Larry the Legend Loc: Not hiding in Milton

"[W]hen a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security..."

On December 13, 1774, that "long train of abuses and usurpations" saw it's final straw when the colony’s activists responded to Boston’s express messenger Paul Revere’s warning that British troops, who were sailing toward Portsmouth Harbor, were intent on taking the stores of gunpowder and arms from Fort William & Mary. More than 400 New Hampshire men picked up their rifles and rushed to Portsmouth, prepared to assault the British-guarded fort and remove the munitions before the troops’ arrival. After a skirmish characterized by some historians as the first shots of the Revolution, the rebellious British colonists emptied the fort, loading its stores onto gundalows for transport on the Piscataqua River to inland towns for safekeeping.



Whether they were to 'hang together or separately', the colonial rebellion had begun in earnest.

More than a year later, New Hampshire’s independence-minded citizens served with other New Englanders in the siege of Boston and provided more soldiers than any other state at the Battle of Bunker Hill.

A little over three months later, the Second Virginia Convention passed a resolution delivering Virginian troops for the Revolutionary War after hearing an impassioned speech from a Virginia delegate named Patrick Henry in which he declared "Give me liberty, or give me death!".

One if by land, two if by sea


Don't fire until you see the whites of their eyes!

out of the woods Loc: to hell and gone New York State

May the hearts of Americans today, be so stirred against the many threats we face, from our own government and invaders.

debeda

YES one of the rallying calls of the American revolution was "no taxation without representation ". Kinda like ObamaCare

PJT

In telling of origins of the American Revolution, seldom mentioned are certain facts: 1. Colonies were paid subsidies for providing naval stores. 2. Britain wanted the colonies to help pay for protection from Indians and others. 3. Colonials smuggling cost England great sums of money. Taxes on colonies much less than on those in England. Some of the taxes had been repealed.
There are usually 2 sides to a story.
Peter J. Thayer

Bad Bob Loc: Virginia

Was debeda a free loader on our healthcare system?

debeda

Oh hell no. Debeda was never a freeloader on any system. Made life harder due to my circumstances but I never cared to have me or mine be a ward of the nanny state...

PJT

Also, English parliament seats then and now have indirect representation. Dontbhsve to live in constituency. Many members of Parliament backed colony grievances. A situation that undermined full British support of British Army in the revolutionary situation.
Peter J. Thayer

Bad Bob Loc: Virginia

"Made life harder due to my circumstances" having health insurance?

Larry the Legend Loc: Not hiding in Milton

Quite right, too. Clearly that makes up for all this (in their own words):

"The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions."

Those spoiled brat colonists. Who do they think they are?

PJT

Benjamin Franklin and a few others of the Founding Fathers (a phrase created by President Warren G. Harding) were for retaining the King until he said he'd back Parliament. So the anti-monarchical sentiment was an afterthought. When Washington announced he would not accept a 3rd term as President, King George III openly praised him for not coveting power.
Peter J. Thayer.

debeda

No my response was I was never on the dole for anything. ObamaCare increased the cost of my paid for health insurance about 45%

Bad Bob Loc: Virginia

Did you have a (worthless) plan that didn't meet the new standard.

debeda

No I had a very good plan. It didn't, however, meet the requirements for obstetrical and prenatal care...seeing as I was over 60. But that is required. Unfortunately those of us that PAY for our own insurance got banged by the "(un)affordable care act" Which, as we all know, was only passed because it was deemed to be a tax.

Bad Bob Loc: Virginia

Well in 5 years you can have a good single payer.

Larry the Legend Loc: Not hiding in Milton

Fact is they tried every avenue they could think of to avoid rebellion, but the outrages just kept piling up. Remember now, these were Englishmen; they weren't predisposed to going against their king just because... When you read the Declaration of Independence, take your time and look over the list of grievances. I'd say they'd been through enough.