American business: colonial era and new republic.

The Wilderness Road was the major route for more than 200,000 people migrating west, at about the time the United States wascoming into being.

The whiskey tax was the United States’ first internal federal tax, and it was promoted to Congress as a “sin” tax; it thus served as the precedent for similar taxes in future years.

In addition to being the first U.S. president and commanding general of the Revolutionary War, Washington was one of the richest men in the American colonies on the eve of the American Revolution.

The Townshend Act interfered with colonial commerce and led to a change in colonists’ consumption habits and colonial merchants’ purchasing.

The passing of the act, coupled with the maintenance of the three-pence American tea tax...

The Stamp Act was effectively resisted and had little direct effect on American business.

The North American colonies’ first regularly scheduled stagecoach line helped New Jersey residents market their products, provided a vital link on the route between New York City and Philadelphia...

Slave trading across the Atlantic Ocean provided revenue for northern ports in American colonies and a labor source for plantations in the American South.

Slaves constituted a valuable kind of private property that could be traded or used to provide labor, usually at less cost than hiring free labor.

Shays’s Rebellion revealed the conflicting interests of farmers in rural areas and merchants along the coast of the new United States.

Initially, the royal charters provided support for early North American colonial farms and businesses, but later, monarchs used the charter’s powers to impose taxes and regulations on the colonists...

The war established the United States as a sovereign nation, allowing it to set up its own system of taxation and trade.

Penn was the founder and owner of the colony of Pennsylvania.

The Parliamentary Charter of 1763 was issued at the conclusion of the Seven Years’ War between France and Britain.

The three Northwest Ordinances defined the Northwest Territory and provided that territory with a blueprint for governance and economic development.

Federal legislation that prohibited American nationals frombeing commissioned in a foreign army, hiring people to serve a foreign government, or outfitting ships for the military of a foreign government.

The Navigation Acts tied the American colonies into the British imperial market, restricting the colonies’ trade with other powers and encouraging smuggling.

Hamilton, as the first secretary of the Treasury, helped establish a national economy with durable structures.

During the years from 1607 to 1775, farmers and merchants in colonies on mainland North America developed a market economy and commercial practices that provided the basis for material success comparable to the most advanced nations of Europe and made possible nineteenth century expansion.

Beginning with the French who settled along the St. Lawrence River during the early seventeenth century and continuing with the British in the second half of the same century, the fur trade constituted a major force underlying the European exploration, settlement, and economic development of the North America continent.

The British victory in the French and Indian War led to greater economic opportunities for Great Britain’s North American colonies, but it ironically also helped the nation’s thirteen American colonies eventually to become independent.

Before becoming one of America’s Founders, a scientist, and a statesman, Franklin was one of America’s first entrepreneurs.

The Depression of 1784 helped convince the nation that the central government created by the Articles of Confederation was too weak and that a new, stronger federal government with the power to issue currency, create tariffs, and regulate commerce was essential to national prosperity.

By reducing the time required to process raw cotton into usable stock, the cotton gin revolutionized the economy of the antebellum South, quickly establishing cotton as the dominant American export.