What are the navigation acts of the 1600's?

The two-fold objective of the Navigation Acts was to protect English shipping, and to secure a profit to the home country from the colonies. The acts were an outgrowth of mercantilism (an economic system based on developing a favorable balance of trade). The chief provisions were that no goods grown or manufactured in Asia, Africa or America should be transported to England except on English ships.

The Navigation Act of 1660 forbade importing into or exporting from the British colonies any goods except in English or Colonial ships. It also forbade articles such as tobacco, sugar, cotton and indigo to be shipped to any country except England or some English plantation.

The northern colonies produced many of the same kinds of goods that England produced and continued to do so well into the 19th century. As a result manufacturing there suffered from the trade laws. The southern colonies which raised crops such as tobacco and rice, which could not be grown in England, suffered far less. In spite of all efforts, the Navigation Acts could scarcely be enforced at all as colonists became lawbreakers. Smuggling was universal and it went on regardless of the courts that were established to prosecute smugglers. Courts were established in most of the colonies for this reason. The Navigation Acts were an economic and political blunder in the long run but for a time they provided England with the wealth and power it used to create a great empire. The trade acts not only made people lawbreakers, it made colonists hold Parliament in contempt, not able to enforce its own laws. The most significant result of the Navigation Acts upon American history was the stifling of colonial manufacturing and increased resentment against (and ultimate break from) the mother country, and one of the reasons leading to the American Revolution.