The War of American Independence: Religious and Economic Issues

To try to argue or assert that religious or economic issues were the only catalysts that set America on a course of revolution from the British motherland paints a portrait of a people who only valued materialistic wealth or that felt that religious pariahs. But in reality the majority of the peoples who settled in the North American colonies were simply looking at finding a better way of life or escaping religious persecution.

The people who settled in the colonies were not refugees from a tyrannical Britain. They were British subjects who were, in essences, explorers of their time. There were some of course that were escaping Britain for less than dubious reasons, but they were not of the majority.

The colonies rebelled because of excessive taxation, with no hope of representation. They rebelled because they were not allowed to worship as they saw fit. They were treated as naughty children, always to be punished and never given equality with their motherland counterparts.

In this essay I shall address the few of the factors that played a major role in the formation of the American nation as an independent entity from King and Crown.

Economics:

The crux of the importance in economic issue in the War of Independence can be summed up in one statement from William Pitt, the Earl of Chatham, when he was speaking in parliament during the Stamp Act debate. "The Americans are the sons, not the bastards of England." From Pitt's point of view, he felt it only proper that the Americans should share both the legal and political rights that the counterparts in Britain were allowed.

The American people shared this viewpoint. Ben Franklin noted in an article in the London Observer dated Nov 1770 that "the colonitsts were proud to be British and maintained the British culture and customes." The colonists had no wish to tear themselves away from Mother Britian.

But the winds of change and dissidence were sweeping through the colonies as Parliament and the King continued to levy further taxes and alledgely unfair sanctions on America. As early as 1765, the economic tide was frought with the indertow of mistrust and distrust of Britian.

Britian had tried to impose herself on the colonists though a sucession of revenue raising Acts. These serve to not only fuel the Americans sense of isolation and discrimination from her Brisitsh counterparts.

The unrest started to gain momentum in 1763 when Britian became to more heavily enforce the Navigation Act of 1620. This tightened enforcement led to higher costs of goods for the colonists, which in turn made the Americans more resistant to London's control of their lives.

London responded over the next several years by introducing more Acts:

- Stamp Act of 1765: collecting revenue from the issuance of legal documents, newspapers.

- Sugar Act of 1764: protected Brisitsh interests in West Indies sugar from foreign takeover

- Townsend Duties Act of 1767: tax on tea and manufactured goods, later became a mechanism that Britian employed to pay 'overseer's' to keep the colonists in order.

- Tea Act of 1773 - higher taxation of tea.

- The currency Act of 1764: control the emergence of colonial paper money.

- Quebec Act of 1773: restricted colonial growth to the west.

Boycotts of British imports greeted the passages of the Acts. The Tea Act invoked the famous Boston Tea Party. The Quebec Act not only incited the colonists, but also perhaps united them on both economic and religious fronts. In my opinion, this Act became synonymous with tyranny and the American became more intent on gaining their independence.

In early 1775, the face of Anglo-American relations started to crack and Britian became to take a sterner view toward the colonies, While Parliament tried to appease the colonists with the repeal of the Stamp Act in 1765, they hoodwinked the Americans by implementing the Declaratory Act, which gave Parliament the authority to impose further rules and regulations on the colonies.

Religious aspects

America represented an opportunity for people to be able to worship according to their beliefs, free from the persecution of religious intolerance.

Britian in the late 1600s was a hotbed of prejudice, especially if a person took a different religious view to that of the majority. "Uniformity of religion must exist in any given society" was the mantra of 17^th century Britian and Europe. This ideal was enforced by the government, and if you didn't agree, execution was often the punishment of choice.

The people who left Britian were primarily divided into two religious groups - the Puritans and the Quakers.

Puritans were members of the Church of England who felt that the church was polluted from the remains of the Roman Catholic Church. The Puritans wish to return the church to what they felt was a purer form.

The Church of England became disenchanted with the Puritans and became to remove laymen and ministers who would not recant their belief. The Puritans suffered imprisonment, torture, property confiscation and were threatened with "extirpation form the earth" for their 'sins' .

The Quakers (also known as the Religious Society of Friends) were similar to the Puritans, but they took the ideals of the Puritans to a higher plane. They took the spartan life of the Puritans and made more austere, feeling that this was more pleasing of God.

The Quakers were also persecuted like the Puritans, suffering mistreatment, torture, imprisonment and death at the hands of the King's jailers.

Both groups emigrated in large numbers to the colonies to start new lives, free of intolerance and physical harm. America became more than a refuge for the Puritans and Quakers along with other religious refugees of Europe. It gives these people purpose and hope.

Conclusion

While religion and economics factors were separately issues that made the American colonists yearn for independence. I am of the opinion that it was the Quebec Act of 1774 that became the proverbial 'straw that broke the camel's back,' and this was a religious as well as an economic issue in the fight for independence.

This single Act reflects Britain's unrelenting tyranny of the colonies. The Act not only was designed to prevent the colonists from moving west, but gave further credence to Roman Catholicism as a valid religion.

The Americans had borne the brunt of the replenishing of British coffers from the victorious French and Indian Wars, but the Quebec Act added further insult by allowing the Ohio Valley to be administered by Upper Canada and recognizing the Catholic faith for the French dwellers of the valley.

For the British government to recognize the very religion that the Church of England was founded to replace, and the decision to not allow the geographic and economical advancement of the colonies, was a snub that could not be ignored. The American colonists were proud of their British heritage. But being treated like outcasts and the continued punishment by increased pressures of taxes and levies drove America from allegiance to independence.