The American Revolution was a colonial uprising that lasted from 1765 until 1783. The Thirteen Colonies won independence from Great Britain, resulting in the formation of the United States of America. In an alliance with France and allies, they beat the British in the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783). Starting with the Stamp Act Congress in 1765, members of American colonial society advocated for "no taxation without representation." They disputed the British Parliament's right to tax them because they were not members of that governing body. Protests grew increasingly violent, culminating in the Boston Massacre in 1770 and the burning of the Gaspee in Rhode Island in 1772, followed by the Boston Tea Party in December 1773, when Patriots burned a shipment of taxed tea. The British retaliated by closing Boston Harbor and passing a series of laws that effectively revoked the Massachusetts Bay Colony's self-government rights, prompting the other colonies to rally around Massachusetts. Other colonists preferred to remain aligned with the Crown and were known as Loyalists or Tories. In late 1774, the Patriots established their own alternative government to better coordinate their resistance efforts against Great Britain; other colonists preferred to remain aligned with the Crown and were known as Loyalists or Tories. When the king's troops sought to capture and destroy Colonial military supplies at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, tensions erupted into a combat between Patriot militia and British regulars. In what became known as the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783), the Patriots (and eventually their French, Spanish, and Dutch allies) fought the British and Loyalists. Each of the thirteen colonies organized a Provincial Congress to take authority from the old colonial governments and eradicate Loyalism, and from there they built a Continental Army under General George Washington's guidance. On July 2, 1776, the Continental Congress declared the colonies free and independent states, declaring King George's rule to be arbitrary and infringing on the colonists' rights as Englishmen. The Patriot leadership preached liberalism and republicanism as political beliefs, rejecting monarchy and aristocracy and proclaiming that all men are created equal. In March 1776, the Continental Army drove the redcoats out of Boston, but the British conquered and held New York City and its crucial harbor for the balance of the war that summer. For a brief period, the Royal Navy blockaded ports and took control of other cities, but they were unable to overwhelm Washington's army. During the winter of 1775–76, the Patriots attempted but failed to invade Canada, but during the Battle of Saratoga in October 1777, they successfully captured a British army. With a big army and naval, France joined the war as an ally of the United States, posing a threat to Britain. In early 1780, the British under the command of Charles Cornwallis captured an army in Charleston, South Carolina, but were unable to attract enough volunteers from Loyalist residents to establish effective control of the province. In the fall of 1781, an united American–French force captured a second British army at Yorktown, thereby ending the war. On September 3, 1783, the Treaty of Paris was signed, formally ending the war and guaranteeing the fledgling nation's complete separation from the British Empire. The United States seized control of practically all of the land east of the Mississippi River and south of the Great Lakes, while the British kept Canada and Spain took Florida. The creation of the United States Constitution, which established a relatively strong federal national government that included an executive, a national judiciary, and a bicameral Congress that represented states in the Senate and the population in the House of Representatives, was one of the revolution's most significant outcomes. Around 60,000 Loyalists migrated to other British colonies, particularly British North America, as a result of the Revolution (Canada).
