2025 civics test · Question 77 of 128 · Colonial Period and Independence

Name one reason why the Americans declared independence from Britain.

Official answers

• High taxes
• Taxation without representation
• British soldiers stayed in Americans’ houses (boarding, quartering)
• They did not have self-government
• Boston Massacre
• Boston Tea Party (Tea Act)
• Stamp Act
• Sugar Act
• Townshend Acts
• Intolerable (Coercive) Acts

Why

The colonists had no self-government. Great Britain raised their taxes to pay for a war, but the colonists had no representatives in the British government to vote on those taxes. This is where the phrase "taxation without representation" comes from. Any one reason on the list is correct.