Revolution- The Declaration of Independence
At the end of the French and Indian War (1763), victorious Great Britain was the only superpower left in North America, with France losing all her North American colonies. However, the French and Indian War left the British colonies broke. Beginning in 1763, the British government imposed a series of taxes and proclamations on their American colonies. The American colonists rebelled against these taxes through a series of boycotts, claiming that, as Englishmen, they were entitled to representation in England prior to any colonial taxation. In response to the British government’s taxes and its declaration that the colonies were in open revolt, on June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia offered a formal resolution to the Second Continental Congress calling for independence of the American colonies from Great Britain. Thomas Jefferson was tasked in writing the Declaration of Independence. On July 2, 1776, Congress approved Lee’s resolution for America’s independence from Great Britain by a 12-0 vote (New York abstained). With independence adopted, Congress spent the next two days editing Jefferson’s draft of the Declaration. On July 4, 1776, Congress formally adopted the Declaration of Independence and sent it to the printer for duplication and distribution.
