Taxation without representation

Today I wanted to make something come alive about the American Revolution. And I knew I could make them care if we used something valuable for them.

M&M's. That was the key to everything. Still, I fussed about the idea all week, trying to figure out how to make it fit together, never quite sitting down to think about it or write anything down. Last night at 10, it seemed about time. I thought about having them having to buy things and then having to pay tax, but it seemed too complicated. And I wanted to focus on the lack of control that they have about the tax.

Somehow this morning, after four or five sheets of scrap paper with random ideas, I thought of sitting down with 10 m&m's each and having to agree on how to eat them. From there, I thought of having a King and Parliament/tax collector group who would decide how the candy would get eaten. And then it morphed into this:

There are two groups. We had eight kids, so six were colonists and two were King and Parliament (the English). The English went off to a far room where they couldn't hear the colonists. There, they pick a card that describes their "mission", for example, "Your wars cost 40 m&m's". This is the amount of m&m's they must raise by levying taxes on the colonists.

They get three tries to tax the colonists in order to raise the right amount. They can choose between a sugar tax, a paint tax, a tea tax, and a stamp tax. And they can choose how much tax to collect for each thing. They only levy one tax at a time.

Meanwhile, the colonists each put a certain number of m&m's in a small jar in front of them. I choose the amount they have to pick according to the mission the English have. I want there to be enough so the English can collect their tax but not so much that the Americans don't care. Then each colonist picks a card from a small deck. There were six "Have a cup of tea", several each of "Buy a newspaper" and "Send a letter" and "Buy a book" (for the Stamp tax), and also "Buy a pound of sugar" and "Paint your house".

As they're looking at their cards, I go back to England to see what tax will be levied. The King writes it down and hands it to me and I go back to America to read it as a decree to the colonists. They decide whether or not to pay the tax.

If the colonists consider the tax to be obsessive, they can choose to go to war (by majority vote). In that case, they don't pay the tax. But, they have to roll a die with 1, 2, 3 meaning they survive and 4, 5, 6 meaning they die. If they die, they lose their m&m's.

When we played, they always paid the tax on the first round. Then I go back to the English and bring them their tax, let them count it, and then tell them that they can levy another tax. They try to figure out how to get enough tax without angering the colonists.

We played several rounds with different kids each time as King and Parliament. In the second round, the King was particularly aggressive and sparked a rebellion among the colonists. Listening to their discussion was really interesting. They were almost ready to go to war, but one girl didn't want to. Then they thought of sending a letter to the king, protesting the tax. They did so, and the King relented, and ended up collecting all the tax he needed, and avoiding war.

After each round, if the colonists had m&m's left over, they got to eat them. If the King and Parliament raised the right amount of taxes, I gave them bonus m&m's. And then I ceremoniously dumped the raised taxes into the "military's" bowl, and nobody got to eat those. Ah, the cost of war.