[PRE-REVOLUTIONARY WAR]. The Glocester Journal. Vol. XLV, No. 2306. Gloucester, England: R. Raikes, 4 August 1766.

4 pp., folio, 11 14/ x 17 1/4 in. Disbound (occasional spotting, some chipping to edges).

The issue contains an inside page report of the Repeal of the Stamp Act by Great Britain. Also included is a front page red British half-penny tax stamp that was so reviled by the British North American Colonies that it was a precipitating factor in the onset of the Revolutionary War some nine years later.

After four months of widespread protest in America, the British Parliament repealed the Stamp Act, a taxation measure enacted to raise revenues for a standing British army in America.

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The Stamp Act was passed on 22 March 1765, leading to an uproar in the colonies over an issue that was to be a major cause of the Revolution: taxation without representation. Enacted in November 1765, the controversial act forced colonists to buy a British stamp for every official document they obtained.

The colonists, who had convened the Stamp Act Congress in October 1765 to vocalize their opposition to the impending enactment, greeted the arrival of the stamps with outrage and violence. Most Americans called for a boycott of British goods, and some organized attacks on the customhouses and homes of tax collectors. After months of protest, and an appeal by Benjamin Franklin before the British House of Commons, Parliament voted to repeal the Stamp Act in March 1766. However, the same day, Parliament passed the Declaratory Acts, asserting that the British government had free and total legislative power over the colonies.

[PRE-REVOLUTIONARY WAR]. The Glocester Journal. Vol. XLV, No. 2306. Gloucester, England: R. Raikes, 4 August 1766.