The movement against English rule spread rapidly. So the colony's Whigs (those who favored independence) formed a provincial congress that sent representatives to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia in September. But Royal Governor Josiah Martin refused to call a meeting of North Carolina's legislature in time to select delegates to go to Philadelphia. In June 1774, the Massachusetts legislature issued a call for all of the colonies to meet at Philadelphia to consider these problems. North Carolina and the Continental Congress The Boston Tea Party aroused all the colonies against Parliament, which was continuing to show its scorn for the colonists' welfare. In 1773, colonists in Boston, Massachusetts, had thrown shipments of tea into the harbor rather than pay Parliament's taxes on the tea. Some white colonists believed that if a war with England broke out, these other Tar Heels would support the king in hopes of gaining more control over their own lives.įinally, Tar Heels knew that other colonies were continuing to resist English control. Many in these two groups hated their low positions in a society dominated by powerful whites.
The royal governor, William Tryon, and his militia crushed the rebellion at the Battle of Alamance.Īnother problem beneath the surface calm lay with the large African and American Indian populations. They wanted to "regulate" the governor's corrupt local officials, who were charging huge fees and seizing property. Just three years earlier at Great Alamance Creek, 2,000 Tar Heel farmers called Regulators had led an uprising, the largest armed rebellion in any English colony to that time. They did not often think about the king of England or his royal governor in North Carolina.īut beneath this calm surface there were problems. Most North Carolinians carried on their daily lives on farms raising crops and tending herds, and in cities shopkeeping, cooking, sewing, and performing dozens of other occupations and tasks. In 1774 much of this unrest had calmed down, especially in the southern colonies. "No taxation without representation" became the American rallying cry. So Parliament did not have the right to take their money by imposing taxes. The colonists felt that since they did not take part in voting for members of Parliament in England they were not represented in Parliament. Also, Parliament was elected by people living in England, and the colonists felt that lawmakers living in England could not understand the colonists' needs. They believed that England had fought the expensive war mostly to strengthen its empire and increase its wealth, not to benefit its American subjects. Parliament said it was right to tax the American colonists to help pay the bills for the war. Parliament said it had fought the long and costly war to protect its American subjects from the powerful French in Canada. That war, which had been fought in North America, left Great Britain with a huge debt that had to be paid. Great Britain was passing these laws because of the French and Indian War, which had ended in 1763. There had been the Sugar Act in 1764, the Stamp Act the following year, and a variety of other laws that were meant to get money from the colonists for Great Britain. Parliament (England's Congress) had been passing laws placing taxes on the colonists in America. Tar Heel Junior Historian Association, NC Museum of History Trouble Brewingīy 1774, the year leading up to the Revolutionary War, trouble was brewing in America. Reprinted with permission from the Tar Heel Junior Historian.