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History of colonies essay
History of colonies essay
History of colonies essay
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By 1750 there were 13 English colonies in North America. They were divided into three groups:
The New England Colonies : Rhode Island, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire
The Middle Colonies : Delaware, Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey
The Southern Colonies: Maryland, Virginia, North and South Carolina, Georgia
Economy of Colonial America
The American colonies were farming land. Colonists grew their own food, corn and wheat. They raised cows that gave them meat, milk and butter and kept chicken and sheep. They also went hunting and fishing.
In New England farms had little land but in the southern colonies farms were much bigger. On these plantations colonists grew tobacco and other products which they sold to England and other colonies. As time went on
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Towards the end of the 18th century Catholics, Jews and other groups lived in America. government
All colonies had a governor who was chosen by the a king. Most of them had assemblies, like the parliament in England. They passed laws and took taxes. Only people who paid taxes and owned land had the right to vote in an assembly. Apart from local laws the British government also passed some laws.
Not all people had the same rights. Women were not allowed to vote and married women were not allowed to own land. In some colonies people had to be a member of a religion in order to have the right to vote.
Geography of the 13 colonies
GEOGRAPHY OF THE
13 COLONIES New England Colonies Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Rhode Island cold winters, mild summers flat land near coastline, mountainous land inland soil was rocky and not fit for farming relied on the ocean as their main resource fished for food (codfish) ship building was a big part of the economy
The Middle Colonies New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware Mid Atlantic region of the United
The New England and Southern colonies, although they had their differences, did share a similar government system. However, the differences on a economic, religious, and social level overrode the similarity shared, making the two regions different nonetheless. The New England’ colonies focus on a business economy made them a central area of trade and commerce, but in the long run created society open to innovation and brought in new inventions. Whereas the Southern colonies’ focus on agriculture economy brought a sensation of profits for the mother country, but later attributed to the introduction of slave codes. Then, in the New England colonies, the religious restrictions increased tensions between the Separatists and Puritans, which later
They made their money through shipbuilding, small-scale farming, and trading. These colonies also had big commercial centers, such as Philadelphia and New York City. The people that lived here were very tolerant to others’ religions. They had multiple different groups of different religions: Quakers, Huguenots, Jews, and Presbyterians. They had very flexible social viewpoints; they developed a middle class of farmers and business owners. Colonists came to settle in the Middle colonies for two reasons, to make money and to practice religion. Finally, the political life of the colonists reflected around the basic rights of Englishmen.
During colonial times, European nations quickly colonized the New World years after Columbus’ so called discovery. England in particular sent out a number of groups to the east coast of the New World to two regions. These areas were the New England and the Chesapeake regions. Later in the late 1700s, these two regions would go though many conflicts to come together as one nation. Yet, way before that would occur; these two areas developed into two distinct societies. These differences affected the colonies socially, economically, and politically.
The original thirteen colonies, established in the 1600’s, shaped the course for the unique, unified and diverse America that we live in today. The thirteen colonies were initially diversified by being placed into three different groups according to their location. The three groups were as follows: the New England, Middle, and Southern colonies. The New England colonies were Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. The Middle colonies were New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware. And the Southern colonies were the Carolinas, Georgia, Maryland, and Virginia. The colonies were unified and stood together in hard times,
The New England, Middle and Southern colonies were all English ruled, but yet very different. Among their distinctions, was the geography which played an important role in shaping these colonies. New England attracted Puritan farmers who wanted to separate from the Catholic Church. But because of the bone dry soil in the North, these colonists found they couldn't continue with their traditional ways of farming. However, with the immense amounts of water that surrounded them, they found that they could fish and trade. The Middle colonies on the other, hand had a moderate amount of everything. The fertile soil and the major seaports such as Philadelphia and New York, allowed these Middle colonists to make a living any way they saw fit. This led to the brisk development of the Middle Seaboard . Unlike the Middle and Northern colonies, the Southern colonies had large amounts of fertile land allowing for the development of large plantations. Because farming the plantations was the economic thrust for the South, towns and cities developed slowly. Thusly Geography greatly affected the lifestyles of these regions in the New World.
During the 1700's, people in the American colonies lived in very distinctive societies. While some colonists led hard lives, others were healthy and prosperous. The two groups who showed these differences were the colonists of the New England and Chesapeake Bay areas. The differentiating characteristics among the Chesapeake and New England colonies developed due to economy, religion, and motives for colonial expansion. The colonists of the New England area possessed a very happy and healthy life. This high way of living was due in part to better farming, a healthier environment, and a high rate of production because of more factories. The colonists of the Chesapeake Bay region, on the other hand, led harder lives compared to that of the colonists of New England. The Chesapeake Bay had an unhealthy environment, bad eating diets, and intolerable labor.
The British rule that was established in the colonies was oppressive and unfair. The British rule was immoral because Parliament contained a totality of British politicians who only cared about Britain’s wants and needs. The Colonists, “wanted the right to vote about their own taxes, like the people living in Britain. But no colonists were permitted to serve in the British Parliament.” (Ember) This unfairness led to many unwanted laws such as the Intolerable Acts and the Stamp Act. These laws did not benefit the colonists in any way, but the acts significantly helped the British. Laws and acts were forced
The three colonial regions blossomed quite differently in terms of economy. English colonists first settled in Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. Failing to find gold, however, people in the southern colonies grew tobacco and rice as marketable commodities. Since tobacco plantation was labor-intensive, a large number of the population was indentured servants and black slaves. Because of the high mortality rate and unbalanced sex ratio, headright system was created in order to attract more settlers. In New England, due to the poor soil condition, people mainly relied on fishing, and lumber. Also, the Navigation Acts stimulated shipbuilding industry. The Middle colonies were based on growing grains and trading with European nations as well as other colonies.
Between 1607 and 1733, Great Britain established thirteen colonies in the New World along the land’s eastern coast. England’s colonies included Virginia, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maryland, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Delaware, North Carolina, South Carolina, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Georgia. Though the colonies were classified as New England, middle or southern colonies, the colonists developed a unifying culture. With this new American culture, the colonists throughout the colonies began to think differently than their English cousins. Because colonial America displayed characteristics of a democratic society and, therefore, deviated from England’s monarchic ways, it was established as a democratic society.
To the south of New England were the middle colonies. There the soil was fertile, and the weather more acclimated to farming (Sarcelle, 1965). Rivers flowed west toward the frontier, enabling transportation. The middle colonies, as opposed to the relatively Puritan dominated New England, were very diverse in people. A mixture of Dutch, German, Swedes, English and other smaller groups were present in middle colonial cities such as New York (Higginbotham, 1996).
Each of these had specific developments that were unique to the regions. Though there were many similarities in the development of the New England, Middle, and Southern Colonies, they were very different: politically, socially, and economically. The three colonies all had comparable similarities, as they were all democratic. But they ran their democratic government in all different types of ways. For instance, the Middle Colonies had their government and church separated. The New England Colonies, however, were a Theocracy, which meant that the church controlled the government. The Southern Colonies had the least autonomy since they were an Oligarchy. This meant that the wealthy plantation owners controlled the government because they were the only people who could manage to pay for all their own expenses. Even though the three colonies were all self-ruled, they all had distinguishing recognize or treat someone or something as different
When settlers from England came to America, they envisioned a Utopia, where they would have a say in what the government can and cannot do. Before they could live in such a society they would have to take many small steps to break the hold England had on them. The settlers of America had to end a monarchy and start their own, unique, form of government. They also had to find a way that they would have some kind of decision making power. The most important change that the colonies in America had to make was to become a society quite different from that in England.
The Colonies were excited about having won their independence in 1783 with the signing of the Treaty of Paris, but they still had to be able to create their own system of government which they thought would create a strong government which would not have an overpowering central government as they thought Great Britain had had. With this was the creation of the Articles of Confederation. These articles were meant to create strong local and state governments while not granting any power to the central government with the idea that it could not have any power over the states. The states were allowed to conduct their own diplomacy, or war, from nation to nation or even from state to state. States were allowed to create their own currency and put heavy import taxes on goods from other states. The federal government had no independent executive, nor could it levy taxes on any part of the states. It could not create or maintain a militia; this duty was left to the states. All decisions had to be ratified by all thirteen colonies. In thought, this was a great idea because only the most popular decisions would be ratified and stronger states could not hurt the smaller states through majority rule. In practice it did not work very well because it could be thwarted by a single stubborn state.
Over the next hundred years and so, the colonists had become self-reliant and resistant to any interference from Great Britain government. The thirteen English colonies, under the King George II were established along the east coast and colonies prospered. The governments in each colony differed, some were self-governing and another had royal governors, yet far from the rules of the King and Parliament1.
During the late 16th century and into the 17th century, European nations rapidly colonized the newly discovered Americas. England in particular sent out numerous groups to the eastern coast of North America to two regions. These two regions were known as the Chesapeake and the New England areas. Later, in the late 1700's, these two areas would bond to become one nation. Yet from the very beginnings, both had very separate and unique identities. These differences, though very numerous, spurred from one major factor: the very reason the settlers came to the New World. This affected the colonies in literally every way, including economically, socially, and politically.