1. American Colonies
Themes
Matt McHolland
Professor Arguello
History 140

2. ***Themes*** EXPANSION
• Newport during the prerevolutionary period was the pearl of the
colonies. The city grew into a rich center of commerce largely
because of pirating, smuggling and handling of contraband,
activities that the British sought to curtail with Acts that affected all
the colonies.
• The town was composed of almost 1,000 homes, many of mansion
quality, and drew the finest of European visitors along with growing
inter-colonial and international trade.
• The city was cosmopolitan with a mix of religious faiths, including
Jewish and Quaker, all accepted under decrees protecting individual
freedom born from a sense of equality and justice, principles that
would later become embodied in the Constitution of the United
States.

3. ***Themes*** MONEY
. The colonists were seen as a means for providing raw materials for British
made goods and for markets for those goods.
. Laws were structured to protect British home merchants and industries and
to prevent colonies from achieving a surplus balance of trade so that the
value of British imports into the colonies was greater than the value of
colonial exports. Thus, colonists were forced to complete payment for their
trade deficits with a flow of silver and gold into England. This created a
chronic shortage of coinage metals in the colonies and enforced barter trade.
. Paper money was issued by colonies and worked reasonably well for
exchange of goods and for paying taxes, but was never redeemable for
coinage. .

4. ***Themes*** RELOCATION
. The years from 1765 to 1772 encompass several violent episodes that
focused the attention of the British and shaped the outcome of the
American political movement locally and regionally. Anti-British sentiment
was so strong that many citizens chose to leave everything rather than
provide the slightest appearance of support. The naval blockade so reduced
the city's activity that over half of its citizens left for the interior or for other
coastal cities in New England or they moved to southern colonies such as
Charlestown, or to the British West Indies islands. The British dealt harshly
with Newport and reduced its once great vitality to austerity. Many of the
homes left vacant were taken down and burned for fuel. Others were
similarly burned as a matter of convenience.

5. ***Themes*** COMMERCE
In the high commerce years preceding the Revolution, the
quest for improved standards of living commensurate with
Europeans was achieved with purchase of manufactured
goods largely in England. Surrounding agriculture maintained
Newport, and as inter-colonial trade grew, much of its riches
came from bootleg manufactured goods from European ports
of call other than England in defiance of increasingly stricter
tariffs on trade of non-British goods. The area grew in its
seagoing capacity as the British sought to restrain all colonists
to purchase only British goods.

6. ***THEMES*** CITIZENSHIP
By 1760, all British laws interfered with some activity in the
colonies that was profitable to England. All citizens of New
England were citizens of England, but rights were restricted at
every quarter of commerce. Citizens charged with
enforcement of British law in the colonies increasingly came
under harsh treatment and an inability to exercise their
authority. Royal Governors were appointed by the Crown,
while colonial assemblies maintained an adversarial role of
growing strength that challenged the Governors, often forcing
changes in policy.

7. ***Themes*** CONSOLIDATION
The major result of the Gaspee incident among the
colonists was the formation of the Committees of
Correspondence in each of the colonies to expedite the
flow of information between them concerning events
of mutual interest. Because of such incident, the
colonies came together with a common cause for the
first time, the initial, formative step of a new nation.