The American colonials proclaimed " no taxation without representation " starting with the Stamp Act Congress in 1765 . They rejected the authority of the British Parliament to tax them because they had no representatives in that governing body . Protests steadily escalated to the Boston Massacre in 1770 and the burning of the '' Gaspee '' in Rhode Island in 1772 , followed by the Boston Tea Party in December 1773 . The British responded by closing Boston Harbor and enacting a series of punitive laws which effectively rescinded Massachusetts Bay Colony 's rights of self-government . The other colonies rallied behind Massachusetts , and a group of American Patriot leaders set up their own government in late 1774 at the Continental Congress to coordinate their resistance of Britain ; other colonists retained their allegiance to the Crown and were known as '' Loyalists '' or '' Tories ''
Boston Massacre
Boston Massacre
American Revolution