The SAR MAGAZINE is the official quarterly publication of the National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution published quarterly.
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18 SAR MAGAZINE The STamp acT Dr. David E. Schrader, MASSAR O n November 1, 1765, 250 years ago, an act called "Duties in the American Colonies Act 1765," known to all posterity as "the Stamp Act," took effect in the British American Colonies. On February 21, 1766, less than four months after it was put into effect, and less than a year after it was initially adopted, the Stamp Act was repealed. Yet somehow this remarkably short-lived tax placed 13 heretofore loyal British Colonies and their mother country of Great Britain on a road of conflict that within 10 years would lead them inexorably to a "rude bridge that arched the flood" where "the embattled farmers stood, And fired the shot heard round the world." (Emerson) Three factors give the Stamp Act a unique claim as the spark that ignited the Revolution: 1) Because of its particular impact on Colonial printers, the Stamp Act galvanized the Colonial press in opposition to parliamentary rule; 2) The process of resistance to the Stamp Act led to the formation of Sons of Liberty groups across the Colonies; and 3) The Act gave rise to the first unified action of the 13 American Colonies. The backdrop to the Stamp Act is what we in the United States call "the French and Indian War." We think of it as a battle between Great Britain and France for supremacy on the North American continent. Yet it was much more than that. In Europe it was known as the "Seven Years' War." Fought largely between 1756 and 1763, it was as close to a world war as might be fought in the 18th century. While Great Britain and France were the primary belligerents, the British were allied with Prussia, Hanover, several smaller German states, Portugal and the Iroquois Confederacy; France was allied with Austria, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Saxony, the Mogul Empire in India, the Wabanaki Confederacy, Algonquin, Ottawa and other Native American tribes. The fighting took place in North and South America, Europe, India and Africa. The British emerged with military victory, but the victory pushed Great Britain to the brink of national bankruptcy, with a national debt approaching £16.5 billion in today's currency (Morgan and Morgan, p. 21). The obvious question for Parliament was how to raise money. At the cessation of the war Britain faced the additional problem of what to do with the large number of soldiers and sailors that had been raised to fight. A number of factors, including lingering tensions with France's former allies, the Ottawa, led to the stationing of 10,000 British troops in the American Colonies. British political leaders, not surprisingly, thought that the Colonists should bear the costs of those troops. The idea of a Stamp Act was, of course, much discussed before it was actually enacted on March 22, 1765. From the summer following George Grenville's appointment as first minister in April 1763, Grenville had been considering a stamp tax (Morgan and Morgan, p. 54). The idea was much discussed on both sides of the Atlantic prior to its introduction in Parliament. Grenville met with Benjamin Franklin, Jared Ingersoll and M.P.s Richard Jackson and Charles Garth, all representatives of American Colonies, on February 2, 1765, to discuss the Stamp Act and other tax options (Thomas, p. 78). The American representatives urged Grenville to require contributions of the several Colonies, leaving the question of how to raise the money to the Colonial assemblies. Grenville found that approach both uncertain and unsatisfactory. Accordingly, the Stamp Act was passed less than two months later. The act imposed a tax that Grenville and his political allies regarded as both equitable and easy to collect. It required a stamp on virtually every item of paper used in the Colonies. The cost of the stamps ranged from £10 for attorneys' licenses to smaller amounts on everything from court papers to playing cards, dice and newspapers (Morgan and Morgan, p. 72). The Stamp Act was a disaster. It was unique because it was the first tax that Parliament had imposed on activities within the Colonies. Morgan and Morgan note that, until the 1760s "New Englanders and other Americans went about their activities unhampered by Parliamentary taxes." (p. 4) Parliament had enacted various forms of import duties, but these were justified as regulation of trade and were not seen as attempts to raise revenue. Not so for the new tax. The issue of taxation without representation had been brewing for some time. The phrase, "no taxation without representation," had been a part of popular political dialogue at least since its introduction by Boston Pastor Jonathan Mayhew in a 1749 sermon commemorating the 100th anniversary of the execution of King Charles I. It was well recognized that the British "Bill of Rights" of 1689 allowed taxation only by the authority of Parliament, that is, by the authority of the elected representatives of the people. This lay at the root of the proposal of Franklin and the other American representatives in February 1765 to delegate the issue of Colonial taxes for support of the British Army to the Colonial assemblies. British political leaders in 250 YearS ago The Beginning of the American Revolution Stamp Act rioting