In the mid-17th century—in pastime of a golden balance of trade and of continuing to exploit raw materials from colonies that besides served as a market for English manufactured goods—the english government adopted the alleged Navigation Acts. Under the Navigation Act of 1651, all goods exported to England or its colonies had to be transported on English vessels or on ships from the nation from which the goods originated. This military action prevented England ’ s great maritime rival, the Dutch, from acting as middlemen in international trade wind with the English colonies, particularly of commodities originating in Africa or Asia. subsequent acts required that all goods bound for England or english colonies, careless of origin, had to be shipped alone on English vessels and that certain “ enumerated articles ” from the colonies ( which came to include boodle, cotton, and tobacco ) could be shipped lone to England, with trade in those items with early countries prohibited. furthermore, ultimately, all goods from other countries bound for the colonies or goods from the colonies destined for other countries had to first pass through English ports, where they were subject to customs duties. Those duties elevated the price of non-English goods so that they were prohibitively expensive for the colonists. Vice-Admiralty courts, presided over by judges but lacking juries ( which were viewed as excessively sympathetic to colonial interests ), were established in the colonies to address violations of trade regulations. In 1696 Parliament established the Board of Trade largely with the intention of maintaining even tighter control of colonial craft. Some historians believe that these compressed reins on the colonies had begun to loosen in the late seventeenth century, but there is no doubt that a sea change occurred with the dominance of Robert Walpole as Britain ’ mho head minister in 1721. Under Walpole ( who is generally regarded as Britain ’ s first base prime minister ) and his secretary of country, Thomas Pelham-Holles, 1st duke of Newcastle ( who late served as choice minister, 1754–56, 1757–62 ), british officials began turning a subterfuge eye to colonial violations of trade regulations. Most historians argue that this tease of the enforcement of the Navigation Acts was primarily the solution of a deliberate though oral policy—that Walpole was contentedness to ignore illegal barter if the ultimate solution was greater profits for Britain. If increased colonial purchases of british goods or goods from early british colonies resulted from colonial prosperity that came about through back door deal with France, what was the injury ? furthermore, as some historians have noted, to have strictly enforced the regulations would have been much more costly, requiring an even larger body of enforcement officials. other historians, however, argue that a greater campaign of good fail was not consider but was alternatively the incompetence, failing, and self-interest of ailing qualified colonial officials who were backing appointees of Walpole. still other historians blame this lack of poor leadership not on clientele but on the miss of desirability of colonial postings, which tended to be filled not by officials in the prime of their careers but by the newfangled and inexperienced or the old and insignificant .
Robert Walpole Robert Walpole, detail of an oil painting by Sir Godfrey Kneller, c. 1710–15 ; in the National Portrait Gallery, London.
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Courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery, London During the period of good neglect, colonial legislatures spread their wings. In hypothesis, considerable power was vested in colonial governors ( most of whom were crown-appointed, though the governors in proprietorship colonies were chosen by the owner, and those of the corporate colonies [ Rhode Island and Connecticut ] were elected ). Governors by and large had the world power to convene and dismiss the legislature a well as to appoint judges and justices of the peace. They besides served as air force officer in foreman of the colony ’ randomness military forces. In practice, however, they frequently exerted a lot less manipulate over the affairs of the colony than did the legislature, which not only had the world power of the purse but paid the governor ’ s wage and was not beyond withholding it if he worked against its agenda. In the process the colonial legislatures grew used to making their own decisions and to those decisions ’ having assurance. Historians frequently link the about-face of the policy of good neglect with the decision of the french and indian War ( 1754–63 ) and the desire by many in Parliament to recoup the considerable costs of defending the colonies with british forces through revenue-generating enforcement of trade restrictions. even before this, however, american samoa early as the 1740s, some british legislators and officials had pledged to reimpose fixed patrol of trade regulations because they were angered by colonial estate banks ’ issuing currentness, which took the form of bills of citation based on mortgaged land value. One immediate result was Parliament ’ mho passage in 1751 of the Currency Act, which sternly curtailed the issue of composition money in the New England colonies. The Currency Act of 1764 extended these limitations to all the colonies. besides in 1764, Prime Minister George Grenville issued the Sugar Act to raise tax income and undertake to end the smuggle of carbohydrate and molasses from the french and dutch West Indies. A year by and by Grenville lowered the boom with the Stamp Act ( 1765 ), Parliament ’ sulfur first try to raise tax income through direct tax income of all colonial commercial and legal papers, newspapers, pamphlets, cards, almanac, and die, which was greeted with violent opposition in the colonies and was repealed in 1766. At the same time, though, Parliament issued the Declaratory Act, which reasserted its correct of direct taxation anywhere within the empire, “ in all cases whatsoever. ” If it was not already open that the policy of good neglect was a thing of the past, it would be with the passage in 1767 of the alleged Townshend Acts ( named for their sponsor, Charles Townshend, chancellor of the Exchequer under Prime Minister William Pitt, the Elder ). jointly these four acts were aimed at reasserting the british government ’ sulfur authority over the colonies through the abeyance of the fractious New York Assembly and through stern provisions for the collection of gross duties. ironically, the oral policy that was expunged did not receive the name by which it is known today until 1775, when Edmund Burke, an adversary of the Stamp and Townshend acts, speaking in Parliament, reflected back on the “ wise and good disregard ” of the colonies by british officials that had allowed british department of commerce with those colonies to expand by a divisor of 12 since l700.
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