Name
Class
CHAPTER
15
S
3
ECTION
READING CHECK
What was the name of the
agreement written by the
Pilgrims to set the guidelines for
governing their new colony?
VOCABULARY STRATEGY
Find the word prevailed in the
first underlined sentence. What
do you think prevailed means?
Read the second underlined
sentence to see what happened
after England prevailed. Use this
information to help you come up
with another definition, in your
own words, for prevailed.
READING SKILL
Recognize Sequence What happened after the signing of the
Treaty of Paris in 1763?
Date
Section Summary
STRUGGLE FOR NORTH AMERICA
In the 1600s, the French, Dutch, English, and Spanish competed for
lands in North America. By 1700, France and England dominated
large parts of the continent. Their colonies differed from one another
in terms of language, government, resources, and society.
In 1534, Jacques Cartier explored and claimed for the French
much of eastern Canada, called New France. Eventually, France’s
empire stretched from Quebec to the Great Lakes and down the
Mississippi River to Louisiana. However, a permanent French settlement was not established until 1608 in Quebec. Harsh Canadian
winters discouraged settlers, and many abandoned farming for more
profitable fur trapping and fishing. In the late 1600s, the French king
Louis XIV wanted greater revenue, or income from taxes. He
appointed officials to manage economic activities in North America
and sent soldiers and more settlers.
In the early 1700s, while New France’s population remained
small, English colonies expanded along the Atlantic coast. Jamestown
in Virginia, the first permanent English colony, was established in
1607. In 1620, Pilgrims, or English Protestants who rejected the
Church of England, landed at what became Plymouth, Massachusetts.
They wrote a compact, or agreement, called the Mayflower Compact.
It set guidelines for governing their colony. In the 1600s and 1700s,
the English created 13 colonies in all. Some were commercial ventures
or havens for religious groups. Some were primarily agricultural.
English monarchs exercised control through royal governors. Yet,
English colonists enjoyed a greater degree of self-government than
did French and Spanish colonists. They had their own representative
assemblies that could advise the governor and decide local issues.
During the 1700s, England and France emerged as powerful
rivals. In 1754, the French and Indian War erupted in North America
and then spread to other parts of the world by 1756, where it is
known as the Seven Years’ War. British and colonial troops eventually captured New France’s capital city, Quebec. Although the war
dragged on, the British ultimately prevailed. The 1763 Treaty of Paris
ended this worldwide conflict. France surrendered Canada and other
North American possessions to Britain, while retaining its territory in
the central region of North America.
Review Questions
1. How did Canadian winters affect French settlement?
2. In what way did English colonists have a greater degree of
self-government than did French or Spanish colonists?
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