Olive Branch Petition

(noun)

Adopted by the Continental Congress in July 1775, in a final attempt to avoid war with Great Britain.

Related Terms

Examples of Olive Branch Petition in the following topics:

  • Pursuing Both War and Peace

    • In 1775, the colonies proposed the Olive Branch Petition to reconcile with Britain and avert war, but King George III denied the petition.
    • The Proclamation of Rebellion was written before the Olive Branch Petition reached the British.
    • This letter was used as a propaganda tool to demonstrate the insincerity of the Olive Branch Petition.
    • The Proclamation of Rebellion was King George III's response to the Olive Branch Petition.
    • The Olive Branch Petition, issued by the Second Congress, was a final attempt at reconciliation with the British.

  • Conclusion: The Fight for Independence

    • In July, the colonists proposed the Olive Branch Petition to reconcile with Britain and avert war.
    • The petition asked for one of two alternatives: free trade and taxes equal to those levied on the people in Great Britain, or alternatively, no taxes and strict trade regulations.
    • The petition followed the Battle of Bunker Hill in which the British suffered massive casualties.
    • King George III, however, denied the Olive Branch Petition, and in August 1775, issued a Proclamation for Suppressing Rebellion and Sedition, declaring the 13 colonies to be in a state of revolt and calling upon British officers and loyal subjects to suppress the uprising.
    • Washington petitioned Congress for supplies and provisions, but received no support.

  • The Second Continental Congress

    • The First Continental Congress petitioned King George III to repeal the Intolerable Acts (punitive measures passed by Parliament in response to the Boston Tea Party) and initiated a boycott of British goods.
    • On July 8, Congress extended the Olive Branch Petition to the British Crown as a final, unsuccessful attempt at reconciliation.

  • The Battle of Bunker Hill

    • King George's attitude toward the colonies hardened, and the news may have contributed to his rejection of the Continental Congress' Olive Branch Petition, the last substantive political attempt at reconciliation.

  • Marbury v. Madison

    • The landmark decision helped define the power of the judiciary as a co-equal branch of the government, constitutionally separate from the executive and judicial branches.
    • The case resulted from a petition to the Supreme Court by William Marbury who had been appointed by President John Adams as Justice of the Peace in the District of Columbia.
    • Marbury's appointment was not subsequently delivered to him, so he petitioned the Supreme Court to force Jefferson's Secretary of State James Madison to deliver the documents.
    • The petition was therefore denied, but more importantly, the precedent for the Court's power of judicial review - not specificially enumerated in the Constitution - was established.
    • Madison created between the executive and judicial branches of government

  • The Expansion of the Federal Government

    • The landmark decision helped define the power of the judiciary as a co-equal branch of the government, constitutionally separate from the executive and judicial branches.
    • The case resulted from a petition to the Supreme Court by William Marbury, who had been appointed by President John Adams as justice of the peace in the District of Columbia.
    • Marbury's appointment was not subsequently delivered to him, so he petitioned the Supreme Court to force Jefferson's secretary of state, James Madison, to deliver the documents.
    • The petition was therefore denied, but more importantly, the precedent for the Court's power of judicial review—not specifically enumerated in the Constitution—was established.
    • James William McCulloch was the head of the Baltimore branch of the Second Bank of the United States.

  • Judicial Review and Marbury v. Madison

    • Its outcome helped define the boundary between the American government's constitutionally separate executive and judicial branches.
    • The case resulted from a petition to the Supreme Court by William Marbury, who President John Adams had appointed as justice of the peace in the District of Columbia, but whose commission was not subsequently delivered.
    • The petition was therefore denied.
    • This new act reestablished that the judicial branch would once again operate under the dictates of the original Judiciary Act of 1789.
    • As such, the case set an important precedent for the future of the U.S. government and further established the system of checks and balances between the branches of government.

  • Separating Church and State

    • The Flushing Remonstrance was a petition for religious freedom circulated in the colonies in 1657, and is considered a precursor to the Constitution's provision on the separation of church and state.
    • Thomas Jefferson used the phrase "a wall of separation between Church and State" when he described the First Amendment's restriction on the legislative branch of the federal government.
    • A US postage stamp commemorating religious freedom and the Flushing Remonstrance, a petition for religious freedom circulated in American colonies in 1657 and considered a precursor to the Constitution's provision on the separation of church and state.