Question

The British Empire was under heavy loss and debt after the __________? seven years war boston tea party treaty of paris

Answer 1

Answer:

Explanation:

The French and Indian War, or Seven Years War, represented the decisive turning point in British-colonial relations. The Treaty of Paris in 1763 ratified Britain’s undisputed control of the seas and shipping trade, as well as its sovereignty over much of the North American continent east of the Mississippi River (including French Canada).

But a steep price accompanied the fruits of total victory. The British Government had borrowed heavily from British and Dutch bankers to finance the war, and as a consequence the national debt almost doubled from £75 million in 1754 to £133 million in 1763. In order to address this onerous liability, British officials turned to larger import duties on enumerated goods like sugar and tobacco, along with a series of high excise (sales) taxes on goods such as salt, beer, and spirits. This taxation strategy tended to burden consumers disproportionately. In addition, government bureaucracy expanded in order to collect the needed revenue. As the number of royal officials more than doubled, Parliament delegated new legal and administrative authority to them. Thus, even as British subjects lauded their preeminent position in the world, they chafed under the weight of increased debts and tightened government controls.

Given Britain’s exertions on the North American continent for the sake of colonial security, both ministers and members of Parliament determined that the colonies were obligated to share the costs of empire. But the war exposed the weakness of British administrative control in the colonies on various fronts. The subsequent efforts on the part of royal officials to rectify these deficiencies and collect unprecedented amounts of revenue violated what many American colonists understood as the clear precedent of more than a century of colonial-imperial relations. New world institutions of self-government and trade, having matured in an age of salutary neglect, would resist and ultimately rebel against perceived British encroachment. Taxation policy became a central point of contention, because it tended to threaten both the prosperity and autonomy of colonial society.

1756-1757 Colonial assemblies in Massachusetts and several other colonies refused to support the war by raising taxes or troops unless royal governors relinquished control over military appointments and operations. Virginia’s House of Burgesses declined to raise the necessary war revenue through taxation at all, preferring a deficit financing method that relied on printing more paper money. Rampant inflation ensued, and British merchants refused to accepted depreciated currency.

The balance of trade between England and the colonies tilted decisively in favor of the former as a direct consequence of the French and Indian War. Military spending and a general increase in the demand for goods and services contributed to significant increases in colonial wealth (and prices). Colonial agricultural exports rose especially rapidly in the 1750s and 1760s. Colonists used the windfall to consume British manufactured goods at an ever increasing rate, supplementing a trend that been on the rise since the mid-1750s. Even with the boom in agricultural exports, colonists consumed more than they exported. British merchants, in the throes of the Industrial Revolution, responded by extending credit to their American customers. Accordingly, extended consumer debt became a common phenomenon in the colonies.

1762 During the late 1750s, the Board of Trade cited the war as justification for cracking down on smugglers and other abuses of the Navigations Acts. Parliament passed the Revenue Act of 1762 in an attempt to halt bribery as routinely practiced by colonists circumventing the Molasses Act. To do so, the Revenue Act dispensed with absentee customs officials who, rather than collecting duties on site, resided in England and relied on deputies susceptible to corruption. The measure was part of a larger effort to block colonial trade with the French Sugar Islands, since many colonists were undeterred by the war and continued their lucrative trade with French possessions. The British government also encouraged the Royal navy to apprehend and detain smugglers. Customs officials became more aggressive in using search warrants, called "writs of assistance" to track down smuggled goods. A young Boston attorney, James Otis, assailed such writs as contrary to the British constitution and beyond the Power of Parliament to administer. By the mid-1760s, however, the custom service collected more than £30,000 a year in duties. During the era of salutary neglect, the figure amounted to only £2,000 annually.