John Hancock

:This article is about John Hancock, the 18th century statesman. For other people and things named John Hancock, see John Hancock (disambiguation).

Career

A Boston selectman and representative to the Massachusetts General Court, his colonial trade business naturally disposed him to resist the Stamp Act, which attempted to restrict colonial trading.

Related Topics:
Boston - Selectman - Representative - Massachusetts General Court - Stamp Act

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The Stamp Act was repealed, but later acts (such as the Townshend Acts) led to further taxation on common goods. Eventually, Hancock's shipping practices became more evasive, and he began to smuggle glass, lead, paper and tea. In 1768, upon arriving from England, his sloop Liberty was impounded by British customs officials for violation of revenue laws. This caused a riot among some infuriated Bostonians, depending as they did on the supplies on board.

Related Topics:
Townshend Acts - Smuggle - 1768 - Sloop - Riot

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His regular merchant trade as well as his smuggling practices financed much of his region's resistance to British authority and his financial contributions led Bostonians to joke that "Sam Adams writes the letters and John Hancock pays the postage" (Fradin & McCurdy, 2002).

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At first only a financier of the growing rebellion, he later became a public critic of British rule. On March 5, 1774, the fourth anniversary of the Boston Massacre, he gave a speech strongly condemning the British. In the same year, he was unanimously elected president of the Provisional Congress of Massachusetts, and presided over its Committee of Safety. Under Hancock, Massachusetts raised bands of "minutemen"—soldiers who claimed they could be ready to fight in sixty seconds—and his boycott of tea imported by the British East India Company eventually led to the Boston Tea Party.

Related Topics:
March 5 - 1774 - Boston Massacre - Minutemen - Tea - British East India Company - Boston Tea Party

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