The Stamp Act

The Stamp Act

The Stamp Act
Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 4 to 6
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	9.27

Vocabulary

	challenging words:		revenue, continental, majority, presented, lasted, accountable, unfair, accept, escape, livid, treasury, harsh, require, such, government, treatment
	content words:		Stamp Tax, King George III, Glorious Revolution, King George, Charles Townshend, Magna Carta

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The Stamp Act
By Jane Runyon

¹     How would you feel if you walked into your classroom one morning and your teacher told you that you had to pay a nickel for each piece of paper you used for your work and another nickel for each page you read in your textbooks that day? That is probably a little like what the American colonists felt when they got word from England that they were going to have to pay a Stamp Tax. King George III was not happy with the independent spirit being born in the new world. These people in the colonies needed to be held accountable for the support that England was giving them, even though the great majority of English leaders had never set foot on this soil, nor did they have any desire to. England had spent a lot of money protecting itself and its colonies against France and other continental armies. Its treasury was low. What better way to control the colonies and fill its coffers than to tax the very people who had left England to escape unfair treatment by the king.

²     There had been a Glorious Revolution in England that took much of the power away from the king and placed it in the hands of Parliament. Parliament became the head of the English government. King George had some say in who the government officials would be, so he made sure that he appointed men who would be loyal to him. One of these men was Charles Townshend. He wanted to please the king, so he presented taxes to Parliament which would be harsh to the colonists but would bring much needed revenue to the king's treasury.

³     One of the taxes which Townshend proposed was to be called the Stamp Tax. This tax would require the colonists to pay a tax for every piece of printed paper the colonists used. This included newspapers, playing cards, pamphlets, legal documents, and advertisements. Parliament passed this tax in 1765, and the colonists were livid. They believed that the Magna Carta had given them rights against such unfair taxes, even if they were thousands of miles away from the mother country. They were so angry, in fact, that many of the agents sent by the king to collect these taxes were covered in sticky tar and then rolled in feathers. This was a humiliating act to these representatives of the king, but it sent a message back to England that the colonists were not going to sit by and accept the king's decisions. The Stamp Tax lasted about one year before it was repealed.

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