Final answer:
Colonial legislatures resisted British taxation by insisting on the principle of 'no taxation without representation,' controlling fiscal matters, and organizing collective actions like the Stamp Act Congress to challenge the constitutionality of British taxation policies.
Step-by-step explanation:
Colonial legislatures played a significant role in resisting British taxation during the pre-Revolutionary period. Their primary form of resistance was asserting the principle of "no taxation without representation". This meant that they believed only their elected representatives in the colonial assemblies had the right to levy taxes upon them, not the distant British Parliament where they had no direct representation.
Colonial Assemblies controlled the budget by voting on all expenditures, including salaries of royal government officials and defense, which previously allowed them to influence these officials through financial means. When new taxes aimed to support British officials were imposed, removing this influence, resistance intensified, underlining the colonies' insistence on direct representation over Parliament's notion of virtual representation.
The Stamp Act Congress of 1765 exemplified this resistance when representatives from nine colonies drafted the Declaration of Rights and Grievances, challenging the constitutionality of taxation without representation and asserting their liberty as subjects of the Crown.