Pedagogia

V. THE ROAD TO INDEPENDENCE
THE AMERICAN REVOLUTIONARY WAR
Britain’s 13 North American colonies matured during the 1700s. They grew in population, economic strength, and cultural attainment (realización). They were experienced in self-government. War between Britain and France in the 1750s was fought partly in North America. Britain was victorious and soon initiated policies designed to controland fund (financiar) its vast empire. These measures imposed greater restraints (restricciones) on the American colonists’ way of life.

The Royal Proclamation of 1763 restricted the opening of new lands for settlement. The Sugar Act of 1764 placed taxes on luxury goods, including coffee, silk, and wine, and made it illegal to import rum. The Currency Act of 1764 prohibited the printing ofpaper money in the colonies. The Quartering Act of 1765 forced colonists to provide food and housing for royal troops. And the Stamp Act of 1765 required the purchase of royal stamps for all legal documents, newspapers, licenses, and leases.

Colonists objected to all these measures, but the Stamp Act sparked (desataron) the greatest organized resistance. The main issue was that they were beingtaxed by a distant legislature in which they could not participate. In October 1765, 27 delegates from nine colonies met in New York to coordinate efforts to get the Stamp Act repealed (revocar).

During the next several years, however, a small number of radicals tried to keep the controversy alive. Their goal was not accommodation, but independence. Samuel Adams of Massachusetts was the mosteffective. He wrote newspaper articles and made speeches appealing to the colonists’ democratic instincts. He helped organize committees throughout the colonies that became the basis of a revolutionary movement. By 1773, the movement had attracted colonial traders who were angry with British attempts to regulate the tea trade.

On the night of April 18. 1775, 700 British soldiers marched silentlyout of Boston. Their orders were to seize (apoderarse) weapons and ammunition that rebellious colonists had stored in Concord, a nearby the town. The colonists were warned that the British soldiers were coming. In the village of Lexington the British found seventy American militiamen, farmers and tradesmen, barring (bloqueando) their way. These soldiers were known as "Minutemen (they had promisedto take up arms immediately whenever they were needed). The Minutemen were ordered to return to their homes. They refused, then, someone, nobody knows who, fired a shot. Other shots came from the lines of British soldiers. The first shots had been fired in what was to become the American War of Independence.

The next month, May 1775, a second Continental Congress met in Philadelphia and began toact as an American National Government. It set up an army of 17,000 men under the command of George Washington - from Virginia and a surveyor with "experience of fighting in the French and Indian War. The Continental Congress also sent representatives to seek aid from friendly European nations - especially from France, Britain's old enemy.

On July 2, 1776, the Continental Congress finallytook the step that many Americans believed was inevitable. It cut all political ties with Britain and declared that "these United Colonies are free and independent states." Two days later on July 4, it issued the Declaration of Independence -the most important document in American history-, written by Thomas Jefferson, a lawyer from Virginia. After repeating that the colonies were now "free andindependent states." it officially named them the United States of America. One of the first members of the Continental Congress to sign the Declaration of Independence was John Hancock of Massachusetts.
The Declaration of Independence also set out the ideas behind the change that was being made. It claimed that all men had a natural right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Ideas,...