The sequence of events leading to the American Revolution, from the French and Indian War to the Battles of Lexington and Concord

1. A Long Train
of Abuses
and Usurpations
The Causes of the
American Revolution
USHC 1.2
Analyze… the conflict between the colonial legislatures
and the British Parliament over the right to tax that
resulted in the American Revolutionary War.

3. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that
Governments long established should not
be changed for light and transient causes;
and... that mankind are more disposed to
suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to
right themselves by abolishing the forms
to which they are accustomed. But when a
long train of abuses and usurpations…
evinces a design to reduce them under
absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is
their duty, to throw off such
Government…

4. Salutary
Neglect

7. British National Debt
£0
£20,000,000
£40,000,000
£60,000,000
£80,000,000
£100,000,000
£120,000,000
£140,000,000
Following the French and Indian War

9. Salutary
Neglect

10. Proclamation
Line of 1763

11. Parliament Taxes
the Colonies
1. Sugar Act (1764)
2. Stamp Act (1765)
3. Townshend Acts (1767)

12. Smuggling
A Serious
Photo Credit: Mary Harrsch

16. NOTE: The colonists did not want to be
represented in Parliament, where their
representatives could have been
outnumbered. They believed that only
their representatives in their own colonial
legislatures could legitimately tax them.

17. Intimidation
Mass Protests

18. Reduced dependence
on British textiles

25. Confrontation
between
and a

29. Just because we don’t tax...
doesn’t mean that we can’t!

30. Photo Credit: Wendell

31. • Tea Act
• Boston Tea Party
• Intolerable Acts
• Lexington & Concord
Leading to the Revolution
Photo Credit: Darwin Bell

32. Grants a
to a British
Photo Credit: John-Morgan

34. MARTIAL
LAW

35. Boston Port Act
Massachusetts
Government Act
Administration of
Justice Act
Quartering Act
Quebec Act

36. Photo Credit : Jeanette Runyon
The

37. Photo Credit: Rachel Ford James
The

38. OBJECTIVE:
Seize the Arsenal

39. THE SHOT
Image Courtesy of The National GuardArtist: Don Troiani

40. Photo credit: herzogbr

41. The British Retreat

42. Such has been the patient
sufferance of these Colonies...The
history of the present King of
Great Britain is a history of
repeated injuries and
usurpations, all having in direct
object the establishment of an
absolute Tyranny over these
States.