Recommended: Sugar and Molasses Act
DBQ Essay – What Drove the Sugar Trade? Beginning in the late 1600s and continuing through the 1700s the demand for sugar became incredibly high due to its addictive qualities. To supply the consumers with sugar they were craving, wealthy Europeans established sugar plantations throughout the Caribbean and built a thriving slave industry, so their need for cheap labor could be satisfied. Sugar consumption increased from 4.6lbs to 16.2lbs per capita annually from 1700 to 1770 due to the increasing addiction of the consumers.
Similarly, the Dutch and English sought to get involved in the valuable spice trade, although they did this by displacing the Portuguese by force. During the early 1600’s the Dutch and English started ventures in the Spice Trade by providing charters to private companies. The British East India Company and the Dutch East India Company both sought for control of the trade by quickly established competing trading post empires that were similar in many respects. The Dutch forced natives out and bought in their own workers, this lead to the Dutch easily being able to monopolize the trade of spices such as nutmeg and cloves which in turn made the Dutch huge profits. The British were excluded from the main spice markets and in turn focused on the Indian market and valuable materials such as cotton.
The French and Indian war sunk Great Britain into deep debt, so they decided to put tax on items that the colonies often used or needed, which of course the colonists refused to pay. “no taxation without representation” was the colonists chant, they did not want to pay the taxes unless the elected representatives had a right to pass taxes if wanted and if the laws passed by their own governmental body. The British were being unfair towards the colonists so the colonists did not do the task given to them easily but brutally. Molasses were a big part of the triangular trade and was very highly taxed which resulted in most people smuggling in the molasses. In 1764 Greenville asked parliament to raise taxes on molasses.
In the Caribbean, during the 18th century, colonists began to smuggle merchandise for various causes. For instance, French merchants sold products at a really low price to make a hefty profit. However, the
This law was put into place because the colonist were buy of merchants so they did have to pay the high taxes on molasses. Which back fired on them because the British lower the tax on molasses because Lord “Grenvile took measures that the duty be strictly enforced. The act also listed more foreign good to be taxed including sugar, wine, coffee, cambric, and lumber”(U.S History). This drove the some of the colonist crazy because now they were being taxes on more things that they had to buy in order to survive in the new world. Once this law got put into place into place it slowed down the economy of the new world.
The Molasses Act of 1733 came from the parliament of great Britain was something that taxed the citizens of the colonies 6 pence every time a gallon of molasses was shipped. This act was imposed to make trades with the french cheaper. This act vitally impacted the global mass trade. The Molasses was used to make rum in New England, this made it much more valuable than anything the colonies had to offer, may it be fish or anything else. Since they had the molasses the British west Indies were considered the most valuable trade partners out there.
The embargo act took place in 1807. the embargo act was attempted by Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson hoped it would not cause a war between the British and the U.S. they did it because the y wanted to get back the British for interfering with the trade. they block american ships from using British ports and the was a problem for american trades he did try to prevent a war but the embargo act cause a war in 1812
The Molasses Act was a law issued by the British Parliament to restrict trade in the North American colonies. Molasses is made when sugarcane is boiled and made into sugar crystals, and is a secondary product made from the sugarcane industry. The extra part of the sugarcane after distillation is molasses, which was used as a sweetener, was used as an ingredient for rum, and many other purposes. (Revolutionary War and Beyond) Molasses was the most critical sweetener, because it was cheaper than refined sugar. This act was put into place because the colonies were getting cheaper molasses from the French, because French planters had to sell molasses for less money.
The British men gathered full control of the trading center present in the Americas, and created the Navigation Acts to help aid them in their tactics to take control over all trade within the Americas. The Navigation Acts were passed under a mercantilist system, and was used to regulate trade in a way that only benefitted the British economy. These acts restricted trade between England and its colonies to English or colonial ships, required certain colonial goods to pass through England before export, provided subsidies for the production of certain raw goods in the colonies, and banned colonial competition in large-scale manufacturing. This lowered the competition in the trading world for the British and caused the British to have a major surge in power, that greatly attributed to the growth of their rising empire. The British’s ambitious motives in the trading world help portray a way that the British took control of an important piece in the economy of all of the other nations present in the colonies in the time period, and shows another leading factor in the growth of the British empire.
What Drove the Sugar Trade? The sugar trade began in 1655 and became a big deal to Britain. Wealthy men would buy property, produce sugar, and sell it to their home country for a low price. (Document 7) Sugar was a product that could be bought and sold easily, since it was in high demand.
What is the sugar trade? Well the sugar trade is when Christopher Columbus brought it with him across the Atlantic in 1495. Then in the 1500’s the Portuguese led the new world sugar production. Well the major reason for the sugar trade is Columbus. The second reason for sugar trade was the condition that was used to make sugar cane.
Imports of lead, glass, paper, paint, and tea were taxed; the British government wanted the colonists to pay so they created punishments for colonists who
Britain needed a way to fix this. They came up with the Sugar Act, a set of taxes to help Britain raise money. Taxes were not a new thing for the colonists, but these new taxes caused big issues. The Sugar Act was suggested by Prime Minister George Greenville.
A subsequent policy, known as the Molasses Act of 1733 sought to give British sugar planters a price advantage through additional taxes on the product (Henretta and Edwards, 2012, p. 93). Fearing a crippling of the distilling industry and reductions in farm exports and colonial income; colonists again reacted by smuggling French molasses and offering bribes to customs officials (Henretta and Edwards, 2012, p. 93). Relations between the American colonies and the British Empire were further strained as colonial currency declined, degradation of the colonial economy ensued, and
The history of the expansion of sugarcane plantations by the Europeans to the Caribbean islands between the 17th and 18th century was not always a sweet one. The beginnings of sugarcane production in the Caribbean began in Barbados in the 17th century when it was brought over by the Dutch from Brazil due to the high demand for sugar in Europe. Furthermore, the Dutch, British and Spanish colonies continued to expand sugar production over to various other Caribbean islands such as Jamaica, Antigua, Bahamas and Haiti. Consequently, large numbers of West African slaves were sent to these islands via the transatlantic slave trade to serve as manual labourers in the production of sugar. However, these slaves were subjected to harsh treatment and
