British+Middle+Colonies

=The British Middle Colonies: =

=Declaration of Independence:=



=Prezi:=

[|Prezi]

= Terms: =

**Proprietary Colonies**- A colony that is granted to proprietors who own all the land. The proprietors had the full rights to self govern. The proprietors are still held to the law of the state they are in if the land they are granted fall within that state.

**Reconquest**- When country reclaims the territory lost in a previous war.

**Quaker**- A Quaker is a person who strictly followed Puritan doctrines.

**Navigation Acts**- The Navigation Acts stated that trade must be done with English owned and built ships that have at least 3/4 English/colonial crews. They forbade transportation of “enumerated commodities” from the colonies to any place except England or another English colony. The Acts also forbade the transportation of European and Asiatic goods to the colonies from any place other than colonies. The Navigation Acts basically said that the colonies could only trade with each other or with England.

**William Penn’s Charter**- The Charter was issued in March 1681. The charter required to enforce Navigation Acts, to submit laws to the king for approval, to allow appeals to the king from Pennsylvania courts, and to provide an Anglican minister when 20 or more colonists asked for one.

**Maryland Act of Toleration**- The Act secured freedom of worship for all Christians who believed in the Trinity.

= Questions to Address: = = = = 1. What were the motives for the settlement for your area and how did those impact the structure of government and relationship with the Mother Country? =

__//Quotation://__ “This search for greener pastures was to become one of the abiding characteristics of American life. Once uprooted, people might wander long before they found a spot where they would remain content. After a few months or years in a home, one morning they would turn their backs on surroundings that had scarcely become familiar and be off to the promised land beyond horizon. From this restless breed the new proprietors hoped to draw new tenants for their feudal domains. Tenants less likely to pay feudal rents would have been hard to find, but that fact was not immediately apparent” (Blum 36).

__//Analysis://__ Blum’s opinion is that early American life was nomadic. Early American settlers did not stay in one spot for very long. Blum thinks that American life was not a very good way of life that the proprietors could profit off of.

__//Answer://__ The colonies were proprietary. This means that a lot of people made money off of land. New York went from being a Dutch colony to being an English colony to being a Dutch to finally ending as an English colony under the control of the Duke of York. The people demanded a representative assembly and eventually the Duke granted the people representation. The relationship between New York and England was good because New York was turned into a royal colony in 1685. The colony of Pennsylvania was settled by William Penn and the Quakers. The English did not control the Middle colonies directly, each colony had an English governor/leader, but that leader had the freedom to make decisions about his colony. The Navigation Acts were the only way that the English had control over the colonies, and the Navigation Acts were economic factors.



= = = 2. How did geography and demography impact the political and social structures that developed? =

__//Quotation://__ “New Netherland had been primarily a series of riverside trading posts[...] The merchants of New Amsterdam were no longer mere Indian traders, and their flourishing overseas business supported a sizable and diversified community.” (Blum 36).

__//Quote://__ “In the Hudson Valley a number of well-to-do Dutchmen had tried to found agricultural settlements, known at patroonships, of the very kind that English proprietors were hoping to establish.” (Blum 36).

//__Quote:__// “But eastern New Jersey was full of Puritans, always unfriendly to Quakers, and western New Jersey had poor soil.” (Blum 41).

__//Analysis://__ Due to their coastal locations of almost all colonies, the British Middle colonies lent themselves towards a port-based economy with a focus on fishing and imports and exports. The rise of the merchant and trader classes resulted not only from the geography, but from the heavy Dutch influence in the Middle Colonies. The Dutch supported the proprietary nature of the colonies with their settlements while also decreasing English domination. Both the religious tension within the demography (between Quakers and Puritans in neighboring regions) as well as the dry, infertile land helped lead to the creation of Pennsylvania.

= = = 3. How did the political structure established lead to discontent in the future? =

__//Quotation://__ “Governor Nicolls tries to appease them at the outset by compiling a special set of laws, which they presumably liked. This code, known as the Duke’s Laws, was presented to a meeting of representatives from 17 towns in 1665, but the meeting was not allowed to alter or add to it. The inhabitants accepted it, but not gratefully. During the ensuing years they objected continually to paying taxes without representation and, instead of being happy about their rescue from the Dutch, complained that they were now ‘inslav’d under an Arbitrary Power’ (Blum 37).

__//Analysis://__ Blum thinks that the inhabitants should have appreciated the Duke’s laws that were passed in the colony of New York because the laws saved them from the Dutch.

__//Answer://__ The people of New York did not have representatives, so they asked the Duke of York for representatives, and he granted them representatives. William Penn wanted to make sure that the people of Pennsylvania had power to participate in legislation. He made a council with richer people in it and an assembly with common people in it. The council had more power to initiate legislation, but the assembly still had some sway in government. Maryland also had a representative government.

= = = = = 4. To what extent did the socio-economic climate in your region lead to a wealth gap? =

__//Quotation://__ “The proprietors, generally friends or relatives of the king, hopes to grow rich from the sale of their lands and from the annual fees, or quitrents, that they charged the settlers. They kept the quitrents low enough not to deter prospective immigrants but high enough to guarantee themselves a tidy permanent income when the colony should be fully populated.” (Blum 36).

//__Quotation:__ //“Dutchmen had tried to found agricultural settlements, known as patroonships, of the very kind that English proprietors were hoping to establish.” (Blum 36).

//__Quotation:__ //“Attracted by the prospect of good land, free government, and religious liberty, English, Irish, Welsh, Dutch, and German Quakers flocked to the colony. (Blum 41).

//__Analysis:__ //The British Middle Colonies, being primarily proprietary, led to the creation of the upper class and tenants, as well as farmers who wanted to use land to grow crops. Many Dutch settlers came to New York and founded their own agricultural settlements, patroonships, like the original settlements of the English. In colonies closer to coastal regions, there was a rise in the merchant class, as well as fishers who used the natural resources to make money. Many international settlers were lured by the prospect of good land, especially in the Pennsylvania and Delaware regions.

== = 5. How oppressive was mercantilism to the settlers in your region? =

__//Quotation://__ “The first settlements in America, which cost the English people dearly in lives and money, cost the English government nothing. But in authorizing settlement the government did expect to gain something more than an outlet for disgruntled Puritans, profit-hungry merchants, and adventurous fortune-seekers” (Blum 31).

__//Analysis://__ Blum is saying that England made a gain while getting rid of people that were making trouble in England while the colonists suffered a loss in money and in lives and gained nothing initially.

__//Quotation://__ “The principal foreign threat to England’s emerging mercantilist empire in the seventeenth century came from the Dutch [...] Dutch merchants controlled the lumber trade from the Baltic and made Amsterdam the sawmill of Europe. Dutch fisherman dominated the North Sea.”(Blum 36)

__//Answer://__ England imposed the Navigation Acts on all of its colonies. The Navigation Acts stated that trade must be done with English owned and built ships that have at least 3/4 English/colonial crews. They forbade transportation of “enumerated commodities” from the colonies to any place except England or another English colony. The Acts also forbade the transportation of European and Asiatic goods to the colonies from any place other than colonies. The Navigation Acts basically said that the colonies could only trade with each other or with England. = = = = = 6. What were the major labor systems that developed and how did they impact structure of your society? Who was laboring? =

__//Quotation://__ “All Christians believed that humility is a virtue. But the Quakers studiously, almost fanatically, avoided pride erected. They wore conspicuously plain and out-of-date clothes; they refused to honor one another- or anyone else- by bowing or kneeling or taking off their hat, or by using the second person plural when addressing an individual (ultimately they forgot the nominative and used only ‘thee’). All Christians professed brotherly love, but the Quakers refused to make war. They also refused to give or take oaths, partly because they believed the imposition of an oath implied distrust of fellow men” (Blum 41).

__//Answer://__ The colonies did not use slaves. Instead the colonies had proprietors who had tenants living on their land. The tenants paid the proprietors while using the land how the tenant wished. = = = 7. How were the indigenous populations (Native Americans) treated in your society and what impact did that have on future colonial development? =



__//Quotation://__ “Penn heard that the land across the Delaware was better and that no one was there but wild Indians, who would be easier to live with than English bishops or New Jersey Puritans. (Blum 41).

__//Quotation://__ “What others had variously called conscience, revelation, or saving grace, Quakers called the Inner Light. The Inner Light, they said, glowed in every human being.” (Blum 41).

__//Analysis://__ In Pennsylvania, Quakers believed that everyone should be treated in a just, accepting manner because everyone had what they referred to as “The Inner Light”. Their religious beliefs dictated their attitude towards all other people, including indigenous populations, and even influenced other regions. When Pennsylvania claimed the region of Delaware, their original policy of fairness towards Native Americans was extended to Delaware.

= 8. To what extent did your region separate church and state and allow freedom of religion? =

__//Quotation://__ “ Penn saw fit to govern in a manner that he hoped would demonstrate the virtues of Quakerism and of political and religious liberty. Though, like other proprietors, he hoped to profit from his colony by quitrents of land, his primary purpose was to conduct a holy experiment in popular government and Christian living [...] Penn placed legislative power in a council and an assembly, both elected by freeholders. [...] And Penn, who retained some traditional ideas about the prerogatives of the well-to-do, made the council the more powerful of the two bodies, with the sole right to initiate legislation” (Blum 41).

__//Analysis://__ Penn was unlike the other governors because he wanted to demonstrate the virtues of Quakerism and Penn also wanted the people to be able to participate in the assembly and be represented. Blum is saying that even though Penn differed in this way, he still had money on his mind like other proprietors.

__//Answer://__ All of the colonies allowed religious freedom because that was one of the main reasons why many of the people left England for the colonies. Church and state were separate in all of colonies with one exception. In some colonies, including Pennsylvania, the governor would have to provide a priest if colonists asked for one.



= 9. To what extent did intellectual movements (Baroque, Enlightenment) influence the development of your region? =

__//Quotation://__ “It was conventional that he [William Penn] should attend Oxford [...] It was conventional, too, that he should spend some time at the Inns of Court studying law [...]” (Blum 40).

__//Quotation://__ “Penn saw fit to govern in a manner that he hoped would demonstrate the virtues of Quakerism and of political and religious liberty.” (Blum 41).

__//Analysis://__ Enlightenment influenced the development of the region through the shift towards rational thought and questioning, as embodied by William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania. He used his educational background to aid him in creating an ideal, well-thought out colony, where he focus on personal freedom, especially in terms of religious freedom.

__//Quotation://__ “His [Franklin’s] genius brought him success in everything he tried, whether it was running a Philadelphia newspaper in his youth[...]” (Blum 82).

__//Quotation://__ “The Enlightenment sang the praises of intellectual freedom; Franklin as a printer defended his right to publish what he pleased. The Enlightenment called for freedom of trade; Franklin worked as a diplomat to achieve that freedom. The Enlightenment encouraged scientific experiment. Franklin made significant observations on a wide variety of scientific subjects.” (Blum 92).

//__Analysis:__// Benjamin Franklin, another great thinker, spent a great deal of time in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where his thoughts influenced those around him. Using his printing press, he was able to not only utilize his intellectual freedom, but was also able to sow the seeds of Enlightenment across the region by spreading his ideas to others. He agreed with the main ideals of Enlightenment: intellectual freedom, freedom of trade and scientific experiment. He was well-known not only for his printed works but for his various research and inventions. He is credited as being one of the first major experimenters with electricity and he utilized the scientific method, another facet of Enlightenment, in his studies.