In a five-hour courtroom speech, lawyer James Otis, representing a group of Boston merchants, argues that the writs of assistance — which authorized British officials to search for smuggled goods without a warrant — are “unconstitutional.” John Adams later considered this the true start of the American Revolution.

With the Stamp Act, Parliament imposes a direct tax on printed materials such as newspapers and pamphlets, igniting outrage over taxation without representation. Delegates from nine colonies meet in New York to mount a united protest, paving the way for the Continental Congress, America’s first national government.

British soldiers fire into a taunting crowd in Boston, killing five colonists. Paul Revere’s widely circulated print of the scene helps turn the bloodshed into a rallying cry against British rule.

An unidentified shot in Lexington, Massachusetts, ignites the first fighting between British troops and colonial militiamen. By day’s end, the redcoats are retreating to Boston under relentless colonial fire. The Revolutionary War has begun.

In Philadelphia, the Second Continental Congress adopts the Declaration of Independence, severing the colonies’ ties to Britain, casting King George as a tyrant and proclaiming that “all men are created equal.”

Delegates sign the Constitution of the United States in Philadelphia, creating the framework for a new federal government. Ratified the following year, it begins one of the world’s longest-running experiments in self-government.