No Taxation Without Representation

Britain won a costly war against France in North America in 1763 and decided the colonies should help pay for it. Parliament passed the Stamp Act in 1765 and later a tax on tea. The colonists had no representatives in Parliament, so they saw these taxes as unfair. Their rallying cry became "No taxation without representation." Those high taxes, imposed without consent, became a chief reason why the Americans declared independence from Britain^Q77.

In 1773, colonists dumped 342 chests of British tea into Boston Harbor. Britain answered with harsh punishments. In April 1775, shots rang out between colonists and British soldiers at Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts. So began the American Revolution, also called the Revolutionary War: the war the Americans fought to win independence from Britain^Q76.