Deck 6: Imperial Triumph, Imperial Crisis 1754-1776

Question 1

The Seven Years' War pitted Britain against France in a struggle to control what region of North America?

A) Louisiana
B) Lower Canada
C) Ohio Country
D) Northwest Territories

Answer 1

Ohio Country

Question 2

The Treaty of Paris (1763) gave Britain title to all French claims

A) west of the Mississippi, and Spanish Florida.
B) east of the Mississippi, and Spanish Florida.
C) east of the Mississippi, along with New Orleans and the French sugar islands of the West Indies.
D) in North America.

Answer 2

east of the Mississippi, and Spanish Florida.

Question 3

Whose defeat at the makeshift defensive structure known as Fort Necessity began the Seven Years' War?

A) George Washington
B) George Grenville
C) James Wolfe
D) the Iroquois

Answer 3

George Washington

Question 4

Whose defeat at Quebec effectively ended the Seven Years' War on the continent of North America?

A) the Spanish navy
B) the marquis de Montcalm
C) James Wolfe
D) the Iroquois

Question 5

William Pitt was

A) the organizer of British victory in the Seven Years' War.
B) relatively sympathetic to American protests during the years after the Seven Years' War.
C) both the organizer of British victory in the Seven Years' War, and relatively sympathetic to American protests during the years after the Seven Years' War.
D) None of these answers is correct.

Question 6

At the end of the Seven Years' War, the Americans ________, while the British ________.

A) were suffering from war-induced economic hard times; were saddled with a great war debt
B) were proud to be British; were comparably proud of their fellow Englishmen in America
C) sought to keep British troops to protect them from the Indians; thought the Americans should settle and defend the Ohio Country on their own
D) celebrated their contributions to victory; voiced contempt for American soldiering and suspicions of American self-interest

Question 7

Regarding the consequences of the Seven Years' War that led to the rift between the colonies and England, which of the following is correctly stated?

A) The French and Indian threats were removed, so the British government felt they had no need to keep troops in the colonies.
B) The British government was soundly defeated.
C) British imperial officials, with a greatly expanded empire to run, were determined to centralize and extend British rule over the colonies.
D) Both the Americans and the British came out of the war content with the way the other had behaved.

Question 8

Who organized a combined uprising of the western tribes in the aftermath of the French defeat?

A) French fur traders who remained in the area
B) the Iroquois
C) Pontiac
D) Cadillac

Question 9

After the Seven Years' War, Britain kept several thousand troops in the colonies in order to

A) enforce the Proclamation of 1763 by providing protection to colonials settling west of the Appalachians.
B) ensure the submission of French Canadians and Spanish Floridians.
C) monitor relations between Indians tribes.
D) enforce Grenville's new measures.

Question 10

What was the basic British policy after 1763?

A) to defeat the French
B) to centralize their empire
C) to deprive Americans of their liberties
D) to conspire to seize political power and influence

Question 11

Which of the following was NOT among British "new measures"after the end of the Seven Years' War?

A) a new, lowered tax-more effectively enforced-on imports of foreign molasses
B) a new, higher tax-more effectively enforced-on imports of British goods like glass and tea
C) a tax-never effectively enforced-on official documents and legal transactions
D) colonial paper money prohibited from being legal tender

Question 12

Americans insisted that they be taxed by their own assemblies because they held to John Locke's dictum,

A) that government governs best which governs least.
B) that all men are created equal.
C) that property guarantees liberty.
D) no taxation without representation.

Question 13

In resisting the Stamp Act, Americans affirmed their

A) general mistrust of power.
B) particular right to freedom of religion.
C) belief in virtual representation.
D) belief in taxation by the Crown.

Question 14

The writers of the English "Opposition"or "Country Party"believed that

A) humans were driven by money rather than principle.
B) politicians would become corrupt, conspiring against liberty to enhance their own power.
C) Parliament needed to be controlled by the monarchs and their ministers, because politicians could not be trusted.
D) history shows that power yields to liberty.

Question 15

After 1768, the presence of freedom fighters in many European countries had which of the following effects upon resistance groups in America?

A) American resistance groups felt increasingly isolated.
B) American resistance groups increasingly thought of themselves as part of a transatlantic network of the friends of liberty.
C) American resistance groups increasingly backed down to British pressure.
D) None of these answers is correct.

Question 16

The Sons of Liberty, emerging in the Stamp Act protest, drew their members from the ranks of

A) the elite members of the assemblies.
B) traders, lawyers, and prosperous artisans.
C) the poorer sort in the seaport towns.
D) male descendants of veterans of the Seven Years' War, regardless of social class.

Question 17

In the Declaratory Act, Parliament

A) asserted its authority to levy direct taxes on the colonies.
B) relinquished its authority to levy direct taxes on the colonies.
C) limited its authority in America to the regulation of trade.
D) left unclear the extent of its authority in America.

Question 18

What was new in American resistance to the Townshend duties?

A) nonimportation of British goods
B) institutionalized mechanisms for enforcing nonimportation
C) an intercolonial congress
D) a formal statement of American constitutional arguments

Question 19

Parliament repealed all of the Townshend duties except the tax on tea because

A) it was a source of revenue and symbol of Parliament's authority.
B) American producers of raw materials suffered from lower prices on the world market.
C) of rioting in America that prevented collection of the duties.
D) Parliament decided temporarily to yield to American views.

Question 20

The Tea Act of 1773

A) raised the price of tea that Americans imported from Britain.
B) gave the East India company a monopoly on the American tea trade.
C) prohibited the consumption of tea in Massachusetts.
D) cracked down on illegal smuggling of tea in the colonies.

Question 21

Which of the following British leaders actually supported the colonists' objections to taxation by Parliament?

A) William Pitt
B) Lord North
C) John Dickinson
D) Thomas Gordon

Question 22

Townshend was determined to curb the power of the American assemblies. To set a bold example, he singled out for punishment the New York legislature, which refused to comply with the

A) Townshend Acts.
B) Quartering Act.
C) Stamp Act.
D) Sugar Act.

Question 23

The sloop Liberty, whose seizure prompted several thousand angry Bostonians to rough up customs officials and a night of violent rioting, was owned by which wealthy Boston merchant?

A) Samuel Adams
B) John Dickinson
C) John Hancock
D) Paul Revere

Question 24

When they learned of the Coercive Acts of 1774, many Americans concluded that a plot to enslave the colonies was being implemented by

A) the king's ministers, but not Parliament or George III.
B) Parliament, but not the king's ministers or George III.
C) George III, but not the king's ministers or Parliament.
D) the king's ministers and Parliament, but not George III.

Question 25

Many colonials believed that the ________ was/were proof of a plot to enslave the colonies.

A) Redcoats
B) Sugar Act
C) Boston Massacre
D) Coercive Acts

Question 26

The First Continental Congress, in late 1774,

A) renounced American allegiance to George III, and established a Continental Army.
B) denied Parliament's right to tax and legislate for the colonies (while acknowledging its authority to regulate their trade), and set up a trade boycott.
C) denied that Parliament had any authority at all in America, but took a collective oath of allegiance reaffirming loyalty to George III.
D) denied that Parliament or George III had any authority in America, and urged colonial legislatures to seize power from crown officials.

Question 27

Which of the following is NOT an example of how the colonies were beginning to seize authority a year before the Declaration of Independence, during early 1775?

A) The Association functioned effectively.
B) Some citizens took the court system into their own hands.
C) Provincial congresses were emerging as virtual revolutionary governments.
D) Many colonial leaders increasingly issued explicit calls for full independence.

Question 28

Which of the following was NOT argued by Thomas Paine in Common Sense?

A) Parliament had deliberately brought about all of America's misfortunes.
B) The American colonials were a distinct people.
C) Monarchy was a foolish and dangerous form of government.
D) Nature had destined America for independence.

Question 29

The so-called Seven Years' War, which began in America in 1754, actually lasted ________ years.

Question 30

According to the terms of the Treaty of Paris of 1763, French holdings in North America west of the Mississippi were to be part of the empire of ________.

Question 31

The ________ widened the terms of the imperial debate, intensified resistance within the colonies, and most importantly provoked the first real display of intercolonial unity.

Question 32

The British theory of ________ representation argued that the colonials were represented in Parliament.

Question 33

________ was the inflammatory name given by Samuel Adams and friends when a panicky squad of British soldiers fired on a crowd of hecklers hurling snowballs.

Question 34

Many colonials saw the Coercive Acts as proof of a plot to ________ the colonies.

Question 35

The first blood of an American soldier was shed by British troops at ________ in April 1775.

Question 36

Explain the success of the British in the Seven Years' War.

Question 37

What were the concerns and strategies of Indian nations during/immediately after the Seven Years' War?

Question 38

Describe the expectations of Americans and the attitudes of the British toward them after the Seven Years' War. In what way did those expectations and attitudes set the stage for the imperial crisis that followed?

Question 39

What was the English Opposition? How did that tradition of thought contribute to the view of some Americans that English rulers were conspiring against their liberties?

Question 40

What did George Grenville hope to accomplish with the Sugar Act and the Stamp Act?

Question 41

Describe the evolution of American tactics for resisting British policy in the decade after 1765.

Question 42

How did the First Continental Congress steer a middle course between revolution and conciliation?

Question 43

What accounts for the behavior of British ministers and members of Parliament during the imperial crisis? Why didn't British policymakers seek more effective ways of dealing with the American resistance?

Question 44

Why did many Americans interpret Britain's attempt to centralize its colonial empire as a sinister conspiracy to enslave colonials by depriving them of property and liberty?

Question 45

According to the text, by 1776, "many Americans had liked being English, but being English hadn't worked. It was the destiny of Americans to be American, not English."In what ways had American ideas of what it meant to be English changed since 1763?

Question 46

Was the dispute over taxation and representation a noble appeal to the principles of freedom, or merely an issue of the pocketbook? Discuss the motivations of the revolutionaries.

Question 47

Samuel Adams remarked, "We cannot make events. Our business is wisely to improve them."What did Adams mean? Use the quotation to write an essay describing what some of the events were and, more specifically, the techniques Adams and others used to "improve"them.

Question 48

What was novel and significant about the ideas put forth by Thomas Paine in Common Sense?

Question 49

Americans eventually won their independence from Great Britain. Explain how and why they were successful.