2. Colonial Society

Question 1

Demographics

Answer 1

• An English visitor to the colonies: ‘fire and water are not more heterogeneous than the different colonies of North America’. In other words, fire and water had more in common than the different colonies of North America.
• Founding Father John Adams: “The colonies had grown up under constitutions of government so different, there was so great a variety of religions, they were composed of so many different nations, their customs, manners, and habits had so little resemblance, and their intercourse had been so rare”

Question 2

Religion

Answer 2

• The founding of America by religious zealots, exiles, dissidents, New World idealists and capitalists had a profound influence on the overtly evangelical nature of American society.
• Many sought new starts and faith renewal by escaping European laws and customs.
• The Great Awakening was a religious revival in American colonies from the late 1730s to the 1760s sparked by George Whitfield (1714–70), an itinerant English Methodist preacher whose evangelical fervour and eloquence led to many conversions
• This would soon bear fruit in terms of a self-sufficient desire for a more representative government

Question 3

Economic Structure

Answer 3

• Mercantilism: an economic system whereby the first priority of setting up new colonies is that they enrich the Mother Country (Britain in the case of America)
• Navigation acts: a series of British laws dating from the early 1600s designed to help the British mercantilist system operate successfully; the British Parliament, Navy and customs officials had sweeping powers to enforce these laws but many American merchants like John Hancock successfully flouted these policies

Question 4

Economic Structure 2

Answer 4

• Mercantilism was an economic policy in Britain and its colonies in the 18th century, focusing on maintaining a positive trade balance.
• Britain invested heavily in colonies, reaping a significant financial windfall.
• Raw materials were obtained from America and other colonies, used in British factories, and sold back to the colonists.
• The policy aimed to establish or take over colonies, limiting the colony’s production and trade with Britain.