History 2010 - Toye (NeSCC): Exam #2

In 1765, the British Parliament imposed stamp duties on the American colonies, setting in motion the chain of events which ultimately led to the American Revolution. This paper analyzes the practicalities of the Stamp Act to provide insights into the way in which a tax instrument that was successful in one setting failed to achieve similar success in another. The reasons for choosing stamp duties as an appropriate fiscal measure, the colonial reaction to the tax, and the way in which the tax was accounted for by the British government bureaucracy are examined. The paper demonstrates the value of using an accounting lens to provide a more nuanced interpretation of the Stamp Act crisis.

The article explores how American colonial sentiments towards the 1774 Quebec Act became a cause of the American Revolution. The author argues that the personal efforts of Great Britain's King George III to both support and pass the legislation helped solidify anti-British sentiments unlike previous legislation aimed against the colonies such as the Townshend duties, the Tea Act, and the Boston Port Act. The author considers how the Quebec Act was portrayed in American colonial newspapers and periodicals, matters of religion in British North America, and historiography associated with the Quebec Act.

London's East India Company was in dire condition in 1772 and hoped to recover by selling surplus tea to the American colonies, though Britain refused to revoke the three-pence a pound tax on the tea. The resulting Boston Tea Party led directly to the Revolutionary War.

By: Jack Rakove
In: American History. 45.3 (Aug. 2010): p58
From: Academic OneFile

An essay is presented which discusses the commercial dispute between the U.S. and Great Britain during the 1780s, with a particular focus on the role that American nationalism played in the dispute. The roles that the U.S. Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, the U.S. diplomat and Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson and Virginia legislator and future U.S. President James Madison played in the U.S.'s trade dispute with Great Britain, including in regard to U.S. sovereignty, are discussed.

Thomas Jefferson's hatred of “money men” and commerce led to the creation of an unruly banking and regulatory system prone to periodic and disastrous breakdowns. The seeds of the current financial crisis were sown during Jefferson's epic battles with the first Treasury secretary, Alexander Hamilton, who was better acquainted than Jefferson with the rough-and-tumble of the marketplace. The two statesmen clashed over enormous war debts from the American Revolution, an unstable money supply, and the question of whether America required a central bank. Initially, Hamilton gained the upper hand, getting the young republic on a sound financial footing by establishing a coherent, disciplined banking system, but Jefferson and his supporters eventually destroyed Hamilton's system, setting the nation on a course to bank fraud and failure, a chaotic money supply, and a boom-and-bust cycle that has produced major financial crises about every 20 years.

The article discusses the political views of former U.S. President Thomas Jefferson, arguing that he was a federalist in favor of the rights of state governments. Topics include Jefferson's views on the powers of the Virginia state General Assembly, Jefferson's views on the General Welfare Clause of the U.S. Constitution, and his conflict with former U.S. President John Quincy Adams on the role of the U.S. federal government. Jefferson's essays "Draft Declaration and Protest of the Commonwealth of Virginia, on the Principles of the Constitution of the United States of American, and on the Violations of Them" and "A Summary View of the Rights of British America" are addressed..

Federalist No. 1 sets the basic framework for interpreting the U.S. Constitution. It contains an implied definition of 'good government' that occupied the founders as they built a stronger national government. This essay explains the conflict embedded in the debate between the two theories of good government offered by Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson and asks how the competing definitions might be reconciled with recent experience.

By: Michael McConnell
IN: Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy; Winter2012, Vol. 35 Issue 1, p259-282, 24p
From: OmniFile Full Text Mega

The author discusses the U.S. founding fathers' concern on the influence of factions like Thomas Jefferson's fear that a powerful faction could restore monarchy and Alexander Hamilton's insistence that a strong central government can counter the power of factions. He notes the retirement of Representative John D. Dingell who believes that partisan factions have paralyzed the political process. He suggests recovering powerful buzzwords like compromise and conciliation for the political lexicon.

Alexander Hamilton was an immensely sophisticated economic thinker who shaped the American economic system as it developed under the Constitution. Hamilton took a strategic approach to economic problems that allowed him to view the newborn United States as a great federal republic. As President George Washington's Secretary of the Treasury, he instituted an economic plan that forced the American “confederation” into a tighter union. He had the national government assume all state debts from the Revolution, created the Bank of the United States, and supported a full-blown industrial policy for the developing country. His policies facilitated the release of immense economic energy in the private sector and helped to shape the distinctive American balance between political stability and economic growth. Hamilton's difficult childhood, his experiences during the Revolution, his marital relations, and his participation in the Constitutional Convention are discussed..