During the 18th century, Britain was one of the most powerful countries in the world and being a part of the British empire, therefore, should have meant sharing in the wealth, happiness, and freedom of that empire. However, a majority of the colonists living in America at this time felt more the constraints of an overpowering mother-country than the liberty of being a part of such a wealthy empire. Towards the early 1730s and onward there was little reason for colonists to have felt rebellious; however, as time went on and more and more groups of colonists began to feel unhappy, confrontation became inevitable. Throughout the 1760s especially, many acts were passed in order to stop merchants and artisans from making money and becoming wealthy. The British empire cared very much for their trading and for that of the colonists. They wanted to stop any other European country from dominating the naval trade and in order to keep this, they had to dominate the trade of the colonies. While the merchants and villagers had compelling reasons to create a declaration and to separate from Britain, rural outlying farmers had little to no reason.
             From the start of the establishment of the colonies, the merchants had a hard time being able to gain from the strict rules set up by British trade policies in the colonies. Since Britain based most of its trade policies on the idea of mercantilism, which said that "self-sufficient nations were the considered the strongest and healthiest"(Britain's North American Empire 22), the colonies had little room to gain wealth because they were always gaining wealth for Britain. From 1660 to 1672 a series of acts called the Navigation Acts created strict rules for the ways in which merchants had to do their jobs. It stated that "all trade between England and her colonies was to be carried in ships built, owned, and operated by the British or British colonials, all European goods im...