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Commerce & Coercion: The Politics of Non-Importation in Colonial Boston

  • Writer: Media Manager
    Media Manager
  • Mar 2
  • 3 min read


Written by one of our very own Hub Town guides, Anticus, this piece takes a deeper look at a key theme dicussed on our Freedom Trail tours. "Anticus" is Latin for "ancient," "former," or "of the past." Much like the name, Anticus is dedicated to looking closely at earlier societies and the people who inhabited them on and off the Freedom Trail. Join Anticus in going beyond the trail and exploring the economic and political tensions that shaped Revolutionary Boston.


The King and the ministers who managed the British Empire had one central goal: enriching England. The Industrial Revolution began in the English textile industry even before the American Revolution. New, highly productive factories needed lots of raw materials as well as buyers for their products. In the eyes of the English government, the Colonies could perfectly complement English production by supplying raw materials. (The laws England set for the colonies forbid them from selling directly to anyone else.) Meanwhile, colonists could buy factory-made products from England. (The laws forbid them from buying directly from anyone else or establishing their own industries to compete with English factories.)


Sourcing raw materials and selling factory-made products across multiple continents involved extensive shipping, for which Boston served as an important way station. Ships shuttling goods around the Empire often stopped in Boston harbor, swapping cargoes. Eventually, we know, many Massachusetts colonists in Boston and surrounding towns rebelled against the role they had been given. A foundational form of rebellion that emerged in the years before the Revolutionary War was refusing the rules of trade imposed by England. When the Townshend Acts of 1767 imposed taxes on English manufactured goods sold in the American colonies, rebellious merchants in Boston refused to pay. They formed a Merchants’ Committee, which made and enforced a “non-importation agreement” amongst Committee members, refusing to import the taxed English goods. 


Market level of Faneuil Hall, 1776, Engraved by John C. McRae. Boston Public Library


Boston merchants were not of one, unanimous opinion. Plenty of colonists, even in Boston, were satisfied enough with their place in the Empire. Some merchants in Boston preferred to pay the taxes, keep goods flowing through their shops, and remain under British governance to protect against outside threats and domestic disorder. Sisters Elizabeth and Ame (pronounced Amy) Cummings were among these. (A noticeable minority of Boston shopkeepers were women. A 1765 census of Boston’s population found that adult white women outnumbered adult white men by more than 20%, meaning that there were plenty of unmarried women who had to find a way to earn cash incomes. Some chose shopkeeping.) For the Cummings sisters and many other small- and medium-scale shopkeepers, participating in the non-importation pact would be too costly to bear. Unlike the very wealthy John Hancock, who played a prominent role in the non-importation effort, they could not afford an extended interruption in business.


Refusing to cooperate with the Merchants’ Committee could itself be costly. Printers supportive of the Merchants’ Committee publicized lists of “enemies to their country.” The Cummings sisters found their name on such a list. Committee members and supporters vandalized the homes or shops of some of the non-participants in the non-importation agreement. Some non-participants were physically assaulted. The Cummings sisters escaped without being physically injured, but they were forced to abandon their business. When the British military abandoned their efforts to subdue Massachusetts and evacuated Boston in March of 1776, the sisters went with them. In the end, they re-established themselves in Halifax where they remained British subjects and carried on their trade.


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