Tyranny, according to the Oxford Dictionary, is "the cruel, unreasonable, or arbitrary use of power or control." Many Americans viewed British policy during the late 18th century as highly tyrannical. But many of them failed to recognize the presence of previous policies that the ones they knew about actually replaced. Ensuring that previously instituted policies are enforced cannot be considered tyrannical. I agree with this view, and this essay will serve to demonstrate that British policy was actually reformist rather than tyrannical in the 1760s and 1770s. One of the major sources of misunderstanding behind British policy of that period is that taxes and regulations were not in place when in fact they were before – they were simply never actually enforced. Between Britain's negligence in properly ensuring that these policies were followed and the corruption present in America with smuggling, bribery or circumventing the rules in some other way, one would hardly have realized that the policies were actually in place . It is therefore not surprising that with the Parliament Fr...