British Parliament imposes direct taxation on the American colonies, igniting the flame of revolution.
On March 22, 1765, the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act, the first direct tax levied on the American colonies. The act required that many printed materials in the colonies carry a tax stamp, purchased with British currency rather than the local colonial paper money then in common circulation.
The legislation taxed newspapers, legal documents, playing cards, and virtually every form of paper used for official purposes. The revenue was intended to help pay the costs of stationing British troops in North America following the Seven Years' War.
"No taxation without representation" became the rallying cry of colonists who argued that, as they had no members in Parliament, the tax was a violation of their rights as English subjects.
The Stamp Act Congress convened in October 1765, bringing together delegates from nine of the thirteen colonies. Their petitions and the widespread boycott of British goods ultimately forced Parliament to repeal the act in March 1766 -- but the damage was done. The precedent of colonial resistance had been established, and the path toward the American Revolution was set.
Britain restricts colonial expansion west of the Appalachian Mountains following Pontiac's Rebellion.
Parliament reduces molasses tax but increases enforcement, establishing precedent for direct revenue collection.
First direct tax on the colonies sparks unified resistance and the cry of "no taxation without representation."
New duties on glass, lead, paint, paper, and tea further inflame colonial opposition to British taxation.
British soldiers fire on a crowd of colonists, killing five and becoming a rallying point for independence.
Colonists dump 342 chests of British East India Company tea into Boston Harbor in protest of the Tea Act.
The "shot heard round the world" marks the beginning of armed conflict between Britain and the colonies.
Morgan, Edmund S. The Stamp Act Crisis: Prologue to Revolution. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1953.
Maier, Pauline. From Resistance to Revolution: Colonial Radicals and the Development of American Opposition to Britain, 1765--1776. New York: Knopf, 1972.
Thomas, P.D.G. British Politics and the Stamp Act Crisis: The First Phase of the American Revolution, 1763--1767. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1975.
"Resolutions of the Stamp Act Congress, October 19, 1765." The Avalon Project, Yale Law School, Lillian Goldman Law Library.
Weslager, C.A. The Stamp Act Congress: With an Exact Copy of the Complete Journal. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1976.