Why did the American colonists decide to break away from Britain?
The Ocean Landlord
Why did the American colonists decide to break away from Britain?
Imagine you live in a house, but the landlord lives an ocean away. He's never visited. He doesn't know you painted the kitchen or planted the garden. But every month, a new bill arrives in the mail with his signature on it. That, roughly, was the situation in 1700s America — thirteen colonies under a king who lived three thousand miles away in Britain.
For a long time, the arrangement mostly worked. Britain protected the colonies, and the colonists felt proudly British. But then Britain fought a long, expensive war against France over land in North America. Wars cost money — enormous piles of it. And when the fighting was over, Britain looked at the empty treasury and then looked across the sea at the colonists.
