AMERICAN HISTORY SECTION 1 TOWNSEND ACT- measures passed by the British Parliament in 1767, affecting the American colonies. The acts were named for their sponsor, the British chancellor of the Exchequer Charles Townshend. The first measure called for the suspension of the New York Assembly, thus penalizing it for not complying with a law, enacted two years earlier, requiring the colonies to provide adequate quartering of British troops in the New World. The second measure, called the Revenue Act, imposed customs duties on colonial imports of glass, red and white lead, paints, paper, and tea. A subsequent legislative act established commissioners in the colonies to administer the customs services and to make sure the duties were collected.

The Townshend Acts were tremendously unpopular in America. In response to a published criticism of the measures, the British crown dissolved the Massachusetts legislature in 1768. Subsequently, the Boston Massacre occurred in March 1770, when British troops fired on American demonstrators. These events brought the colonies closer to revolution. http://www.townsend.com/index.htm

WRITES OF ASSISTANCE- http://www.realnames.com/Resolver.dll?provider=1&realName=Writes+assistance+ QUARTERING ACTS- measures passed by the British Parliament in 1767, affecting the American colonies. The first measure suspended the New York Assembly for not complying with a law requiring the colonies to provide adequate quartering of British troops in the New World. The second measure, called the Revenue Act, imposed customs duties on colonial imports of glass, red and white lead, paints, paper, and tea. The Townshend Acts were tremendously unpopular in America; the colonists openly criticized the measures and held demonstratic

Crispus Attucks-a slave who escaped from William Framingham. He helped the people of Boston rebel against the Europeans. http://www.crispusattucks.org/crispusattucksthepatriot.htm

Committee of correspondence-Committees of Correspondence, colonial groups organized prior to the American Revolution to mobilize public opinion and coordinate patriotic actions against Great Britain. They were established by private citizens, town councils, and legislatures in the American colonies. Although colonial legislatures had appointed committees and charged them with communicating with their counterparts in other provinces during the 1760s, the first revolutionary use of Committees of Correspondence occurred in Massachusetts in 1772. On November 2, the Boston town meeting voted to establish a 21-member committee "to state the Rights of the Colonists and of this Province in particular," to the other towns in the colony. Thereafter committees were formed throughout Massachusetts to respond to the Bostonians' communications. So successful were these committees in generating support for the province's radical opposition to the British that the Boston committee itself soon became a power in Massachusettespolitics, where it assumed a leading role in organizing resistance to the Tea Act in 1773.

Tea act-On May 10, 1773, parliament authorized the East India Tea Co to export a half a million pounds of tea to the American colonies for the purpose of selling it without imposing upon the company the usual duties and tariffs. It was their intention to try to save the corrupt and mismanaged company from bankrupcy. The effect was that the company could undersell any other tea available in the colonies, including smuggled tea. The disruption to American commerce was unacceptable to many, including Sam Adams of Boston. http://www.wpi.edu/Academics/Depts/MilSci/BTSI/abs_bostea.html

Intolerable acts- name given to four laws passed by the British Parliament in March 1774 to punish the colony of Massachusetts for defying British policies. Resentment of these acts led to the outbreak of the American Revolution (1775-1783). The Boston Port Act closed the port of Boston to trade; the Massachusetts Government Act revoked the colony's charter and forbade town meetings; the Quartering Act required that the colonists provide billets for British soldiers; and the Impartial Administration of Justice Act removed British officials from the jurisdiction of Massachusetts courts. The First Continental Congress convened in September 1774 to formulate a response to the acts. http://encarta.msn.com/index/conciseindex/6C/06C80000.htm

Quebec act-