Stamp Act of 1765 Facts & Worksheets

• The Grenville ministry thereupon resolved that Parliament would generate this cash by imposing taxes on the American colonies without their assent. This was unprecedented; Parliament had previously enacted regulations on colonial trade, but it had never directly imposed taxes on the colonies to generate income. London politicians had consistently anticipated that American colonists would finance their defence. 
• As long as a French threat persisted, it was relatively easy to persuade colonial governments to offer support. Assistance was typically rendered through the establishment of colonial militias, financed by taxes levied by colonial governments. 
• The legislatures were occasionally amenable to supporting the regular British soldiers tasked with defending the colonies. As long as this assistance was provided, the British Parliament had minimal justification for levying taxes on the colonists. However, following the peace of 1763, colonial militias were promptly disbanded.  
• Militia officers were fatigued by the contempt exhibited by regular British officers and exasperated by the near impossibility of securing regular British commissions; they were disinclined to continue their service after the war concluded. In any event, they possessed no military function, as the Indian threat was negligible, and international threats were absent. Colonial politicians saw no necessity for the British troops.
• The Sugar Act of 1764, a revenue-raising act passed by the Parliament of Great Britain on 5 April 1764, was the inaugural tax in Grenville’s initiative to generate money in America. It represented an amendment to the Molasses Act of 1733.
• The Molasses Act introduced a levy of 6 pence per gallon on foreign molasses imported into British territories. The Act aimed not to generate money but to render foreign molasses prohibitively expensive, establishing a monopoly for molasses supplied from the British West Indies.  
• Due to economic concerns, the colonists’ initial reaction was to reject the Act, but with great consideration on its possible legal benefits, they later on acknowledged it. The British Constitution ensured that taxes could not be imposed without Parliament’s consent; nevertheless, the colonists contended that, based on their notional Rights as Englishmen, they could not be taxed without their consent, which was manifested through representation in Parliament. The colonists did not elect any representatives to Parliament; hence, it was perceived as a breach of their rights for Parliament to impose taxes on them. There was insufficient time to address this concern over the Sugar Act; however, it became a significant opposition to the Stamp Act the same year.

STAMP ACT

• The Stamp Act provoked intense opposition during a period of economic distress in the colonies. While the majority of colonists maintained their acceptance of Parliament’s ability to control trade, they asserted that only their elected assemblies had the power to impose direct, domestic taxes, exemplified by the Stamp Act. The legislation was enacted by the British Parliament on 22 March 1765, with an effective date of 1 November 1765. It was approved by a vote of 205–49 in the House of Commons and received unanimous consent in the House of Lords. Historian Edmund Morgan specified the particulars of the tax:

The highest tax, £10, was placed ... on attorney licenses. Other papers relating to court proceedings were taxed in amounts varying from 3d. to 10s. Land grants under a hundred acres were taxed 1s. 6d., between 100 and 200 acres 2s., and from 200 to 320 acres 2s. 6d., with an additional 2s 6d. for every additional 320 acres (1.3 km2). Cards were taxed a shilling a pack, dice ten shillings, and newspapers and pamphlets at the rate of a penny for a single sheet and a shilling for every sheet in pamphlets or papers totaling more than one sheet and fewer than six sheets in octavo, fewer than twelve in quarto, or fewer than twenty in folio (in other words, the tax on pamphlets grew in proportion to their size but ceased altogether if they became large enough to qualify as a book).

- Edmund S. Morgan & Helen M. Morgan, The Stamp Act Crisis: Prologue to Revolution, 1963.

• The elevated levies imposed on lawyers aimed to curtail the expansion of a professional class inside the colonies. Stamps needed to be acquired with hard currency, which was limited, instead of the more abundant colonial paper currency. The revenues were to be relocated to America to avert the financial concerns due to large acquisitions of supplies and salaries given to British Army personnel who served in the country. 
• Colonists reacted to two aspects of the Stamp Act, one of which pertains to the legal aspects. The tax on court documents explicitly encompassed courts exercising ecclesiastical jurisdiction. These courts were not currently established in the colonies, and no court judges were present to monitor the colonists just in case they compromised a policy stated in the Stamp Act. The statute conferred admiralty courts the authority to adjudicate criminals, mirroring the precedent established by the Sugar Act. Historically, admiralty courts were limited to disputes related to the open ocean. 

REACTIONS FROM THE COLONISTS

• Parliament proceeded with the Stamp Act in spite of the colonists’ objections. The reactions of the colonists to the Stamp Act gradually escalated in different areas. For example, Virginia Governor Patrick Henry presented a series of motions to the House of Burgesses, the colony’s assembly. These motions explicitly rejected the authority of the Parliament to impose taxes on colonies and urged the colonists from different areas to oppose the Act as well.
• Newspapers owned and operated by the colonists disseminated the Parliament’s resolution, which led to more negative reactions from the colonists. The resolutions established the framework for the declarations of the Stamp Act Congress, an extralegal assembly consisting of delegates from nine colonies that convened in October 1765. The Stamp Act Congress submitted petitions to the monarch, asserting their devotion but maintaining that only the colonial assemblies had the constitutional authority to impose taxes on the colonists.