Massachusetts Circular Letter - Consequences

Consequences

After the Circular Letter had been passed and issued to other colonies, Lord Hillsborough, secretary of state for the colonies, ordered the Massachusetts General Court to revoke it. The body voted against revoking the letter, 92-17. In response to the General Court's defiance, Governor Francis Bernard dissolved the assembly. This led to an outbreak of mob violence from colonists who no longer had any legal way to deal with their grievances. They attacked customs officials, making it impossible for them to perform their duties. In response to the deteriorating situation, Lord Hillsborough sent four regiments of British soldiers to Boston. Arriving in October 1768, the soldiers only increased the tensions, as recorded in the anonymously penned "Journal of Occurrences", which chronicled the occupation. These tensions culminated on March 5, 1770 with the Boston Massacre.

Read more about this topic:  Massachusetts Circular Letter

Famous quotes containing the word consequences:

    [As teenager], the trauma of near-misses and almost- consequences usually brings us to our senses. We finally come down someplace between our parents’ safety advice, which underestimates our ability, and our own unreasonable disregard for safety, which is our childlike wish for invulnerability. Our definition of acceptable risk becomes a product of our own experience.
    Roger Gould (20th century)

    There are more consequences to a shipwreck than the underwriters notice.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    The consequences of our actions grab us by the scruff of our necks, quite indifferent to our claim that we have “gotten better” in the meantime.
    Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)