Cause of Shay's Rebellion?

Farmers in western Massachusetts resented the fact that the state's tax laws favored trade at the expense of farming. The state legislature was composed mostly of merchants from Boston and other shipping towns and cities. In 1786, farmers assembled in conventions and demanded that their property tax be lowered.

To make up for the loss of revenue, they called for the abolition of aristocratic branches of the government in Boston. A Revolutionary War veteran named Daniel Shays led about 2,000 armed men against the Springfield arsenal. The governor of Massachusetts asked for help from the national government but the government under the Articles was unable to act.

The rebellion eventually collapsed but the problems continued. Shays and his followers believed they were simply carrying on the sprit of the Revolution. Thomas Jefferson, then minister to France, agreed with them.

"A little rebellion now and then is a good thing," he wrote to a friend. "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." Washington did not agree with Jefferson.

He welcomed the failure of Shays's Rebellion and he compared it to his having to use force to prevent a military coup by a group of army officers under his command. He believed citizens could not take up arms whenever they felt something was not done correctly or they had a grievance. Shays and the government of Massachusetts agreed to a meeting and an attempt to end the stalemate.

The governor sent the state militia to the armory and Shays's agree to march in with his "troops." The state militia fired and four of Shays's men were killed. The remainder were arrested and tried and several of he rebels were fined and imprisoned, but some received the death penalty.

A general amnesty was granted in 1788. Most of the men, by then, had been released or had their death sentences commuted. Two men were hanged on 6 December 1787.

Shays was pardoned and he eventually moved to New York where he died in 1825.

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