Birth of an American Republic

Standards

SS.912.W.5.5 Analyze the extent to which the Enlightenment impacted the
American and French Revolutions.

Academic Vocabulary

•Stamp Act
•George Washington
•Thomas Jefferson
•popular sovereignty
•Declaration of independence
•Treaty of Paris
•federal republic

Birth of an
American
Republic

The 13
Colonies

• Georgia

• South Carolina

• North Carolina

• Virginia

• Maryland

• Delaware

• Pennsylvania

• New Jersey

• New York

• Connecticut

• Rhode Island

• Massachusetts

• New Hampshire

The Colonies in
the Mid-1700s

• Colonial cities such as Boston, New York,

and Philadelphia were big commercial
cities---linked North America to the West
Indies, Europe, and Africa

• Britain wanted to strengthen the economy

by exporting more than it imported

• Passed the Navigation Act in the 1600s

• Colonies were diverse

• Colonists felt entitled to the rights of

English citizens

Colonists Express
Discontent

• The Seven Years’ War and French Indian

War drained the British

• King George III and his advisors thought

colonist should help pay

• Taxes began to increase

Sugar Act

(1764)

Imposed import taxes

Stamp Act (1765)

Imposed taxes on items such as newspapers

and pamphlets

Declaratory Act (1766)

Complete authority over the
colonists

Boston Massacre (1770)

British soldiers opened fire on crowd– killing 5
protesters

Boston Tea Party (1773)

Colonists hurled a cargo of recently arrived British tea

into the harbor to protest a tax on tea

Lexington and Concord (1775)

• First engagements of the American Revolutionary War

• “Shots heard around the world”

The Declaration of
Independence (1776)

George
Washington

James Madison

Benjamin
Franklin

Battle of Saratoga
(1777)

• First turning point

in the war

• American

triumphed over the
British

• Formed alliance

with France,
Netherlands, and
Spain

Yorktown
Virginia/Treaty of
Paris (1781)

• French fleet blockaded

Chesapeake Bay—British army
surrenders

• American, British, and French

diplomats sign treaty to end war

Redraft of Constitution
(1787)

Constitution is
supreme law of
the land (1789)

This document endures for more than

200 years