American History Homework Two Answers - Student Seventeen

Ruth L. 9/18/2008 American History Andrew Schlafly

1. 2. British burdens hurt nearly all Colonists in all walks of life. 4. Legally, colonies disagreed with “virtual representations.” 7. 1/3 of Colonists were not even English, and thus felt to attachment to the British.

Good, but put in your own words.

2. The phrase “taxation without representation” was first used by Reverend Jonathan Mayhew. It represented everything the Colonists were feeling at that time: that they were being unfairly taxed by the British because they had no representation in Parliament.

Good.

3. The Boston Tea Part was an act of defiance by the Colonists against the Tea Act. The Tea Act was a tax on tea that King George III had imposed on them. The Colonists tried boycotting British tea to get rid of the tax, but that did not work. So, one night when a ship full of British tea was docked in Boston Harbor, Samuel Adams led a group of Colonists on board and they dumped all of its tea (350 chests) into the harbor. Adams wanted to make it clear to King George III that this act was against the tea tax not just a random act of violence against the British. So, firstly, he did not allow the Colonists to steal anything or destroy anything but the tea. Secondly, after they had spent the night dumping the tea, Adams had all the men mop the decks until they were shining.

Excellent.

4. I blame the leaders of Salem, Massachusetts for the witch trials. If it wasn’t for the strict and harsh lifestyle that they enforced, the girls would not have felt that the only way they could get attention or have any entertainment was to pretend (I believe they were just play acting) to be possessed and have special powers.

Interesting interpretation, shifting blame from the girls!

5. False. Whether the Colonists had religious freedom or not, they all still wanted freedom from England. And they all had their fair share of conflict with King George III.

The examples show the opposite. Your opinion is fine, but it needs examples to back it up. (Minus 1).

6. Debate: Do you think a jury should be able to ignore the law in order to find a defendant “not guilty”?

Juries should never be allowed to ignore the law, even if they believe it is an unjust law. Even if the law is wrong, it is not the jury’s place to determine the law. The cases where the juries ignored a law that they believed it was wrong are similar to what the Supreme Court Justices are doing now. They are “interpreting” the law for their own uses. If a there is a bad law, there are ways to go about changing it. But just like it isn’t the place of Supreme Court Justices to change the law for their own purposes, it isn’t the place of juries to ignore the law because they believe that it is wrong.

Good.

7. This cartoon was the first political cartoon in America. It was written in 1754 when there were only 8 colonies. It is based off of and old legend that said if a snake was cut in two, it would come back to life if its two parts were rejoined by sunset. This cartoon is saying that if the colonies join together soon, there’s still a chance that they might have freedom. But if the colonies stay apart, then they will be forever locked in tyranny.

Superb, but mention what the threat to the colonies was (e.g., what they were uniting against).

Good work. Score: 68/70.--Aschlafly 23:20, 27 September 2008 (EDT)