The document evaluates the similarities and differences among the thirteen American colonies by the time of the American Revolution, prompting an analysis of their political, economic, and social developments. While some essays argue that the colonies became remarkably similar, citing shared governance and growing religious tolerance, others highlight enduring disparities, particularly between the North and South. Overall, the document suggests that despite increasing similarities, significant differences still persisted among the colonies.

1. Question
"Although the thirteen American colonies were founded at
different times by people with
different motives and with different forms of colonial charters
and political organization, by the
time of the American Revolution the thirteen colonies had
become remarkably similar."
In your essay evaluate the accuracy of this statement. Were the
colonies really "remarkably
similar" by the time of the Revolution?
Evaluating the Essays
When reading the essays consider the following questions:
the question? Is there a
thesis?
indicate the main point which is
being argued in each paragraph? Remember, the topic sentence
should be what you're

2. trying to prove in the paragraph -- it shouldn't be a statement of
fact. A fact is used as
evidence, it's not something you're trying to prove.
logically organized to address
specific issues relating to the
argument? Or are they a jumble of ideas and facts that don't
necessarily relate to
answering the question? If they are relevant to answering the
question, is this connection
made clearly? Remember, you can't just throw out ideas and
facts, even though they may
be good individual points. They need to be organized to
support your argument -- you
need to show how these ideas and facts relate to proving your
argument and answering
the question.
supported by specific historical
evidence? Does this evidence support the main argument
presented in the topic sentence?
Is the evidence correct? Relevant to the point?
usion summarize the overall response to the
question? Show what has
been proven in the body of the essay?

3. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Sample Response #1: Poor
The 13th colonies were founded because people didn't want to
be in Europe anymore. Because of this
many people came to the colonies seeking other things. They
were looking for money and so they could
practice any religion they wanted. The good thing about the
colonies was that people were able to be
free! This provided the foundations for the nation we know
today.
The first settlers were the Pilgrims. They came to Plymouth
Rock because they had been chased out of
England. The English hated them because they were Protestants
and the English were Catholics. The
Pilgrims quickly began to make money by growing tobacco
using slaves. So, they were much happier in
America, because they could money, unlike in England. Of
course, the slaves weren't very happy because
they were treated very poorly and often killed for no reason.

4. This is why we see all of the colonies
suffering from slave rebellions which almost succeeded in
overthrowing their governments. There were
also the people who came to Pennsylvania starting in the 1780s.
The colony of Pennsylvania was
founded by William Penn. The King owed Penn a lot of money,
so rather than paying him he gave him a
big chunk of land. Penn was very friendly with the natives, so
that helped his colony a lot.
In 1676 Bacon's Rebellion tore through Virginia. Virginia and
Maryland were troubled early on because
lots of people died of diseases and fighting with the natives.
Eventually, though, it did get better and
people started to live longer. Then, they started to become rich
by becoming merchants, building ships,
and engaging in lots of commerce. This was exactly what
happened in places like New York, so they
were pretty similar. Another way they were similar was because
they hated the British and wanted to be
free. This ultimately led to the Revolution and the creation of
the Constitution. Under the Constitution
the colonists became united under one government which had
the power to stand up to the British and win
their war. As one people, under one government, the colonists

5. were now free.
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Sample Response #2: Fair
The 13 colonies started off being very different indeed. Some
colonists came for religious freedom while
others came to make money. Each colony had their own ideas
about their goals and how they were going
to organize themselves. By 1776, though, they were all unified
in being Americans.
First let us talk about their economics. All of the colonies
became much more stable and economically
prosperous over time. Individuals could make money in all
kinds of ways, like farming or engaging in
trade. During this time the fur trade with the Indians grew
greatly. There was also growing trade with
England and other places in the world. The Navigation Acts,
which applied to all the colonies, also
ensured that their economies were pretty similar.
Next, we can discuss how the colonies governed themselves. In
the beginning there were several
different types of colonial governments, including charter
colonies and proprietary colonies. These were

6. governed in different ways. In New England they had town hall
meetings, which were very democratic.
By the time of the Revolution, however, all of the colonies had
become royal colonies directly controlled
by the British government. This is an important reason why the
American colonists ultimately rebelled
against the British -- they were tired of being governed by them
in an arbitrary fashion.
Finally, the colonies had become very religiously similar by the
time of the Revolution. They were all
Christians and they had come to believe in being religiously
tolerant and not having government
controlled churches. This was a big change from what it had
been in the beginning. Places like
Massachusetts had been very intolerant of other religions and
they insisted upon having only one church,
paid for by everyone out of their taxes. Pennsylvania, on the
other hand, was very open about other
religions right from the beginning. By the time of the
Revolution all the colonies pretty much looked like
Pennsylvania.
As we can see, the colonies had definitely grown together and

7. become very similar by the time of the
Revolution. What they had become was very similar what we
have in America today: freedom of
religion, democracy, and economic opportunity.
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Sample Response #3: Good
The American colonies did become more alike over time. By
the time of the Revolution their basic forms
of government were similar and increasingly they shared a
culture defined by tolerance for religious
diversity. They were also bound together by the growth of the
Atlantic trading economy, which in turn
sparked a rising disparity between the rich and poor throughout
the colonies. However, since there were
also still some significant differences between the colonies, the
statement is only partially correct.
One of the ways in which the colonies were most similar was in
their political systems. There were some
variations in terms of how governors were chosen, based upon
whether they were royal, proprietary, or
charter colonies. By the time of the Revolution most colonies
were royal colonies in which the governors

8. were appointed by the king, but in a couple they were appointed
by the colony's proprietor and a few
more they were actually elected by the people. Other than that,
their political systems tended to be pretty
similar, since all of them enjoyed a representative form of
government with an elected assembly.
The general trend throughout the colonies was also for greater
religious tolerance. In the beginning the
most religiously intolerant colony was Massachusetts. By the
time of the Revolution, however, their
religious enthusiasm had waned and they became less concerned
about enforcing religious conformity.
Throughout the colonies tolerance for religious diversity had
been increased by a couple of factors. It
became increasingly difficult for colonial authorities to support
having just one church supported by the
government out of everyone's taxes because there were simply
too many different churches whose
members actively resisted this idea. This explosion of religious
diversity in the 18th century was in part
because of immigration from places other than England, and in
part because of the Great Awakening, out
of which came several new religious movements who tended to
support the idea of separation of church

9. and state. Another factor in the growth of religious tolerance
was the influence of Enlightenment thought,
which stressed reason over faith as the proper way to
understand the world. While Enlightenment thinkers
generally did believe in the concept of a God, they were far less
likely to believe that there was only one
way to worship God. These factors tended to push all of the
colonies towards a greater acceptance of
religious diversity and a growing separation between church and
state.
The growth of the Atlantic trading economy increasingly tied
the colonies together, but there remained
important differences between the colonial regions. By the time
of the Revolution all of the colonies
witnessed a significant increase in the amount of overseas trade.
They also all traded within the confines
of the British mercantile system, created by the Navigation Acts
of the 17th century. However, the
different colonial regions experienced this growth of trade
differently. The South became increasingly
dependent upon the export of agricultural crops raised using
slaves. The North also exported some crops,
but they tended to be those that were less labor intensive, like
wheat, and slavery was not nearly as

10. important an economic institution. The Northern economy also
began to be more diversified, since they
were more likely to engage in activities such as shipbuilding
and more likely to become the merchants
who were actually moving goods to and from the colonies.
Thus, by the time of the Revolution there was
a growing difference between the economies of the North and
the South.
Socially, all of the colonies saw the growth of class differences
between the rich and the poor, but they
also remained dissimilar in the types of people who inhabited
the various colonies. In the South the
success of plantation agriculture led to the rise of a very
wealthy and powerful planter class, while in the
North it was the mercantile elite which rose to the top. In both
cases society became much more
stratified, with a growing gulf between the rich and the poor.
However, in terms of population, they were
also increasingly different. Because of slavery, a much larger
population of African-Americans inhabited
the South. There was quite a lot of non-English immigration
from Europe at this time as well, but where
they settled varied widely. Initially the most popular location

11. for both German and Scotch-Irish
immigrants was Pennsylvania, although many Scotch-Irish
ultimately did move into the Southern
backcountry. New England was different because very few
immigrants settled there. Thus, while there
were some social similarities, there were also significant
differences.
It is generally true that the colonies became more similar by the
time of the Revolution. They shared a
fairly common experience of representative government,
growing religious tolerance, the growth of
connections to the Atlantic economy, and an increase in social
stratification. However, there were also
significant differences that remained, particularly between the
Northern and the Southern colonies.