Independence Hall

Engraving of Independence Hall, Philadelphia, 1800

Stamps

 

Proof sheet of one-penny stamps submitted for approval to Commissioners of Stamps by engraver. 10 May 1765.

Stamp Act Repeal’d

1765 teapot celebrating repeal of the Stamp Act

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The Repeal

The Repeal, or the Funeral Procession, of Miss America Stamp. The coffin is carried by George Grenville.

The Last Shift

 

This 1765 print is a British artist’s impression of what it meant to appoint Americans as stamp distributors under the Stamp Act. The men on the left tell the highwayman, “We are all Americans,” while the king tells the Earl of Bute, “Money we must have.” The way the act promised to turn Americans against each other—pitting imperial employees against their fellow colonists—was another element of its perceived cruelty.

The Deplorable State of America

 

At the center of this 1765 etching, Britain offers America the Stamp Act in the form of a Pandora’s Box, as Commerce flees and a bellicose Athena tells them not to take it. The print illustrates the multidimensional difficulties associated with the Stamp Act—commercial, political, and existential. On the far left, Americans stand in front of a gallows, reflecting that “necessity has no Law” and “We shall all starve.”

The Great Financier

 

This 1765 British satirical print shows George Grenville, the “financier,” weighing pennies against the nation’s deep postwar debts, but, in doing so, shackles America, which would—if free to trade—be able to deliver the sack of dollars she holds in her right hand. The yoke on the enslaved America’s neck is marked “Taxed without Representation.”

O! The Fatal Stamp

American newspaper response to the Stamp Act, 1765.

Mason

George Mason (1725-92). Writer of the Virginia Declaration of Rights, advocate for the Bill of Rights, general important figure of the American Revolution.

Philadelphia

The “Philadelphia,” a gunboat from the American Revolution. Recovered from Lake Champlain, now in the Smithsonian Museum of American History.