Impact Of The Enlightenment On North American Colonies

Register to read the introduction… Since the French and Indian War had just happened, Britain was in a lot of debt, so they decided to exploit the American Colonies so they could create greater revenue to pay off the debt and regain economic stability. The debt was so huge that it made the British government fall apart, thus it lead to conflicts that ultimately caused the Revolutionary war (Kindig, 1995). The British government decided to impose a series of taxes or navigation acts on the colonists to pay off the debt (Radojini; Drivas, 1997). This angered greatly the colonists because they felt they were being taxed without their consent. It all began with the Molasses act, which was later replaced with the Sugar Act. Eventually everything had a tax, but these taxes were not only imposed, but they were secretly placed on the goods, which, unsettled the colonists even more. After the war, the Policy of Salutary neglect was repealed and now the mainland paid more attention to the colonies, and subsequently was harsher when it came to paying taxes. Discontent dwelled among the attitude of every colonist for they had taxation without representation (Koeller, …show more content…
The timing of the Enlightenment was impeccable because it triggered that shift in mind and that desire to obtain freedom; to build a righteous nation without the oppression of the British Empire. It not only defined the American Revolution, but it defined hundreds of years of political affairs and decisions because nowadays American presidents still take their decisions based on the dogmatic and philosophical ideals of the Enlightenment. We are still able to see the effects of the Enlightenment and the colossal influence that it has had on our society. Even though the Enlightenment originated in Europe and it is there were it was widely spread and preached, the main demonstrations of it took place in America because it was the American leaders like Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and George Washington who followed these ideals which led to the Revolutionary war and subsequently to the birth of the United States of