George III
George II’s grandson, George III (1760-1820),
came to the throne in 1760. His reign lasted 60
years and is one of the longest in English history.
To reduce the public debt due to the Seven Years’
War, the king introduced new duties on corn,
paper and tea, which caused fierce opposition in
the American colonies.
→The English Parliament responded to the
protest by repealing some of them, but the tax
on imported tea remained.
By the 1770s many colonists had become
resentful of British rule, which imposed a strict
control on trade. So, they began to think that
they should only pay taxes approved by their
local governing assemblies.
The Declaration of Independence
At the Boston Tea Party in 1773 some rebels,
dressed as Native Americans, threw the British
tea coming from a India into the harbour.
The rebels maintained that the taxes were unjust,
as the colonies had no political power: they said
‘No taxation without representation.’
In England, the philosopher Edmund Burke
recognised the justice of their cause;
Thomas Paine’s Common Sense stimulated the
desire for a republic.
The Americans divided into Patriots, who wanted
independence, and Loyalists, who wanted to
remain part of Britain, and the War of
Independence began in 1775.
The Americans set up an army under the
command of George Washington to face the
stronger and better trained British army.
On 4th July 1776 in Philadelphia, the Congress
(made by the representatives from 13 of the
colonies) signed the Declaration of
Independence, written by Thomas Jefferson.
It stated that:
1) the colonies were a new nation, since all men
had a natural right to ‘life, liberty, and the pursuit
of happiness’.
2) governments can only claim the right to rule if
they have the approval of those they
govern→‘the consent of the governed’.
In 1781 at the Battle of Yorktown, the British
army was defeated and recognised the
independence of its former colonies with the
Treaty of Versailles (1783).
America became the symbol of a ‘new start’,
where people from all European countries could
melt into a new race.
The new republic of the United States of America
adopted a federal constitution in 1787 and
George Washington became the first President in
1789.
William Pitt the Younger
After the loss of America, George III had a difficult
time with his ministers until, in 1783, he asked
William Pitt the Younger to become Prime
Minister.
•He tried to simplify the financial system
•reduce the national debt
•promoted profitable trade and finance
•supported Adam Smith’s theory of laissez-faire,
illustrated in The Wealth of Nations (1776).
→Smith’s philosophy of economic liberalism
encouraged free trade and economic self-
interest, and stressed the division of labour.
Adam Smith was a Scottish philosopher and
economist.
He is regarded as the father of ‘classical
economics’, due to his laissez-faire theory against
intervention or restrictions on free markets from
the government.
The new United Kingdom
In Ireland, in 1791, a group of Catholics and
Protestants founded the Society of United
Irishmen who aimed at forming their own
republic.
They organised an uprising that was crushed by
the British troops.
To prevent other rebellions, in 1801 the Act of
Union joined Ireland and Britain to form the new
United Kingdom.
→The Irish flag was added to create the Union
Jack that is still used today.
