“Among the natural rights of the Colonists are these: First, a right to life; Secondly, to liberty; Thirdly, to property; together with the right to support and defend them in the best manner they can.” Like Benjamin Franklin said, we have the right to defend are rights in the best manner we can. And by the colonies separating themselves from Great Britain and their unlawful acts, they had to declare their independence.
In my personal research and understanding of this matter, I believe that the colonies had every right to declare independence from Great Britain. The colonies had their rights and freedoms being taken from them over night. It was only a matter of time before the colonies started their own government.
Natural rights, also called inalienable rights, are the rights that all men are born with. If anyone were to take away someone’s natural rights, then they would be consider a criminal and would be set up for a trial. As said by Thomas Jefferson “Citizens have the natural right and the common sense duty to protect themselves, their families, their communities, and their property...guns are the equalizing tools of self-protection, utopian lamentations notwithstanding.” By protecting yourselves, from someone trying to take these rights from you, it is not illegal.
For the first example, Great Britain was taking away their natural rights, which are Life, Liberty, and Property (The Pursuit of Happiness). By creating taxation without representation, Great Britain was making it almost impossible to live a financially stable life. Everyone’s property was in danger of being taking away from them; prices went higher when buying goods, and most people could not afford to keep up with their lands. Almost everything that you could buy, sell, or deal was being taxed on. It made it extremely difficult to live in this time and to protect yours and your family’s life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Therefore, causing families to revolt and going against the government and refusing to pay all the taxes.
Another main reason why the American Colonies needed to revolt was because the British were expecting them to pay unreasonable taxes. Some of the main taxes were: the Stamp Act, the Townshend Act, and the Tea Act. The government may have some good reasons to force all the colonies to pay these taxes, but without any representation from the colonies there was not a chance that they would all agree to pay these taxes.
The Stamp act was for any printed material to be printed on stamped paper, to collect revenue. These printed materials were legal documents, magazines, newspapers and many other types of paper used throughout the colonies. This act was passed in 1765. The purpose of this tax was to help pay for troops in North American at the Seven year war. Many of the colonies felt that this was unfair to be taxed without consent. After many petitions and boycotts, the act was never put into force and none of the colonies had to pay the tax.
The Townshend Act is a series of acts that began in 1767. In the series, there was the Revenue Act, the Indemnity Act, the Commissioners of Customs Act, the Vice Admiralty Court Act, and the New York Restraining Act. The purposes of these acts were to raise revenue for the salaries of governor’s and judges.
The Tea Act was passed in 1773. The purpose of this act was to raise revenue in the American Colonies. The Boson Tea Party was a big event that happened because of the Tea act being passed. Some officials in Boston refused to return over 300 cases of tea, so the colonist began to revolt. They boarded the ship and destroyed all the tea by tossing it off the edge into the water. About 10,000 pounds of money was destroyed that day in tea. This Boston Tea party soon put an end to the Tea act. This rebellious act turned out to be very useful. The colonies no longer had to pay those taxes anymore.
Boycotting (refusing to use, buy, deal with a persons/ organization as a protest for political reasons) was one of the main revolting strategies when the colonies were declaring independence. The colonists boycotted just about everything that they received from Great Britain. They boycotted the imported goods and refused to trade with them. But most important of all they boycotted their home countries government. Clearly they had issues with the taxes they were being forced to pay, and it wasn’t even because of the taxes themselves. They were upset because they were taxed without representation. Of course they are going to boycott. Their king claimed that they were a free people but they were receiving no such rights. The British government showed absolutely zero respect or care for the colonies. So, the colonists did the only thing they could think of and stood up for their rights.
In conclusion, by declaring independence, the colonies couldn’t have done anything more to stand up for what they believe in. America is a very strong and proud country, and without this countries history to get to where we are now we wouldn’t be those proud Americans we are today. And without the Declaration of Independence this country would not be where it is today, with all its strong and powerful leaders. This country may be very young compared to all the other countries, but America definitely has discovered the right kind of foundation. We found a new form of government that has been working very well for all the people in this country. We discovered away to fill everyone’s needs and have been able to come to an agreement on most things that are vital to this country.
