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The Stamp Act 1765 (short title ''Duties in American Colonies Act 1765''; 5 George III, c. 12) was an act of the Parliament of Great Britain that imposed a direct tax on the colonies of British America and required that many printed materials in the colonies be produced on stamped paper produced in London, carrying an embossed revenue stamp.〔Morgan and Morgan pg. 96–97〕〔"The Stamp Act of 1765 – A Serendipitous Find" by Hermann Ivester in ''The Revenue Journal'', The Revenue Society, Vol.XX, No.3, December 2009, pp.87–89.〕 Printed materials included legal documents, magazines, playing cards, newspapers and many other types of paper used throughout the colonies. Like previous taxes, the stamp tax had to be paid in valid British currency, not in colonial paper money.〔Wood, S,G. "The American Revolution: A History." Modern Library. 2002, page 24.〕 The purpose of the tax was to help pay for troops stationed in North America after the British victory in the Seven Years' War and the French and Indian War. The Americans said there was no military need for the soldiers because there were no foreign enemies on the continent, and the Americans had always protected themselves against Native Americans. They suggested it was rather a matter of British patronage to surplus British officers and career soldiers who should be paid by London. The Stamp Act was very unpopular among colonists. A consensus considered it a violation of their rights as Englishmen to be taxed without their consent—consent that only the colonial legislatures could grant. Their slogan was "No taxation without representation." Colonial assemblies sent petitions and protests. The Stamp Act Congress held in New York City, was the first significant joint colonial response to any British measure; it petitioned Parliament and the King. Local protest groups, led by colonial merchants and landowners, established connections through Committees of Correspondence that created a loose coalition that extended from New England to Maryland. Protests and demonstrations initiated by a new secret organization the Sons of Liberty often turned violent and destructive as the masses became involved. Very soon all stamp tax distributors were intimidated into resigning their commissions, and the tax was never effectively collected.〔Draper pp. 216–223. Nash pp. 44–56. Maier pp. 76–106〕 Opposition to the Stamp Act was not limited to the colonies. British merchants and manufacturers, whose exports to the colonies were threatened by colonial boycotts, pressured Parliament. The Act was repealed on March 18, 1766 as a matter of expedience, but Parliament affirmed its power to legislate for the colonies "in all cases whatsoever" by also passing the Declaratory Act. There followed a series of new taxes and regulations, likewise opposed by the colonists. The episode played a major role in defining the grievances — later clearly stated within the text of the ''Indictment of George III'' section of the Declaration of Independence — and enabling the organized colonial resistance that led to the American Revolution in 1775.〔Middlekauff pg. 111–120. Miller pg. 149–153〕 ==Background== The British victory in the Seven Years' War (1756–1763), known in British America as the French and Indian War, had been won only at a great financial cost. During the war, the British national debt nearly tripled, rising from £72,289,673 (equal to £ today) to almost £329,586,789 by 1764, (equal to £ today).〔Morgan and Morgan, ''Stamp Act Crisis'', 21.〕 Post-war expenses were expected to remain high because the Bute ministry decided in early 1763 to keep ten thousand British regular soldiers in the American colonies, which would cost about £225,000 per year, equal to £ today.〔Anderson, ''Crucible of War'', 563; Thomas, ''British Politics'', 38; Middlekauff, ''Glorious Cause'', 55.〕 The primary reason for retaining such a large force was that demobilizing the army would put 1,500 officers, many of whom were well-connected in Parliament, out of work.〔Anderson, ''Crucible of War'', 561; Middlekauff, ''Glorious Cause'', 55.〕 This made it politically prudent to retain a large peacetime establishment, but because Britons were averse to maintaining a standing army at home, it was necessary to garrison most of the troops elsewhere.〔Anderson, ''Crucible of War'', 563.〕 Stationing 10,0001 troops to separate American Indians and frontiersmen was one role. The outbreak in May 1763 of Pontiac's Rebellion, an American Indian uprising against the British expansion, reinforced the logic of this decision.〔Morgan and Morgan, ''Stamp Act Crisis'', 22.〕 The main reason to send 10,000 troops deep in the wilderness was to provide billets for the officers who were part of the British patronage system.〔Anderson, ''Crucible of War'', 560. See also Charles S. Grant, "Pontiac's Rebellion and the British Troop Moves of 1763", ''The Mississippi Valley Historical Review'' 40, no. 1 (June 1953), 75–88.〕 John Adams said, "Revenue is still demanded from America, and appropriated to the maintenance of swarms of officers and pensioners in idleness and luxury." George Grenville—who became prime minister in April 1763 after the failure of the short-lived Bute Ministry—had to find a way to pay for this large peacetime army. Raising taxes in Britain was out of the question, since there had been virulent protests in England against the Bute ministry's 1763 cider tax, with Bute being hanged in effigy.〔Anderson, ''Crucible of War'', 510–11; Thomas, ''British Politics'', 6; Middlekauff, ''Glorious Cause'', 62.〕 The Grenville ministry therefore decided that Parliament would raise this revenue by taxing the American colonists without their consent. This was something new: Parliament had previously passed measures to regulate trade in the colonies, but it had never before directly taxed the colonies to raise revenue.〔Thomas, ''British Politics'', 37.〕 Politicians in London had always expected American colonists to contribute to the cost of their own defense. So long as a French threat existed, there was little trouble convincing colonial legislatures to provide assistance. Such help was normally provided through the raising of colonial militias, which were funded by taxes raised by colonial legislatures. Also, the legislatures were sometimes willing to help maintain regular British units defending the colonies. So long as this sort of help was forthcoming there was little reason for the British Parliament to impose its own taxes on the colonists. But after the peace of 1763, however, colonial militias were quickly stood down. Militia officers, tired of the disdain shown to them by regular British officers and frustrated by the near-impossibility of obtaining regular British commissions, were unwilling to remain in service once the war was over. In any case they had no military role, as the Native American threat was minimal as was any foreign threat. Colonial legislators saw no need for the British troops. The first tax in Grenville's program to raise a revenue in America was the Sugar Act of 1764, which was a modification of the Molasses Act of 1733. The Molasses Act had imposed a tax of 6 pence per gallon (equal to £ today) on foreign molasses imported into British colonies. The purpose of the Molasses Act was not to actually raise revenue, but instead to make foreign molasses so expensive that it effectively gave a monopoly to molasses imported from the British West Indies.〔Thomas, ''British Politics'', 32.〕 It did not work: colonial merchants avoided the tax by smuggling or, more often, bribing customs officials.〔Thomas, ''British Politics'', 44.〕 The Sugar Act reduced the tax to 3 pence per gallon (equal to £ today) with the hope that the lower rate would increase compliance and thus increase the amount of tax collected.〔Thomas, ''British Politics'', 47–49.〕 The act also taxed additional imports and included measures to make the customs service more effective.〔Anderson, ''Crucible of War'', 547.〕 American colonists initially objected to the Sugar Act for economic reasons, but before long they recognized that there were constitutional issues involved.〔Reid, ''Authority to Tax'', 206.〕 The British Constitution guaranteed that British subjects could not be taxed without their consent, which came in the form of representation in Parliament. The colonists elected no members of Parliament, and so for Parliament to tax them was seen as a violation of the British Constitution. There was little time to raise this issue in response to the Sugar Act, but it came to be a major objection to the Stamp Act the following year. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Stamp Act 1765」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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