What were the American colonists of the eighteenth century protesting against?

American colonists protested new taxes imposed by the British government because they had no representatives in Parliament to speak for them. Their complaint was summed up in the phrase “no taxation without representation.” The French and Indian War was a conflict, and mercantilism was a broader economic policy, but the immediate protest described here was against taxes without a say.

AI-written and checked against the verified answer.