Before the American Revolution, Great Britain had a say in many of the affairs of the young colonies that would become the United States of America. The King controlled anything from what the colonies could and could not export to what he wanted to collect taxes on. This often posed a problem with the colonists and eventually escalated into the revolution. A key document that led to this was the Stamp Act paper of 1765. This paper posed a tax on all printed objects in the colonies and affected all colonists. If looked at from the perspective of today's society, it is easy to see why many colonists found it unfair, unjust, and just plain ridiculous.
While the document was effective in a sense that the King got money from the colonies, it wasn't an effective way to tax the people. Not only would the people not stand for being taxed on so many things, they would also retaliate violently. All printed materials including "pamphlets, almanacs, newspapers, all bonds, notes, leases, policies of insurance, together with all papers used for legal purposes"1 were taxed no matter the circumstances. The future Americans felt it was a violation of their liberties. They would not accept anything of the sort, so in a sense it was more effective for bringing backlash of the colonial people than it was for collecting their money.
It also was not a smart thing for the King to do. Britain and the states already had hard feelings because the colonies felt that they could be on their own. This would affect everyone, not just the wealthy landowners, so it would give the common people something to fight for too. The document posed "taxation without representation": the monarchy would collect the money and that was it. Colonists could not say or do anything about it, at least peacefully. So with a nation full of angry people that did not want to get taxed anymore, things did not look good for Britain.
"Resistance of the statute took the form of petitions to the king and Parliament, a boycott of British goods, the refusal of lawyers or printers to use stamps or stamped papers, and violence sparked by the Sons Of Liberty.
