Navigation Act

9 Key excerpts on "Navigation Act"

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  The Royal Navy and the British Atlantic World, c. 1750–1820

  • John McAleer, John McAleer, Christer Petley(Authors)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • Palgrave Macmillan

    (Publisher)

  In 1650 and 1651, statutes passed by Westminster insisted that the seaborne carriage of goods between English possessions should be on English ships. Parliament continued to flex its muscles after the Stuarts were restored in 1660. That year, MPs approved the first of a series of Navigation Acts designed to create a legislative framework for the overseas trade of the colonies; more followed in 1663, 1673, and 1696. 13 This body of laws expanded upon earlier precedents, but introduced many new elements: It limited the carriage of goods to English ships, three-quarters of whose crews had to be the crown’s subjects; it stipulated that the products of other European countries had to pass through an English port (and pay English customs duties) before they could be shipped to the colonies; and it listed, or ‘enumerated’ in the language of the legislation, certain lucrative colonial products, such as sugar and tobacco, that must come to an English port (and pay English customs duties), even if their eventual destination was elsewhere in Europe. We can identify three principal aims behind the Navigation Acts: to squeeze the Dutch out of the Atlantic carrying trade and build up English shipping and the English maritime labour force; to encourage the colonies to buy English rather than continental European manufactures; and to give the English economy (and English public finances) first call on important colonial products, and enable it to profit by the re-export of goods that could be shipped to continental Europe. 14 From a modern free-trade perspective, it seems entirely reasonable that such a restrictive system would have provoked colonial resistance. And so it did. Soon after the Navigation Acts were introduced, Massachusetts assemblymen denied the right of the Westminster parliament to regulate the overseas trade of their colony, an act of defiance that cost them their charter in 1684

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  Colonial America

  • Jerome R Reich, Jerome Reich(Authors)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  9 Seventeenth-Century Revolts and Eighteenth-Century Stabilization

  The English colonies in America began to show signs of maturity roughly during the last quarter of the seventeenth century. This process was accompanied by a series of revolts, most of which were precipitated by the Glorious Revolution in England beginning in 1688. During the following half century, the colonies enjoyed relative political stability, which encouraged the development of a common “American” culture. This chapter deals with these events and developments that will facilitate an understanding of later chapters of this volume.

  The Effects of the Navigation Acts

  One of the leading causes of colonial discontent was the Navigation Acts. From the English point of view, the Navigation Acts were an unqualified success; however, colonial reactions to them varied according to place and time. New England’s shipbuilding industry benefited from the monopoly granted British ships. Furthermore, none of its products was on the enumerated list. However, New England merchants resented the fact that some of their cargoes could be sold only in England and that they were not allowed to purchase goods directly from the nations of Europe. They were most vociferous against the Plantation Duty Act of 1673, which required that duties on enumerated articles being carried from one colonial port to another be paid in advance. This made it theoretically impossible, for example, to ship tobacco from Virginia to Boston and then to France without paying any customs duties. However, for over a century New England sea captains continued to evade this as well as other regulations of the Navigation Acts.

  In Virginia the Navigation Acts were at first viewed as a disaster. Even though the acts prohibited the importation of foreign tobacco into England (and even restrained the growing of tobacco in England), tobacco prices fell sharply during the 1670s. Overproduction was probably the main cause of this drop in tobacco prices, but the Virginia planters chose to blame it on the Navigation Acts, particularly the Plantations Duty Act. Virginians also resented the necessity of shipping their tobacco in English ships. Dutch vessels charged lower rates and in general provided better service. Finally, Virginians found themselves paying higher prices for the goods that they imported from Europe because of the added freight charges and extra duties levied on the goods as they were transshipped through England.

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  A Short History of the World's Shipping Industry

  • C. Ernest Fayle(Author)
  • 2013(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  1

  It was admitted even by the warmest advocates of the Acts that their effect was to raise the cost of imports; but this did not trouble those who held with Child that “Profit and Power ought joyntly to be considered,” and that the increase of English shipping was a more important matter than “the present Profit of the generality.” The system bore hardly also on the colonists, who were often prevented from selling their products in the best market, or shipping them by the most convenient vessel; but this was not likely to trouble statesmen who looked on a colony as an estate to be farmed for the benefit of the mother country.

  For good or ill, the spirit of the Navigation Acts continued to dominate British commercial policy throughout the whole of the eighteenth century. (We can now say British rather than English, for the Act of Union in 1707 threw open the whole of the reserved trades to the enterprising shipowners of Glasgow and Greenock.) It was not a spirit that was confined to Great Britain. Sweden imposed such drastic measures of discrimination against imports in foreign bottoms, that English ships, even when laden with English products, had to trans-ship their cargoes to Swedish vessels in a Baltic port, so that they might be entered under the national flag. Spain continued to prohibit all direct trade with colonies whose requirements she was unable adequately to supply, with the inevitable result that a vast organized smuggling traffic grew up, leading to perpetual friction, and occasional war. Holland continued to exclude all foreigners from traffic with the Dutch East Indies. France pursued the same policy in her Canadian and West Indian colonies, and her ministers devoted a large share of their attention to building up a mercantile marine and a flourishing foreign commerce, by means of subsidies, protective duties, navigation laws, and the formation of privileged companies. The French and English East India Companies fought each other for trade concessions in India, even when their Governments were at peace. Commercial rivalry lay at the back of war after war, and in every treaty of peace colonies passed as the prize of victory.

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  Social and Economic Networks in Early Massachusetts

  Atlantic Connections

  • Marsha L. Hamilton(Author)
  • 2009(Publication Date)
  • Penn State University Press

    (Publisher)

  After the Restoration in 1660, Charles II needed to control the flow of goods to and from England and Scotland in order to provide more revenue to the royal treasury. He also wanted to place further restrictions on the Dutch, and to con- trol smuggling with the French and the Spanish. He chose to strengthen and enforce the Navigation Acts, closing loopholes in earlier legislation by enumer- ating certain colonial products, such as sugar and tobacco, that had to be shipped to England or a colonial port before being reexported to the Continent. Non-enumerated items could still be carried directly to Europe, and cargoes from these ports could be brought directly to the colonies as long as they were massachusetts merchants  75 carried in English or colonial ships and without any intermediate stops. The Staple Act of 1663 closed this loophole in colonial trade by forcing all imports to the colonies to arrive via England or Wales. Scotland, Ireland, and the Channel Islands were also cut out of colonial markets, since only servants, horses, and provisions could be directly shipped from these areas. 10 Thus a British mercantile community in Massachusetts, which included merchants and mariners from many parts of the Atlantic world, coalesced after 1660 in part around the need to find creative responses to the Navigation Acts. For instance, as commercial networks grew after the Restoration, the restric- tions on direct trade between Scotland, Ulster, Jersey, and England’s North American and West Indian colonies forced merchants to conduct business through factors in London or the English outports. This increased the attractive- ness of sending resident merchants to the colonies, since settled residents could trade on an equal footing with English merchants. The result was an increase in non-Puritan participation in intercolonial trade, as well as in trade with Britain and Europe.

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  The Ocean Is a Wilderness

  Atlantic Piracy and the Limits of State Authority, 1688-1856

  • Guy Chet, William M. Knoblauch(Authors)
  • 2021(Publication Date)
  • University of Massachusetts Press

    (Publisher)

  Moreover, such vessels (ships of less than fifty tons, which were often used as smuggling vessels) were prohibited from importing into colonial ports merchandise that offered high profits for smugglers, such as liquor, tobacco, and tea. 33 At the same time, Parliament attempted to change administrative structures and procedures to combat corruption and collusion with smugglers. Whereas in previous decades American merchants and smugglers were easily able to dissuade customs agents from enforcing the Navigation Acts (by paying them off, pressuring them through influ-ential connections, or retaliating against them with civil suits in colonial courts presided over by friendly judges and partisan juries), British navi-gation acts put in place after the war, such as the Revenue Act of 1762 and the Sugar Act of 1764, established tighter Parliamentary supervi-sion over customs agents. They stipulated harsher penalties for corrup-tion and prohibited the appointment of officers in ports near their places of birth or recent places of residence, while also providing measures to shield agents (and deputized naval officers) from political pressure and judicial retaliation. 34 As mentioned earlier, wartime legislation already authorized the cus-toms service to deputize naval officers. Following the war, however, Par-liament offered naval officers an added incentive to remain active on this 75 Smuggling front: whereas customs officers kept only one-third of captured prizes (giving the rest to the Crown, the local provincial governor, and the ad-judicating Vice Admiralty court), naval officers were allowed to divide their prizes with the Crown equally—fifty/fifty. The Royal Navy, it was hoped, would be less susceptible to corruption and intimidation than lo-cal officeholders at port. Immediately following this legislation, in the spring of 1764, the Admiralty—rather than the customs service—began initiating deputations of naval officers as customs agents.

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  Commerce and Manners in Edmund Burke's Political Economy

  • Gregory M. Collins(Author)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • Cambridge University Press

    (Publisher)

  222 On the second point, it should be noted that Burke’s argument was not an inaccurate portrayal of the colonial perspective on the older Navigation Acts. In 1774, the First Continental Congress adopted a statement insisting that while colonies possessed the legislative authority over their internal affairs, they “cheerfully” consented to “such acts of the British parliament, as are bona fide, restrained to the regulation of our external commerce, for the purpose of securing the commercial advantages of the whole empire to the mother country, and the commercial benefits of its respective members.” 223 This admission conveyed formal colonial assent to the Acts, recognizing the laws to be tenable measures of imperial policy connecting American goods to the seat of empire. What, then, are the implications for Burke’s theory of political economy? First, his description of the Navigation Acts confirms his view expressed in Speech on American Taxation that the trade laws must have furnished some advantage to the Anglo-American connection, as displayed by the sparkling growth of British and American commerce in the eighteenth century. Second, our inquiry into Burke’s remarks on commerce, revenue, and taxation, particularly in the 1770s, requires elevated attention to the historical and political contexts in which he introduced his arguments, without merely reducing his commentary to the time period in which he lived. Third, characterizing Burke’s economic thought through stiff frames of either free 219 Langford, Writings and Speeches, III, 137–138; and 138n1. 220 Langford, Writings and Speeches, III, 138. 221 Langford, Writings and Speeches, III, 138. 222 Langford, Writings and Speeches, III, 138. 223 Worthington C. Ford, ed., Journals of the Continental Congress 1774–1789, vol. I (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1904–1937), 68–69. Observations and Anglo-American Commerce 293

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  Narrative and Critical History of America, Vol. 6 (of 8)

  The United States of North America, Part I

  • Justin Winsor, (Authors)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • Perlego

    (Publisher)

  The difficulty arose from a misconception of the relations of the colonies to the mother country. They were not a part of the realm, and could neither equally share its privileges nor justly bear its burdens. The attempt to bring them within imperial legislation failed, and could only fail. They were colonies; and the chief benefit the parent state could legitimately derive from them was the trade which would flow naturally to Great Britain by reason of the political connection, and would increase with the prosperity of the colonies.

  Early in 1763 the Bute ministry, of which George Grenville and Charles Townshend were members, entered upon the new policy. To enforce the navigation laws, armed cutters cruised about the British coast and along the American shores; their officers, for the first time, and much to their disgust, being required to act as revenue officers. To give unity to their efforts, an admiral was stationed on the coast. To adjudicate upon seizures of contraband goods, and other offences against the revenue, a vice-admiralty court, with enlarged jurisdiction, and sitting without juries, was set up.[45] Royal governors, hitherto chiefly occupied with domestic administration, were now obliged to watch the commerce of an empire. It was seen long before this time that the successful administration of the new system would require some modification of the provincial charters; but the difficulties were so serious that the matter was deferred.

  Such was the new order of things. The student who reflects upon the complete and radical change effected or threatened by these new measures, so much at variance with the habits and customary rights of the colonists, breaking up without notice not only illicit but legitimate trade, and sweeping away their commercial prosperity, is no longer at loss to account for the outburst of wrath which followed the Stamp Act, a year later.[46]

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  The American Colonies and the British Empire, 1607-1783, Part II vol 6

  • Steven Sarson, Jack P Greene, Steven Sarson(Authors)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  6

  Three years after, by the act of the 15th of the same reign, further regulations and restrictions were made, and every person or persons importing goods into the colonies obliged to deliver to the Governor of such colony, or to such person or officer as shall be by him thereunto authorized or appointed, a true inventory of all such goods, &c.7 At this time, and until ten years after, no duties were laid, by act of parliament, upon any commodities in the plantations, and of consequence no custom-houses had been / erected, or collectors or other custom-house officers appointed or thought of in the colonies, but the whole care and inspection of trade remained with the Governor, or the person be appointed Naval-Officer. – Afterwards, by the act of the 25th of the same reign, chap. 7. sect. 3. duties being laid on sugars and sundry other articles, to be paid in the plantations, when carried from one plantation to another, the several duties so imposed were to be levied and paid to such collector or other officer, in said plantations, as should thereafter be appointed by the commissioners of the customs in England; who did accordingly appoint collectors, and such other officers as occasion required, for that purpose, who ever since their appointment, it is well known, have had the chief care and inspection of the trade.8

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  Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America

  • Edmund Burke, Sidney Carleton Newsom, (Authors)
  • 2004(Publication Date)
  • Perlego

    (Publisher)

  In 1651 originated the policy which caused the American Revolution. That policy was one of taxation, indirect, it is true, but none the less taxation. The first Navigation Act required that colonial exports should be shipped to England in American or English vessels. This was followed by a long series of acts, regulating and restricting the American trade. Colonists were not allowed to exchange certain articles without paying duties thereon, and custom houses were established and officers appointed. Opposition to these proceedings was ineffectual; and in 1696, in order to expedite the business of taxation, and to establish a better method of ruling the colonies, a board was appointed, called the Lords Commissioners for Trade and Plantations. The royal governors found in this board ready sympathizers, and were not slow to report their grievances, and to insist upon more stringent regulations for enforcing obedience. Some of the retaliative measures employed were the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, the abridgment of the freedom of the press and the prohibition of elections. But the colonists generally succeeded in having their own way in the end, and were not wholly without encouragement and sympathy in the English Parliament. It may be that the war with France, which ended with the fall of Quebec, had much to do with this rather generous treatment. The Americans, too, were favored by the Whigs, who had been in power for more than seventy years. The policy of this great party was not opposed to the sentiments and ideas of political freedom that had grown up in the colonies; and, although more than half of the Navigation Acts were passed by Whig governments, the leaders had known how to wink at the violation of nearly all of them.

  Immediately after the close of the French war, and after George III. had ascended the throne of England, it was decided to enforce the Navigation Acts rigidly. There was to be no more smuggling, and, to prevent this, Writs of Assistance were issued. Armed with such authority, a servant of the king might enter the home of any citizen, and make a thorough search for smuggled goods. It is needless to say the measure was resisted vigorously, and its reception by the colonists, and its effect upon them, has been called the opening scene of the American Revolution. As a matter of fact, this sudden change in the attitude of England toward the colonies, marks the beginning of the policy of George III. which, had it been successful, would have made him the ruler of an absolute instead of a limited monarchy. He hated the Tories only less than the Whigs, and when he bestowed a favor upon either, it was for the purpose of weakening the other. The first task he set himself was that of crushing the Whigs. Since the Revolution of 1688, they had dictated the policy of the English government, and through wise leaders had become supreme in authority. They were particularly obnoxious to him because of their republican spirit, and he regarded their ascendency as a constant menace to his kingly power. Fortune seemed to favor him in the dissensions which arose. There grew up two factions in the Whig party. There were old Whigs and new Whigs. George played one against the other, advanced his favorites when opportunity offered, and in the end succeeded in forming a ministry composed of his friends and obedient to his will.

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