In 1500 the Roman Catholic Church was all powerful in western Europe. There was no legal alternative. The Catholic Church jealously guarded its position and anybody who was deemed to have gone against the Catholic Church was labelled a heretic and burnt at the stake.
The taxes that were imposed by the Townshed Acts<span> of 1767 were </span>important<span> because they helped to reignite anger in the colonies against England.</span>
