact violating those laws you are a criminal. this is the law we're talking about, this is how society is going to work. in this way we're making

clear we were enough to get rid of the stamp act but at least they are clear that they need to abide by the taxes we aresetting up for them . and the next year we of course have to pass more taxes, we still have a debt problem. the empire needs this help. we need you to pay it to d. place new taxes gss, lead, paper, it's also tightened enforcement of what we've got there. parliament clear in its right to tax, of course it's got a right to tax, all the british people push forward . legislatures, this is not. if you have laws on the books parliament is passing them and you have people objecting to that saying let's not go

along with the laws of britain, treasonous is not a bad word to use for that. the rule of law itself requires you to abide by the law. and they aren't. so obviously if these upstart assemblies, colonial assemblies are acting in treasonous ways you're going to disband them. you can't abide treason. these are in place for several years and after a terrible tragedy day to stupidly i would say were repealed. they were repealed because of the boston massacre, whata tragedy . what could looms? ese young people stones,

throwing stones at british soldiers. they cornered them in the square and were throwing stones and snowballs w. the mob was growing and they were cornered, they couldn't get away and yes, they fired, it's terrible they fired of folly into thiscrowd . five died. what a tragedy. but why were they there? why were they being quartered?d? why were people helping them with rocks? what started this was in the troops, what started this was the colonists. throwing stones and acting like thugs. we did the same things that any government would do when

there is tragedy and disorder. we tried to make sure this didn't happen again. we should have our army wherever our army needs to be but we moved itout of boston to make sure there were no other problems . we repealed the one giving into colonial pressures. i would argue this is a mistake. but what this does is teaches the colonists that they are, you know, unbelievably disordered way of living is going to be rewarded by them not having to be like the rest of the british in the empire, treated equitably. they want to be treated as something special.

the east india tea company, we have to pass la tt are of benefit to everybody and there s important part of the empire, e st india company a profitable company s ving hard times. it was near bankruptcy. to save the crown gave a monopoly to this company and it set up nobody else is going to be trading and we're going to lower the duties we add on t. remember the townsend duties had a duty on tv, they lowered it. but even then they lowered the duty, instead of celebrating it a interpreted cheaper legal t as oppression. what the hell was going on?

they went themselves into a frenzy and dump atea and were not talking about a cup of tea. we're talking about barrels, 45 tons, hundreds of thousands of pounds of tea. private property destroyed going into saltwater . what do you do in the face of mobs who are destroying private property and thinking that's okay? what do you do in the face of colonies who think they are super special, who think that they can be freeloaders letting the rest of the empire pay for the business they are getting and being unwilling to pay?

unwilling to pay their way? what you do is you crack down . what else can you do? we tried to be nice, even backed off on some of the taxes . we were clear the declaratory act but in the wake of this parliament passed a number of to bring this , we weren't having such a problem with south carolina or massachusetts that was being such a problem right now so we're going to be measured, were not going to make everybody pay, we're going to make them pay. these acts closed boston's work, restricted the governing body that we could not trust any longer. look at how they were acting

which we're going to try british officials in england, are you thinking we're going to try british officials which could include soldiers . in massachusetts, there's no way we could get a free trial there. and we the army has to be where ithas to be . to put the troops where they were needed. rebellion contempt for the law, mob behavior, freeloading. cannot be condoned. next 30 seconds, think about that. alright you colonists, you americans, can you poke holes in any of my arguments there? ouyou freeloading people you. am i wrong with any of this? how would you phrase it. click speaking to generally

but i would say for everyone. >> there's a whole bunch to talk about, that's nice. other things that come to mind. >> just a little bit. but was that point of view the right point of view and maybe our elementary schools and middle schools and high schools where you learned a rather different story about this are wrong. what's wrong here? >> there was no explaining outside of that one property. [inaudible] as >> i haven't listened to my british persona but yes.

it's not getting justification. yes. >> in high school i've never heard this point of view before. that there's no reason and the boston tea party was this big patriotic thing. but i don't know why we did it. >> it's a party, it's was lovely. that's not the way it's taught i'm sure but nevertheless this is a perspective we don't t tend to get until you get to college. until you start like on that first day flipping maps from one side to another, what does it look like from another perspective. this is a different perspective but the piece i want to press just a little bit harder on is any of this wrong.

>>. [inaudible] these main bullet points you see, i don't think it's necessarily wrong. >> i'm glad i was able to present it to you and you are not rejecting it. anything that was particularly convincing, a piece of evidence or slide or something that you felt like that's important to think about . was there something that was less convincing ? i think i'm going to leave that i want you to keep mulling that over and we've got another i'm going to do and then asking some similar questions towards the end and hold that in, what was the most convincing from this ht side, from that side. this is what i put up atthe beginning . in this awful stupid british

professor went on a tirade where he was saying unbelievably mean things about our colonies, freeloading. that is mean. we're in the middle of the class, we will talk later. that was interesting. freeloading colonists, that's just insulting. whining, good lord, what is the matter with this guy p getting all the benefits, of course they have benefits . paying for their, what? not only do we pay something in the navigation act but we pay taxes ourselves to the colonial assembly, to the colony. our assemblies have tax power and we've been paying

taxes ourselves to ourselves. we've been running things within our own colony, if we're not paying as much as other people in the empire maybe that's something to talk about, don't talk about not paying taxes. so this is just, do you want to know what we should be talking about, we need to temper the tyranny of the british. british turned away from their faith and liberty is what's going on here. in the wake of the seven years war over and over again parliament demonstrated it had abandoned its sense of democracy, abandoned its defense of us. and obviously by the time you get to the coercive act i would say obviously it's goal of this is the word you need to keep in mind for the next 20 years of american history. usurping, taking away the power and authority of the

colonies especially the colonial assembly. the assemblies are more democratic than parliament, not everybody votes for parliament, not everybody in the colonies votes either. but a greater percentage of them and white men, being realistic here, are voting for their elected officials in the assembly voted in britain for the parliament. it's more democratic and undercutting that is undercutting us. their generations we've had a way that we felt with the motherland with and they are violating the way in which we have done business all the way through this. we did not start with violent protests, we did not start this process after theseven years war thinking these wild thoughts at this british professor was talking about .

we were measured. offended? yes we were offended. we were offended by the line drawn through theappalachian mountains, the proclamation line . we win territory like european kehours when in any war they fought, that's what you do is you settle up at the end of the war by treating territory. you can see that through the history of europe, that's what happened here and gained all these territories and they're saying don't go there? what the hell is that? that to start with is insulting. that we now have all this land and we triple the size of british north america and you're saying but stay right here on the east coast. that's insulting. this isinsulting. so what did we do , we were measured. we were called.

we had our legislators who protested to parliament directly. that we are taxing the colonists and this is an encroachment upon the colonial assembly tax. this is where we started to get a little armed and for good reason. legal documents through the colonies, nobody can avoid this tax. this is a way of pulling everybody into amoneymaking venture we've never had before . not for us, for things going on in the rest of the empire, a storm of protests, of course it did . legislators resolved to oppose the stamp act. we just started petitioning and we're going to continue to petition but a lot more

strongly and there are some people who will be in mass protests. some had violence, i'm not condoning violence but there was violence where stamp act officials were tarred and feathered or theirhouses broken into . movement to boycott british goods were underway, that put pressure on british merchants and why would they repeal the act? because it was wrong.as it was clear that it was wrong. it's not the way we've done business with britain and the empire and they are imposing upon us and our colonial assembly's ability to tax. this shows how we are right. who cares about this? they say a few things to cover their but when you

backtrack havi t wrong policy and dn't pay much attention and why wou. say what you need to say inin order to get to the place where you're doing the right thing. taxing us again, the nextyear . well we had practice. by this point. colonists are boycotting british goods, there's a circular around other colonies about how to divide the duties. it's not, it's three more years before they actually calm down but they come down. why do they come down, because of the horrific violence against martyrs to liberty. these people who were standing up to having the standing so you need a standing army in north america okay, put that on the frontier. you're going to put them in

boston? why the hell do you need the red party, the redcoats, quite a different story wouldn't day, the red army. the redcoats in boston and housed on boston commons, this is not the british army protecting the colonies. this is the british army intimidating the colonies. you don't put them in an urban area full of british people but not to manage the british people. so is it a terrible thing, of course it is, who's to blame, people who brought this army to boston are toblame . heartless. the soldiers weren't there to protect us, they were there to intimidate us. it was inevitable that there was going to be aconflict .

d stead of selling it the colonists said what was that, we got tea from the dutch as well asthe english and now we can't an. cheaper tea from the dutch. you brought down the price, what you did is try to cageus into a monopoly . and under the guise of lowering the duty, the enforcement. that keeps us rigidly tied into. it's not like t was just tea like it is now, t was the most popular drink of the time. it was a central part of british life in britain and the british colonies. for the last decade parliament overstepping its bounds year after year after year. it's not like we weren't telling them how their

problematic . we told them, petitioned them. we got out in the streets and petitioned them. this is another example sneaking the issue of taxation by the people. these are patriots who decided you've got to in fact it in the pocketbook. they're not listening to us. let's throw the tea into the sea and see what they think of that. this of liberty is alive in the colonies, where inbritain ? are they trying to enslave the british sons and daughters? that's what it seems like this moment. then you push somebody far enough and they show their truecolors . and we pushed them.

and lookt at they showed. all t colony, not just massachusetts, massachusetts eaking out about this before they deroyed their homes but all the colonies, cutting off the port is cutting off the lifeblood of massachusetts. that's trying to kill the colonies. all of the colonies are responding to this. ending the limiting and ending democracy in massachusetts, what a giveaway. what is it you care about, making money. what is it you're willing to sacrifice, apparently the lives of colonists. democracy itself. the lifeblood of thiscolony . they are reviewing your true nature.

does parliament have the right to make such law, usurping the rights of colonists. this is the moment we have a continental congress that meets in 1774 for the first time . in which representatives from all the colonies come to try to figure out how do you respond to this kind of intolerable series of acts against us. 30 seconds. was anything here wrong? no, not really. was anything here biased or was i just telling the truth? >> i think both sides of it i

have read and i think anytime one side did something the other side just took it very aggressively. oh, i'm lowering your taxes. but our colony is like you're trying to turn us against each other well said. excellent. other responses. what's going on here, is anything wrong? were there particular parts that were convincing or now having heard the otherside less convincing than it was when you heard some of these arguments in middle school or high school . >> i think the colonies said we're not going to pay.

>> as they never framed it like that, i framed it like that . they were finding it in comparative terms to what people were talking about but very good point . that issue is one that seems to be pretty darn important and i don't know that everybody knew at the time what other people were saying . sometimes i like this class so i've been teaching this since before you were born, this class . and i like this one a lot. that's why i chose it to be one myself but because every time i do it, i convince myself that revolution was stupid. and then i convince myself that it was a good thing. and you convince yourselfof both of those things . and it's not that there is one part of the evidence

that's right and the other part iswrong , it's that it's painful which is the way life is. life is complicated like that . so the piece that gets me the most is the one you are poking at witches if the colonists understood how much in taxes people were paying in britain, when they have felt differently about the taxes y that they were asked to pay? they didn't understand that and people weren't setting it up in that way. it just makes me wonder if communication is really the problem. just if they had talked to each other a little better when we not have had a revolution?

other things from looking at this other side that the doctor was talking about that comes to the four for you, that stands out as either being more convincing or less convincing on this side of the argument? okay. how do we reconcile directly competing perspectives, directly competing use of some of the same evidence just looking at it from different lines or valuing it differently. how do we find meaning in this moment? what an important development , perched on the edge of deciding i'm going to pick up

a gun and start shooting at people in redcoats who i was fighting next to 12 years before. imagine what it would take for somebody who thought of themselves in 1763 and four and five as british first and then one of my next, i am a virginian, one of my way later down the list and american, what is that? that isn't even a classification yet. to think of yourself as somehow united with the other 13 colonies . so how do you get from this place of i'm british too let me pick up a gun and shoot the british. that's a lot in 12 years. and so this is a really important moment figuring out what can be meaningful in this moment is a lot of what

we're doing in the next couple of weeks, we're starting it now but we're going to be doing it in the next couple of weeks. what does this add up to, that's the sort of, where does this leave you in thinking about this conflict and i want you to talk to the person next to you about anything in terms of this for another one minute or maybe two just to get your wheels going on this. and we're going to talkabout this together . i like a lot of the conversations i'm hearing little bits and pieces off but i get tired of not being part of the conversation because i'm extremely self-centered so i want us to talk as a group. about anything you guys were just talking about that sleeping up to the four for you . yes. >> even during the seven years war that as you said, they didn't really fight in

their homes, they went back to their farms so tending to their own colonies more than the british. >> may be the era of benign neglect that we talked about last time, the ways in which the british were hands-off in governing colonies and letting them do their own thing land to a sort of underground separation becomes revealed when you have all the conflict but maybe there was more separation that was already there, is that fair to think? i think that's an interesting thing to thinkabout . other things that you guys are have that came out of your conversation. >> what does this add up to d.

>> tran 20 that's definitely the direction we go in where the separation just gets more and more separate. we're looking at conger concorde massachusetts in a book you're looking at and we're going to be seeing this process playing out with individuals, with individual communities but one of the key moments we're talking about in the future is once you start fighting , it's really hard to go back. there's blood that's been spilled now. concorde and lexington happens, that's a sort of increasingly separating kind of thing. can we hold more than one perspective in our minds at the same time and say both are legitimate?

>> .. [inaudible] >> finding one of the most compelling on one side orst the other. by show of knowledge or something like that or raise hands are you thinking some of the arguments thema british were making made more sense or are you leaning in one direction or another?

you can nod when i say the different possibilities. the first one where you take some from both. >> [inaudible] there is a way in which you can step further back and say isn't it kind of inevitable if you're separated by an ocean and you're getting more and more complex civilization in british north america that you're going to be growing apart from what's going on in britain and you're going to be more alienated?

so there's a way in which this is the moment it happens but there's a sort of natural development here and thomas paine has interesting things we are going to read about the justification for why would, for instance, why would an island rule a continent? they shouldn't. it's common sense that we should rebel. so, we are going to be getting into that. other things from what was convincing on one side or the other or how we can balance perspectives. is there a way we can formulate this that takes both? can you think of a lion or a couple of sentences that would allow us to give a nod to the british and american doctors

roddy? [inaudible] [inaudible] and in fact, you can sort of

apply that to the moment and say doesn't it always happen in history that one action means that everyone adjusts to that one action and there's going to be a counteraction? both sides are in fact moving along together. it's the opposition to the stamp act that might have ledd to moe parliamentary members, parliament members being more firm about how to crack down on the colonies later, that we were teaching them a lesson and they were teaching us a lesson. towns and duties, boston massacre. history isn't just one person,

it's everybody moving around. asand in this case you've got te british perspective and american perspective bouncing off of each other. do you think we would have been angry if they weren't so angry that they were doing things they otherwise wouldn't have wanted to do but because of all the things they saw us a doing, it is a bouncing back and forth. were they usurping the powers of the colonial assembly? they were to some extent. but those were never reallyly written down. those were informal kinds of relationships that we had and parliament absolutely have the right. but we absolutely felt like they are utterly trying to change the

relationship between colonies in a way that we cannot endure and once you get to the coercive acts, the 1774 closing of the harbor and all that, that just seems brutal. but there it really does seem like you can't interpret this as anything other than trying to destroy this colony. we can't condone that. when did the american revolution start? thater is exactly the right answer, looking at me with sort of big eyes and saying -- what is the date that automatically comes to mind in terms of the revolution for everybody as of

elementary school or maybe before elementary school? what's the date? >> [inaudible] >> declaration -- there's good reasons for that. when did the fighting actually start? concorde which was 1775. when did it become inevitable that there would be fighting? you can call that the beginning of the revolution. and i'm not sure that you could say it was the acts that made it and if you say the coercive acts then maybe what you're really saying is that he act the boston tea party or whatever saying what was the spark. some historians call these proximate reasons, ones close at

hand the sparks that light the fire. is it going to be lexington concorde? is it going to be the coercive acts? you can make an argument for any of these things but it's the whole series of them happening in the early 1770s. the 73, four, five leading us in the direction so not proximate, not the spark but what is it that is fundamentally putting us in a place where we are doing this seemingly amazingly huge thingg of turning from in 12 years i'm british to i'm going to shoot the british. what does the spark set fire to?

there you've got to go to bigger themes, bigger arguments and we are going to be building some of those in the coming several class periods talking about how colonists were thinking about themselves, the empire, the revolution that was underway. but the bigger themes, is it england's change, so i'm going to say the biggest change is 1774, i'm sorry, 1764, with the sugar act and the stamp act in 1765. i can't say my dates. because that's when britain changes the nature of the relationship by turning the switch and turning the profit off in a different way. that's going to cause problems or is it america gradually over

several generations becoming something different, diversifying the population, becoming competitors with new england states, seeing ourselves as being more and more distinct. we've got generations born here. is it something like that? there's different answers m to l of this. and one more minute, i want you to write down what you would say this class period adds to the bigger question of when did the revolution start. >> if you are enjoying american history tv, sign up for the newsletter using the qr code on the screen to receive the weekly schedule of programs like lectures on history, the presidency and more. sign up for the american history tv newsletter today and be sure to watch american history tv every saturday or anytime online on c-span.org/history.

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