Final answer:
The Navigation Act was a series of English laws that regulated colonial trade to benefit both England and its colonies. It ensured England's control over trade and generated revenue, while the colonies enjoyed trade monopolies, lower prices on goods, and naval protection. The laws included creating the Board of Trade for better economic control but were sometimes laxly enforced.
Step-by-step explanation:
The Navigation Act was a series of laws passed by Parliament to regulate trade and strengthen the economic position of England and its colonies. The Act mutually benefitted England and its colonies by providing various advantages. For England, it ensured control over colonial trade, fostered the growth of its merchant fleet, and secured a market for its manufactured goods, thus increasing revenue from customs duties. For the colonies, the Navigation Act offered a guaranteed market for their raw materials like tobacco and indigo, rebates on British products, and protection by the Royal Navy from piracy. This symbiotic relationship created a sense of economic cooperation despite the restrictive nature of the Navigation Acts on colonial trade. Over time, the Acts helped to enforce the mercantilist belief that colonies existed to benefit the mother country, underpinning England's commercial and political control. The Acts required that certain goods, referred to as 'enumerated articles', could only be shipped within the British Empire, thus ensuring exclusive trading rights. Additionally, these legislations led to the creation of bodies like the Board of Trade, with the aim of developing and supervising commerce more effectively than its predecessor, the Lords of Trade. This moved towards a more formal and controlled development of the British economy. However, the system wasn't perfect, with lax enforcement at times fostering an attitude of salutary neglect and the flourishing of colonial shipbuilding and trade, especially in New England.